eSports Federation (eSF) disbands - Page 8

On January 29 2014 02:53 Kheve wrote:


Thanks. Im not trying claim blizzard is devil incarnate. But I am trying to set some facts out straight to those who gets even the facts wrong. Blizzard cause of action was that BW tournaments was to the detriment of SC2 thus seeking an injunction against Kespa holding BW tournaments and damages from Kespa.

As for plainsix, he is entitled to his opinion like everyone else. But I just wish he gets the facts right at least and not base his opinions on wrong facts.

On January 29 2014 02:35 Ammanas wrote:
Also all the exclusive rights were so much bullshit anyway. Imagine someone somewhere would be giving exclusive licenses to broadcast ALL of hockey or football or basketball or fucking chess... All those games (because that's what they are afterall) were created by someone somewhere, but the broadcasting licenses (or any licenses for that matter) belong to the creators of leagues, not creators of that game...

On January 29 2014 03:01 emythrel wrote:


Hate to tell you this, but the rights to broadcast all those sports ARE exclusive. in the UK, until 3 years ago, only Sky Sports could broadcast live Premiership matches, everyone else could only show highlights and they all had to state "Video courtesy of Sky Sports". In most countries, the rights to broadcast sporting events are exactly exclusive, thats how they make money selling the rights and how companies recoup money from advertising, if you want to watch X sport, you have to watch it on X channel.

It might not be that way in the US, but I'd bet that there is one organisation, maybe 2, that have the rights to broadcast live american football, hockey, baseball and that they sub-let the rights to other companies within each state, or they simply broadcast on their syndicated networks.

If you want to broadcast a sport, you have to pay their sporting board for the rights, wanna broadcast English football? Gotta pay the English FA. Wanna broadcast snooker? gotta pay the World Snooker Association. Wanna broadcast live snowboarding? Gotta pay the World Snowboard Association. Notice a pattern yet?

Someone holds the rights to everything you see on TV and someone else had to pay for the right to broadcast it. If we knew exactly who created Soccer, I promise you that person would claim the rights to it and you would have to pay them instead of the FA or whomever, more liekly the FA would have to pay that person, then they would sell on the rights to Sky Sports etc.

but in the case of Kespa vs Blizzard, Blizzard were the appropriate holder of any rights to Starcraft or Starcraft 2

On January 29 2014 02:59 Plansix wrote:

Blizzards internal reasoning for bringing the lawsuit are not known fact. You think it's to stop BW events and I think it was to secure broadcast rights and protect their IP. Both were things that could have happened during the law suit. You can't just declare that only one half of that mattered.

On January 29 2014 03:11 Ammanas wrote:

The thing is, it was PREMIERSHIP who sold those rights. Not the person who created football, their heir or FIFA. It was the league. Same for Kespa - they create league, they can give the rights to broadcast to anyone. The sport creator shouldn't hold the rights for broadcast of said sport everywhere in the world, the leagues should. And they always are.

On January 29 2014 03:16 Kheve wrote:


Cause of action is the legal basis (Ive already mentioned it when I first brought up this term). If I sue under contract law for breach of contract, my cause of action would go X actions breach Y terms of the contract causing me damages, thus I ask for damages or specific performance (a type of judgement to compel the defendant to do something). That would be my cause of action. Lots of details involved (is the defendant the correct party, terms constant, interpretation of the terms, causation, actual damage assessment etc).

Cause of action is the legal term of the writs contents. It has to be specific concise otherwise the court will throw it out. Blizzard internal/public reasoning does not come into play at all. It is what is claims to the courts.

On January 29 2014 03:01 emythrel wrote:


but in the case of Kespa vs Blizzard, Blizzard were the appropriate holder of any rights to Starcraft or Starcraft 2. All the sports u mentioned were being broadcast long before IP laws went in to effect, if a new sport was invented tomorrow, and one person, collection of people or company could prove they created it, they could easily trademark the game and have exclusive rights to its use. Board games work this way, everything else works this way, so why should an eSport be any different? The company who make the game have all the rights to its use and rightly so.

On January 29 2014 03:19 Plansix wrote:

Starcraft is not a foot ball or soccer ball. It is the ball and field you play on, and blizzard up keeps the rule book. Blizzard can own the broadcast rights to the game they made, just like a band has the broadcast rights to all their songs.

On January 29 2014 03:11 Ammanas wrote:

The thing is, it was PREMIERSHIP who sold those rights. Not the person who created football, their heir or FIFA. It was the league. Same for Kespa - they create league, they can give the rights to broadcast to anyone. The sport creator shouldn't hold the rights for broadcast of said sport everywhere in the world, the leagues should. And they always are.

