Tattoo artists target NBA game in copyright complaint
A group of tattoo artists has sued the makers of a National Basketball Association (NBA) video game, claiming that depictions of tattooed stars including LeBron James and Kobe Bryant infringe its designs.
" NBA 2K16" is the latest in a series of games made by video game developer Take-Two. It was released last September on both the Xbox and PlayStation.
The game features representations of the NBA’s most famous basketball players and allows users to compete with the players.
Solid Oak Sketches filed a copyright infringement lawsuit at the US District Court for the Southern District of New York on February 1.
The lawsuit centres on eight tattoos on five basketball players. They are: LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, Kenyon Martin, DeAndre Jordan and Eric Bledsoe.
Because Take-Two has depicted the tattoos in previous versions of the game, Solid Oak contacted the publisher in July last year about a possible $1.1 million licensing deal to use the designs in the "2K16" version.
According to the complaint, the parties could not reach an agreement.
In the lawsuit, Solid Oak said whether tattoos can be copyrighted has so far not been decided by a court.
Previous legal disputes concerning this area of protection have ended in settlements, it added.
But Solid Oak cited the US Supreme Court’s 1991 decision in Feist Publications v Rural Tel Serv, which it argued set a low bar for originality.
In the decision the US Supreme Court said any work that “possesses at least some minimal degree of creativity” is eligible for copyright protection.
A lawyer representing Solid Oak declined to comment.
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