A U.S. judge has ruled that Take Two Interactive is not liable for copyright infringement because the NBA 2K series of games reproduces tattoos licensed by individual artists. Although the court did say that the artist representatives could pursue actual damages, they said that statutory compensation was out of the question.
The original lawsuit was filed by Solid Soak Sketches LLC (which represents the artists behind the designs) and claimed that because Take Two and developer Visual Concepts used tattoo designs in the game without permission from the copyright holder, they were in breach. It hoped to recover as much as $150,000 per infringement (as per Reuters).
There were eight tattoos in question, including the words ?hold my own,? on Lebron James? left bicep and Koby Bryant?s bicep tattoo of some butterflies. These designs were used in the latest game, as well as in previous iterations. While that might have helped increase the potential ceiling for a settlement, that actually proved to be the downfall of the statutory damage demands.
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