On January 29 2014 03:24 Plansix wrote:

How does that prove me wrong again? At the end if the case blizzard got the broadcast rights and didn't get damages. And I work in law, I know that you have to ask for everything you are seeking upfront, even if you don't plan seeking everything you asked for.

On January 29 2014 03:27 Ammanas wrote:

And now we are in gray area. I believe there is no law about something this. I mean.. Chess is a 1v1 game, like Starcraft. Surely there is someone who have created it (or their heir) or some company who created the modern rules for it. The game turns into competitive 'sport' which people are watching. Does that mean those abovementioned people should be able to give exclusive broadcasting rights for ALL chess events ever done in (for example) Russia? Shouldn't it be the creators of league itself? We know how it works in real sports, why should it work differently in esports?

On January 29 2014 03:28 emythrel wrote:


If football were invented today, that wouldn't be the case. We don't know who invented football, even if we did, the laws protecting IP didn't exist when it was invented so it wouldn't matter. Any new sport would have the same protections that Starcraft does. The rights to broadcast most sports belong the the governing body of that sport, not the league. The FA does not run the non professional leagues but you have to pay licencing fees to them to have your team accredited, if you want to form your own league you have to pay for the rights to the FA. Its not the league creators at all that hold the rights, its just that most professional leagues are run by the governing body.

If you want to have Deal or no Deal on TV in your country, you have to pay for the rights from whomever holds them, that might not be the person who created it, but the person who created the show sold the rights to a TV company usually, who can then sell them on to someone else, but they have to give a percentage to the original creator in most cases.

Starcraft is a game, a trademarked game, therefore if you use its content in a direct fashion like SC2 is used, and you make money from that, you have to pay Blizzard. That is as it should be. Modern Soccer, Rugby, Baseball etc are significantly different from their original forms, if you could find the guy who first picked up the ball and ran with it (How rugby was "created") you would have no right to claim the modern game of Rugby as yours, it would be so vastly different in the centuries between, however what Kespa were broadcasting was Blizzards property, pretty much exactly how they designed it, and they didn't even show a logo with Blizzard on it until they were forced to!

Anyone who tries to defend Kespa for not paying Blizzard to broadcast their game simply is living in a world where the creators of content are obviously not worthy of note. A songwriter has the rights to the broadcast of their music, an author has the rights to the reproduction of their writing, Movie studios have the rights to all films made by them, why should games be any different? They might not have been using BW as it was originally intended (simply as a game) but they were making money from it and not paying Blizzard for the privilege and that is wrong. Blizzard have every right to be paid when you use their work to make money for yourself, that is how everything else in the world works.

On January 29 2014 03:28 Kheve wrote:


Blizzards cause of action in suing Kespa is that BW tournaments is detrimental to SC2 thus causing blizzard damage and thus blizzard seeks an injunction to stop BW tournaments.

On January 29 2014 03:27 Ammanas wrote:

And now we are in gray area. I believe there is no law about something this. I mean.. Chess is a 1v1 game, like Starcraft. Surely there is someone who have created it (or their heir) or some company who created the modern rules for it. The game turns into competitive 'sport' which people are watching. Does that mean those abovementioned people should be able to give exclusive broadcasting rights for ALL chess events ever done in (for example) Russia? Shouldn't it be the creators of league itself? We know how it works in real sports, why should it work differently in esports?

On January 29 2014 03:37 emythrel wrote:


The league crators should have the rights to their league, but they should have to pay whomever created the game for the right to use it. You can't compare games created centuries ago with modern video games.

The rights to broadcast ALL professional snowboarding belong to one body, the WSA, they took a hobby and created form and structure to have different disciplines with distinct rule sets, what they broadcast is sufficiently separate from the creation of a snowboard that the first snowboarder can not claim the rights. However, what Kespa was broadcasting was Blizzards game, with their unit balance, the only thing they created themselves were the maps. Even the league format for proleague is not original, its just a series of round robins. The individual matches use a well established best of system and the "ace" match has been around since long before BW, you find it in team pool matches, tennis, etc etc.

Kespa can not claim the rights to anything, they did not change how the game was played, the game itself or the rules significantly enough to claim that what they were broadcasting was seperate from what blizzard created. The only thing Kespa ever created was a league, they didn't even invent the ranking system or format of the league, but used already well established formats. So what exactly were Kespa trying to claim that they had the right to broadcast BW without paying blizzard based upon?

On January 29 2014 03:33 Plansix wrote:

But that didn't happen. It was settled and resolved with with blizzard getting the broadcast rights to SC2. Blizzard alway has the option to file a TRO, but they never did.

On January 28 2014 15:51 xuanzue wrote:
actually, I only care about life getting a good team.

On January 29 2014 04:08 Kheve wrote:


It did. It was the cause of action. They filed it. Not sure if korea has a registrar system. Nevertheless the cause of action was mentioned.