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Minecraft Developer and EA Games Sued By Patent Troll

July 23, 2012 In Blog, Patents, Trolls, Video Games By Gregg Katz

Minecraft Developer and EA Games Sued By Patent Troll

Mojang, the developer of the popular game Minecraft, and Electronic Arts Games, publisher of Bejeweled 2, have been sued by copy protection company Uniloc. Uniloc claims the Android version of Minecraft, called Minecraft: Pocket Edition, as well as EA’s Bejeweled 2, infringe its patent 6,857,067, which describes a “system and method for preventing unauthorized access to electronic data.” This kind of copy protection is known as digital rights management or DRM protection and serves to prevent piracy of software.

Minecraft creator, Markus “Notch” Persson, has vowed to fight the lawsuit and has given his thoughts on software patents like Uniloc’s. Persson wrote on his Twitter account, @notch, “Software patents are plain evil. Innovation within software is basically free, and it’s growing incredibly rapid. Patents only slow it down.”

Uniloc, obviously a “patent troll” (it has sued almost 80 other companies for infringing on its patents, including Microsoft and Sony), is seeking damages and royalties. The complaint can be viewed on Persson’s site here.

Gregg Katz

Gregg Katz is a 3L at Fordham University School of Law. He grew up on Long Island, New York and played a lot a video games and watched a lot of TV. Now he is trying to turn those interests into a career in entertainment law. Gregg is IPLJ's resident video game expert but we promised him we'd keep that secret between us.