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2022 Esports and the Law 1 (2022)

handle is hein.hackboth/esprtlw2022 and id is 1 raw text is: Winter 2022 Esports and the Law[l PUBG vs Free Fire, Apple, and Google: A Legal Battle Royale By Courtney Seams, 3L, GW Law Wrafton, the maker ofPUBG: Battle- grounds, filed a copyright infringe- ment suit on January 10 against Garena, the maker of Free Fire and Free Fire Max. Krafton alleges that Garena's game is infringing on numerous copyrightable aspects of PUBG's gameplay. This is the third high-profile suit that Garena has brought in recent years to protect its copy- right interest in PUBG, previously suing NetEase (claiming its Knives Out and Rules of Survival games were infringing) and Epic Games (claiming that Fortnite was infringing) in 2018. The NetEase case was eventually settled, while the Epic Games lawsuit was dropped. Krafton is hoping for more success this time around in its suit over the Free Fire and Free Fire Max games. PUBG: Battlegrounds was arguably the first high profile battle royale format online game and over 75 million copies of it have been sold. Shortly after its re- lease in 2017, Garena began to sell Free Fire: Battlegrounds, now known as Free Fire, in Singapore. Krafton brought suit in Singapore, alleging that Free Fire was essentially a mobile copy of the PUBG game. Krafton even alleges in this suit that Garena rushed to launch Free Fire to capitalize on potential game players before the PUBG mobile game was released. See PUBG on Page 9 Court's Decision Represents a Warning for Player Unknown's Battlegrounds Mobile Cheaters 3 Esports And The Metaverse - Behind the Curtain Dismissal of Overgrowth Developer Wolfire Games Antitrust lawsuit against Valve No High Score for Atari in IP Trial against E-Commerce Marketplace Pace University Launches Esports Program Esports and the Ethical Implications of Facial Recognition Technology New Husson University Esports Facility Opens 4 5 6 8 8 10 Opinion - Esports Needs Independent Economic Impact Studies, Unions, and Transparency Regulations By Ellen Zavian Everyone talks about the value of esports but I often hear that only the publishers are making money. This means, the team owners, event operators, leagues, coders, gainers, are just making it or can handle a current loss for the hope of a future gain. Since the publish- ers own the intellectual property to the game, it would only make sense they reap the financial benefits of their R&D first, before all other stakeholders. However, according to Peter Warman, Co-Founder and CEO of NewZoo, a games and esports data company, Es- ports is the shiny object and will take some time to be profitable. In fact, Warman stated that NewZoo did not get into esports for the money, initially, because we knew it would take a while for the market to mature. The time to mature may still not yield profitability, as Warman believes esports, for game publishers, is not a profitable business and probably will never be... but this might change if betting is integrated. Despite this believe, NewZoo reported that esports is currently a $1B dollar industry. If not the publishers, then perhaps the team owners. After-all, many of the team owners own teams in other professional sports, like the NBA. Ted Leonsis, founder, majority owner, chair- man and CEO of Monumental Sports & Entertainment, which owns the NHI's Washington Capitals, NBA's Washington Wizards, NBA G League's Capital City Go-Go, WNBA's Washington Mystics, and formerly theAF's Washington Valor and Baltimore Brigade. As his connection to esports, Leonsis is a member of the in- S @ COYIH 0 202 HAKE ULCTOS (HCNYPBIAIOSCM

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