psssst Sanmu think of all the rep u could gain if u helped fizzer for nothing

Minor update for those following at home- here's the next 3 dates to mark on your calendar:
- 2021/08/20: Warzone.com, LLC, deadline for responding to Activision's Motion to Dismiss
- 2021/09/03: Activision's deadline for filing a reply supporting their Motion to Dismiss, once Warzone responds
- 2021/10/01: Hearing date (at 1:30 PM Pacific Time) if the Motion to Dismiss gets that far

This deadline change (Activision originally asked for 2021/08/27) was agreed upon by both parties.

I like Fizzer as a person a lot actually. He's fun to play with in Small Earth quickmatches and he's pretty nice.

I just don't think the case is very strong at all. There are situations where the dispute is far more ambiguous and arguments can be made on both sides. I just don't think this is one of those situations.

lol you played Fizzer in rt SE?

Oh yeah, tons of times. He's pretty highly rated in RT Small Earth, and he plays it a lot.

https://www.warzone.com/MultiPlayer?GameID=27785949
https://www.warzone.com/MultiPlayer?GameID=27624146
https://www.warzone.com/MultiPlayer?GameID=27513528
https://www.warzone.com/MultiPlayer?GameID=27504033
https://www.warzone.com/MultiPlayer?GameID=27503697
https://www.warzone.com/MultiPlayer?GameID=26902639

Court filing update: On Thursday, Warzone.com, LLC, filed their response to Activision's motion to dismiss their counterclaim.

You can find it here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1_Uhh878GWZUn6r2brvH5104q3YduUidx/view?usp=sharing

To survive the motion to dismiss, basically all Warzone.com, LLC, has to do is to convince the judge that the case isn't already clear-cut decided in Activision's favor by some matter of law- i.e., that a jury's input as finder of fact might have value. Even if the court doesn't think a jury would realistically side with Warzone, they would/should deny the motion to dismiss as long as they think the case has enough merit to get argued in court and deliberated on by a jury.

It's a low bar.

Activision's deadline to respond is September 3 (2 weeks from today). After that, there may be a court hearing on this motion in early October at the latest. Just to avoid getting hopes up, don't expect this case to wind up in front of a jury anytime soon.

Whats the endgame in all of this anyway? Does Fizzer want damages or just to be left alone?

The endgame is that everyone can move on and go back to levelling up our accounts.

Whats the endgame in all of this anyway? Does Fizzer want damages or just to be left alone?

From https://www.washingtonpost.com/video-games/2021/06/04/warzone-name-lawsuit/:

“At the very least, I would like to be made whole,” he said. “I spent about $60,000 on the domain name* and legal fees, plus three years of my life into this brand and it hurts business to have to change the title.”
...
“I’m just interested in making sure my business doesn’t get destroyed, since this is my only source of income,” Ficker said. “I want to get back to making video games. That is what I enjoy doing. I hope to work on this game for the rest of my life.”

From Warzone's Prayer for Relief:

Counterclaimant... requests that this Court enter judgement in its favor for the following relief:

1. Dismissal of [Activision's] claims against [Warzone.com] with prejudice;
2. ... restraining [Activision]... from:
a. ... making unauthorized use of the WARZONE Mark;
...
4. Requiring [Activision] to pay over to [Warzone.com] monetary damages caused by its wrongful acts, and directing that such profits be [tripled] due to [Activision's] willful actions.
5. Requiring [Activision] to pay [Warzone.com] monetary damages for reverse trademark confusion, and directing that such damages be [tripled] due to [Activision's] willful actions.
...

They're going for the trademark to the word "Warzone" + for $, but unclear what amount. 3 times damages could be anything, because it comes down to how you calculate damages**. More than $10k, less than 0.25% of Call of Duty: Warzone profits. Pretty broad range between a one-time payment of $10,000 and up to $5,000,000/yr.

If/once the counterclaim gets closer to trial, we'll have more concrete numbers, although the ask might be an enhanced royalty rate that we can't convert to dollars without knowing CoD's profitability. The trial might also be bifurcated (liability phase, then damages phase), so we might not know the ask until/unless it gets to the damages phase.

* bonus:


** see Google v. Oracle for an extreme example - Oracle sought $8.8 billion based on some very aggressive calculations based on the # of Java licenses Google would've had to buy if they didn't reimplement Java for Android. Of course, no court was going to grant anything close to that in damages. For reverse consumer confusion theories (like this case), the question of how to calculate damages is even harder than for trademark confusion in general (where the rule of thumb is lost profits).

Edited 8/24/2021 01:49:55

thanks for the convenient updates, knyte.

who is @drill

Edited 8/24/2021 12:26:15

@dril is a living meme (http://wint.co, https://twitter.com/@dril, https://www.patreon.com/dril)

Edited 8/25/2021 01:28:15

We’re seriously asking who Dril is, when he’s existed as a warzone map for years.

You can't say that without linking the map.

The endgame is that everyone can move on and go back to levelling up our accounts.

no thanks

https://www.warzone.com/Map/29651-dril

TL;DR: By early October, we'll have a real legal confrontation and a much better idea of who's winning (if the case doesn't get settled out-of-court before then).

Document update: Activision has filed their reply to Warzone.com's response to Activision's motion to dismiss the counterclaim.
Link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1sBLKdxnNBIbfHULDUf-xEy2iUZvh_ACG/view?usp=sharing
Gist: Activision doubles down on the Rogers test, arguing (off of the First Amendment) that, since Call of Duty: Warzone has above-zero artistic relevance and is not explicitly misleading, the court must dismiss Warzone.com's counterclaim as a matter of law.

Next event: On October 1, 2021, at 1:30 PM Pacific Time, the California Central District Court will have a hearing on this Motion
Significance: There's two cases here: Activision suing Warzone.com (to get the "warzone" trademark and to block any claims of trademark infringement by Warzone.com) and Warzone.com suing Activision (over alleged trademark infringement by Call of Duty: Warzone). If the motion to dismiss passes, Activision v. Warzone.com continues but Warzone.com v. Activision ends. The court would effectively be ruling that Call of Duty: Warzone does not, as a matter of law, infringe on the alleged common law "warzone" word mark owned by Warzone.com.

I recommend skimming it. It has some fun-to-read excerpts and Activision's lawyers have only slightly toned down their level of spiciness. If you are interested in further discussion, hop on to the #activision-vs-wz channel on the Discord.

Thx for the update. Hope it goes well

NGL saw this coming as soon as COD Warzone became popular.

Looks like they have bigger problems and might be interested in settling smaller suits
https://www.theverge.com/2021/9/21/22686183/activision-blizzard-chief-legal-officer-leaves