Star Citizen Media Musings

[Penny579]

But it is, at the end of the day, a non compete clause. Even using LumberYard doesn't mean CIG is "in the business of" promoting or developing an engine.

doesn't look promotional to me

[Penny579]

Has anyone noticed that while everybody is talking about this lawsuit nobody is talking about the failed state of the game?

That's what this is all supposed to be about. There is NO GAME.

Regardless of the outcome of this lawsuit the fact remains that this is a money pit  that has sucked up over 170 million dollars and has no end in sight. Admittedly should Crytek succeed it could hasten the demise of this sham masquerading as a game development.

Just create a kickstarter fund to buy Chris Roberts a Hot Dog cart and perhaps we will see him manage a business that matches his skill set.

Your honor as you can see we have produced NO Games, not TWO as crytyek claim, not ONE as we agreed , its ZERO GAMES.  and no where in the GLA does it say we can't market and sell two separate packages of jpegs.

[Aya Reiko]

Has anyone noticed that while everybody is talking about this lawsuit nobody is talking about the failed state of the game?

That's what this is all supposed to be about. There is NO GAME.

Regardless of the outcome of this lawsuit the fact remains that this is a money pit  that has sucked up over 170 million dollars and has no end in sight. Admittedly should Crytek succeed it could hasten the demise of this sham masquerading as a game development.

Just create a kickstarter fund to buy Chris Roberts a Hot Dog cart and perhaps we will see him manage a business that matches his skill set.

Because it's dead, Jim.  We're just waiting for Skadden to push it into its grave and pile on the dirt afterward.

Then we'll have a nice spot to piss on.

[Kyrt]

CIG/RSI/Ortwin already lost, when they got sued by CT. A win would have been settling out of court, without the public taking notice.

The backers don't care. They'll continue funding CIG no matter what, so as long as Chris is willing to take their money, they appear ready to give it.

If Amazon cancels their AWS (to bar CIG/RSI/CR from using LY), they are never going to find another engine vendor willing to contract them.

Doubt Amazon would do that.

[Kyrt]

doesn't look promotional to me

Are CIG "in the business" of promoting, developing, marketing, etc another engine?
No.

[Spunky Munkee]

I could swear that CIG claimed to be using Star Engine at some point. That would be their own engine based upon the bones of Cryengine. That sounds like building and promoting to me. At least that would be my thought on the subject if I were on the jury regardless of my opinion on the game.

[Penny579]

Are CIG "in the business" of promoting, developing, marketing, etc another engine?
No.

then explain there wtf they are doing in that lumberyard commercial ?

literally they are in the add as CIG 'the business'
its an advertisement so its marketing by default
they talk about working with amazon which is developing
they talk up lumberyard, which is promotional

i don't know how much more clear cut you could get.

[DemonInvestor]

Are CIG "in the business" of promoting, developing, marketing, etc another engine?
No.

Let's argue that for a a moment. Legal definitions simply differ from common definitions. Just in the last year i'd to report the numbers of employees three times to my gov, every time following a different legal definition. They same holds true for the definition of consumer and such.
Commercially and business can be defined as doing something for a profit/gain. Does CIG gain something by promoting Lumberyard? Yes they actually do. So in that sense it definately is business.
https://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/does+the+business
But naturally it isn't CIGs primary business, it could be counted as a side activity, therefore not falling under a non-competition clause - which the clause its written might encompass.

So to make it clear, i'm not saying it is business, but it might be business.

[Kyrt]

then explain there wtf they are doing in that lumberyard commercial ?

They are promoting LumberYard.
They are not "in the business" of promoting an engine.

Just because I bake a loaf of bread does not make me a professional baker. I would not be "in the business" of baking therefore any agreement that requires me to be a professional baker would not be actionable.

Whether or not Skadden can make it means something else is a real question, but that the clause refers to CIG being "in the business" of doing something is different from CIG simply doing it.

2.4 prevents CIG from being "in the business" of performing those actions. It's a non compete clause. CIG could not take the knowledge it gained from working on CryEngine and use that knowledge to produce its own engine.

But - so long as it isn't "in the business" - there is nothing there that really says CIG can't perform those actions so long as it isn't in the business.

