Throwing this in indie games to help support a fellow indie developer in Mobigame. A few weeks ago, Mobigame's game Edge was pulled from the App Store for unknown reasons. Well, now we know why. It looks like one Tim Langdell believes he owns a monopoly on the word EDGE and is doing his best to be a dick.
http://fingergaming.com/2009/05/28/update-edge-pulled-over-alledged-trademark-infringement/Langdell, CEO of EDGE Games, GDC 2009 speaker and Lead Game Faculty at National University, contacted Mobigame and Apple in April asking that the game be pulled. Langdell claims his company owns the worldwide “trademark” EDGE. Despite this, the game remains up in other territories.
This is not the first time. Simon Carless wrote a pretty scathing article on Tim Langdell and his trademark on the word EDGE before it got pulled for unknown reasons. Luckily the article's been copied and posted in other places.
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=16044280&postcount=5953It looks like trademark suits based around the word 'EDGE' and anything game-related are still occurring, too, too - here's one from March 2009 against Cybernet, who are making an obscure, long-dormant game called Edge of Extinction.
According to the suit, brought by Cybernet, Langdell started writing to them in January 2009, demanding that the 'Edge Of Extinction' trademark be assigned to him for free and that a license agreement be signed with Edge Games. When Cybernet refused, and asked for money for the domain transfer, Langdell said to "expect... [a] Federal Law Suit", so Cybernet sued Langdell and Edge. The case appears to be ongoing.
And there's some evidence, via a Virginia-based website's PDF, of a series of similar discussions with computer manufacturer Velocity for their 'Velocity Edge' gaming PCs. In this particular document, which is based around a suit by Velocity, the Court finds Edge Interactive liable for several falsehoods related to the suit, including untrue claims that Langdell had resigned from the company and could not receive the countersuit.
Overall, the Virginia District Court found a "deliberate strategy [on the part of Edge Interactive] to obfuscate and mislead this Court in order to delay the Court's determination of default." (However, the companies settled confidentially in December 2008 and Langdell now lists 'EDGE game PCs (made by Velocity Micro)' as an 'EDGE branded venture' that he has 'spawned'.)
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But now we're seeing great indie developers like Edge creator Mobigame hobbled because Langdell is aggressively enforcing his trademark based purely on a four letter name - rather than a particular style of game or character similarities, if that is even a more justifiable reason to do so. I think that's a major shame and, at least from my personal point of view, a morally repugnant thing to do.
Even if Tim Langdell and Mobigame somehow come to an agreement to get Edge back on the App Store, I hope this story can spread far enough so the negative publicity for these EDGE legal cases becomes an issue for one Mr. Tim Langdell. Note how Tim Langdell for the most part has had nothing to do with the vast majority of projected with the name EDGE in them. He's a vulture. He swoops in for his licensing fee and bullies around people who can't afford fancy lawyers.
The story just broke last night so hopefully more details will be forthcoming.
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