LOLCats
Banned
they have. In fact i thought it was pretty widely known that while the pinkertons did work for the states and government, some of them were really bad hombres.
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Rockstar Games in Legal Battle with the Pinkertons Over Red Dead Redemption 2.
- Thread starter IbizaPocholo
- Start date
they have. In fact i thought it was pretty widely known that while the pinkertons did work for the states and government, some of them were really bad hombres.
MightySquirrel
Banned
Me too me too. Scummy beggars.
DiscoJer
Member
In a sense they were like an early version of the FBI, only a private company.
In one of the more famous nasty incidents, they somewhat just randomly threw a bomb into the home of Jesse James's family, killing his little brother and blowing the arm off his mother.
CeeJay
Member
RDR2 is a work of fiction with fictitious characters set in a fictitious world though regardless of how historically accurate the cultural setting is. They are not retelling a historically factual story, they have created a brand new work and made a conscious decision to use someone else's trademark without consent. I think this is a key point to how the case will be presented by Pinkerton. The fact that others have got away with exactly the same thing unchallenged in the past doesn't mean that they don't have a case. The fact that they haven't challenged anyone in the past and lost is actually in their favour. It's obvious that Pinkerton can see the dollar signs after the success of GTAV and want a piece of it, the other previous similar occurrences of the Pinkerton name being used were not as financially lucrative as they would be with RDR2 should they win. All it will take is to find a single legal precedent where a similar thing has happened in the past with another trademark and they will have a good case. I don't think they would have brought the case unless they had already found some legal precedence that they think is relevant and thought they had a good chance of winning as they haven't been aggressive with their trademark and IP protection in the past.
Frank Spencer
Banned
Randall365
Member
Guess Weezer are next!
Sqorin Hammerfarf
Banned
I'm pretty sure they were the force hunting down Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Their relentless pursuit in that movie is iconic. It's like the Western version of It Follows.
Like what you did there.
I don’t get this sueing culture, it’s just pathetic. Anything for money these days.
MMaRsu
Member
Culture? These are laws and have nothing to do with culture. And yes, businesses always want more money. What a surprise.
thelawof4
Member
Are you telling me Pinkertons isn't doing this because Rockstar is making a fuckton of money with their creative work and they want some free money? Not everything that is law is fair. And there is without doubt a culture of suing regardless of laws.
DeepEnigma
Gold Member
Sue the history books. They make mad money off college kids.
DeleteriousObnoxious
Member
Still red dead redemption 2 is the most historical factual game product that exists of Wild West games in our industry. I don’t think companies should be allowed to sue products that aim to show history as good as they can. Games are by nature fiction. But that doesn’t mean they can’t be teaching products for generations that prefer this medium.
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VectorVictor
Member
That's actually giving the Pinkertons too much credit. Think Blackwater, but with the ability to arrest and detain on domestic soil, and virtually no oversight.
Plus, they migrated into being for-hire muscle by the government to break strikes, intimidate protesters, and generally harass undesirables (per the government). These were not good people, not by any stretch of the imagination.
joe_zazen
Member
Was just going to post this. The were (maybe still are) tools of the rich to harass, kill, and terrorize poor people.
DeepEnigma
Gold Member
Bingo!
The way Rockstar portrayed them was pretty mild compared to how they actually were in real life.
Who these fools kidding? Are they going to sue history books and newspapers next for documenting such events?
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joe_zazen
Member
It is probably to send a message to anyone thinking about using them in a story to think twice. For those without rock* money, getting sued can be disastrous.
DeepEnigma
Gold Member
They have decades to catch up on then, considering they were used in a ton of works from books to shows to movies, etc., where I know damn well they weren't licensed.
What a time to be alive, where historical events, etc., can be supoosedly trademarked.
I guess we will see how this plays out in the courts.
VectorVictor
Member
Kadayi
Banned
I hear what they are saying, but at the same time given how often they have been cited in Books, Films and Television I think it's a tough one. They'd have to present a strong case for why up to now they've failed to take all these other creative endeavours to task, and more importantly demonstrate how through association they've been negatively impacted. I don't think many people today are going to confuse a fictional portrayal as an accurate reflection of the firm today. Still ultimately it's for the lawyers to argue and the courts to decide, though I dare say Rockstar have better lawyers.