It will be interesting to see if Skadden can make its interpretation stick.

[dsmart]

2.4 prevents CIG from being "in the business" of performing those actions. It's a non compete clause. CIG could not take the knowledge it gained from working on CryEngine and use that knowledge to produce its own engine.

But - so long as it isn't "in the business" - there is nothing there that really says CIG can't perform those actions so long as it isn't in the business.

It will be interesting to see if Skadden can make its interpretation stick.

I disagree that's just a non-compete clause; as does Skadden. Now we wait for the judge to decide.

[Kyrt]

I disagree that's just a non-compete clause; as does Skadden. Now we wait for the judge to decide.

I'm not going to argue ;)

I disagree, and feel that the clauses purpose and intent is primarily as a non-compete, but there is enough vagueness that Skadden (especially with that "indirectly" aspect) could plausibly argue that tweaking LumberYard counts as developing, taking part in videos counts as promoting and that even they aren't "in the business" per se, that this all counts as "indirect" support.

[N0mad]

2.4 prevents CIG from being "in the business" of performing those actions. It's a non compete clause. CIG could not take the knowledge it gained from working on CryEngine and use that knowledge to produce its own engine.

But - so long as it isn't "in the business" - there is nothing there that really says CIG can't perform those actions so long as it isn't in the business.

Yeah, 2.4 is really interesting, and it's been dismissed by the SC community (& YT Lawyers) as a non-compete clause. Which it is. BUT the key for me is the OR between selling OR licensing. So the question is: are CIG in the business of developing, supporting, OR promoting a competing game engine? Clearly the answer is yes to some if not all these points. At the very least they are now promoting LY.

I'm sure that there's enough ambiguity in the GLA to necessitate a court appearance. This won't be going away any time soon.

Curiously, SC Reddit seem to have completely ignored the Skadden response.

[Kyrt]

Yeah, 2.4 is really interesting, and it's been dismissed by the SC community (& YT Lawyers) as a non-compete clause. Which it is. BUT the key for me is the OR between selling OR licensing. So the question is: are CIG in the business of developing, supporting, OR promoting a competing game engine? Clearly the answer is yes to some if not all these points. At the very least they are now promoting LY.

I'm sure that there's enough ambiguity in the GLA to necessitate a court appearance. This won't be going away any time soon.

Curiously, SC Reddit seem to have completely ignored the Skadden response.

If you want to assume that this can be extended beyond a simple non-compete clause, and that the "indirect" aspect catches them...

...then CIG are promoting LumberYard by displaying its logos (instead of CryTeks) and appearing in videos.
...It might also be said to be developing LumberYard if they share their code with Amazon. 
...they have licensed LumberYard which would be also against 2.4, and would support CryTeks assertion that "exclusive" means "exclusive"
...By enhancing their game engine through the development of new netcode and server code and AI routines etc, they are developing for a competing engine regardless of whether the code is shared with Amazon or not, and are arguably supporting it AND creating a need to maintain it. The clause doesn't mention anything about whether it is shared or not, whether the beneficiary is CIG or some other body - just that the act is performed. Similarly, because the GLA is not terminated, CIG are legally obligated by the GLA to display and promote CryTeks logos in game no matter what engine they use (indeed, that such a clause exists could even be said to support that the intention was for no other engine otherwise displaying the logos would be contingent on the engine being used)

2.4 - if you don't limit it to a non-compete clause - is fairly damning towards CIG. If CIG respond, alongside the RSI signature issue, I would expect them to hammer home the assertion that 2.4 is a simple non-compete clause.

I would still argue that the intent and purpose of this clause is primarily as a non-compete clause and that Skadden are extending its scope beyond what it was originally intended to do. But, as I said, with the "indirectly" phrase embedded, Skaddens argument is plausible.

[dsmart]

Yes, that's why I said people who are thinking that it's just a non-compete clause, are wrong. It's more than that.

[StanTheMan]

Because it's dead, Jim.  We're just waiting for Skadden to push it into its grave and pile on the dirt afterward.

Before they are covered up with soil, I suspect there will be plenty of people queing up to squat over the open grave and pinch off a loaf.