Bethesda sues Notch over the use of the word "Scrolls"

[Saraane]

Sooo... are they gonna sue Israel for the Dead Sea Scrolls next? Cause it's looking like they are trying to copyright the word, scroll.

 

Dead Sea Papers coming your way...

[Mechaflash45]

This article is factually inaccurate in two ways. First, it is ZeniMax Media who sent out the letter, not Bethesda. Second, they are not suing anyone, this was a potential breach of copyright notice sent out by the legal department, not a summons or a subpoena.

[popcorn71]

ZeniMax owns Bethesda.

That and you don't pre pay court fees if you don't intend to sue.

Edited August 8, 2011 by popcorn71

[Rational314]

Actually most companies do pre pay court fees, and ZeniMax owning bethesda does not change the fact that it was Zenimax and not Bethesda that has threatened legal action.

[yoba333]

It was not Bethesda Game Studios, it was Bethesda Softworks'/Zenimax's legal department that issued the papers.

Would they not have the same legal department?

 

And even on Notch's blog, he titles his post "Bethesda are suing us, here's the full story!"

Edited August 8, 2011 by yoba333

[Heraklesgod]

Wow. I feel bad for Bethesda Game Studios, since they have to see their game that they worked so hard on being sold by such pricks.

 

I'm not even interested in Scrolls, though I do have Minecraft. On 11/11/11, I'll be playing Skyrim and Minecraft and saying f*** you to ZeniMax.

[TheMatrixPrime]

A little extreme . . .

[kayinv]

Like anyone really refers to these games by their full names...

 

"Hey, have you checked out Skyrim?"

 

"Ya, The Elder Scrolls Colon Skyrim sounds awesome! Say, do like The Elder Scrolls Colon Oblivion too?"

 

"The Elder...what?"

[Braggadar]

I'm sure the use of the word "Scroll" is not at the true heart of the issue here. I would hope everyone who read the original post would realise that at least to some level.

 

Lets look closer. Zenimax believes that "Scrolls" could be confused with TES. If "Scrolls" was a futuristic space MMO with menus, gameplay and characters completely different than TES, then this situation may never have happened.

 

Obviously Zenimax believes that Scrolls shares too many similarities with TES and these similarities in ADDITION to the name is what makes Zenimax nervous enough to attempt to protect their copyrighted material.

 

I suppose a problem with this is originality. With so many games produced someone will always release something that will look like a game someone else did. The difficult part is where is the fine line between plagiarism and inspiration?

 

I believe that the handling of this issue by Zenimax is perhaps the true problem here. While it is perfectly reasonable to request a name change or interface changes etc if it is too similar to TES, it is NOT reasonable to begin litigation over it without "asking nicely" first.

 

Of course, if they already warned the makers first and got a refusal / no response, then litigation would be warranted. I don't have all the facts, so I refuse to take sides as yet.

Edited August 8, 2011 by Braggadar

[DaErkka]

Now remeber people, if you make an RPG with magic and monster in it, do not use the following words in your title or they will sue your ass:

"Oblivion"

"Scrolls"

"Elder"

"Isles"

"Shivering"

"Arena"

"The"

and the numbers 1,2,3,4 and 5

Edited August 8, 2011 by Da Erkka