The War Z May Have Copied League of Legends Terms of Service

[Karloff]

The War Z May Have Copied League of Legends Terms of Service

Copying a legal contract may not have the consequences you'd expect.

In an embarrassing moment for The War Z [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/118614-Zombies-Eat-the-World-in-The-War-Z-MMO] developer Arktos Entertainment Group, a copy of the game's License Agreement has popped up with the League of Legends Terms of Service copied in. Embarrassing for Arktos in particular, as the man who founded this private equity and investment company - which is helping to create Hammerpoint Interactive's War Z - is Sergey Titov, formerly of Riot Games. Riot, you may recall, is the company that owns League of Legends.

One Reddit user [http://www.reddit.com/r/TheWarZ/comments/11jh5y/league_of_legends_in_the_legal_agreement/?sort=old] who noticed the faux pas claimed that the actual terms of service document was fundamentally the same as the League of Legends terms, but that it had The War Z in the title rather than League of Legends. The same user also claimed that the document read "The War Z (the "Game") is a free-to-play computer game developed and operated by OP Productions." League is free-to-play with optional in-game purchases; if you want to play The War Z, you pay at launch for the download, but - though The War Z will feature in-game purchases - there are no fees after that.

Here's the fun part. Say for the sake of discussion that game company A did copy-paste game company B's Terms of Service, and passed it off as their own. What crime has been committed, if any? It could potentially be classed as copyright infringement, but copying legal documents is something lawyers do all the time. They have to, because even one misplaced comma [http://abovethelaw.com/2006/10/comma-comma-comma-comma-comma-chameleon/] in a contract can cost millions; once a contract lawyer finds a form that works, he, or she, sticks to it like stink on the proverbial monkey, since the slightest deviation could be catastrophic.

In short: while this looks bad, the consequences may not be as dire as you might think. No lawyer's going to be in a hurry to thump a colleague for doing something that lawyers do all the time, potential copyright infringement or not. If anyone has a reason to be feeling uncomfortable right now, it's the person who drafted the document, since The War Z folks might like a quiet word.


Source: Reddit [http://www.reddit.com/r/TheWarZ/comments/11jh5y/league_of_legends_in_the_legal_agreement/?sort=old]


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[Falterfire]

I think the most interesting part of this article is the implication that not only did somebody bother to read the War Z terms of service, but they ALSO read the League of Legends terms of service and remembered enough of it to note similarities.

I hope I never sink that low in my life.

 

[Aeshi]

Wait, there are people out there who actually read those bloody things to begin with?

 

[Tireseas_v1legacy]

Early ToSs are almost always form contracts because (a) sneaking terms in there is really fucking hard and (b) those terms could be thrown out in court if they aren't reasonable.

 

[DazZ.]

I think the most interesting part of this article is the implication that not only did somebody bother to read the War Z terms of service, but they ALSO read the League of Legends terms of service and remembered enough of it to note similarities.

I hope I never sink that low in my life.

It states "League of Legends" and links to their site in the War Z ToS.

But yeah, no need to read them as if anything is "wrong" someone else will point it out and make a fuss no matter how minor.

 

[Somethingfake]

The real question is: Does anyone actually care?

This is the internet, of course someone will care! XD

 

[the doom cannon]

The real question is: Does anyone actually care?

lol you should check out the posts on reddit. Those silly people are going nuts over it. Anyway, I have no clue who wrote the ToS for either game, but it is most certainly not the game companies. A lawyer writes them, so it could even be the same person or group and they just copy-pasted without caring much.
tldr: lawyers are lazy when it comes to reproducing documents, this is news?

 

[Baldr]

Here the weirder part, they sell contract books, basically books with generic legal contracts in them for legal students and small business to use. I still have a couple from my contracts, copyright, and negotiation classes. All the forms are almost identical.

I guess since almost every lawyer in the US had to do this some point in their legal education, that it just became acceptable practice.

 

[VladG]

I think the most interesting part of this article is the implication that not only did somebody bother to read the War Z terms of service, but they ALSO read the League of Legends terms of service and remembered enough of it to note similarities.

I hope I never sink that low in my life.

No, WarZ literally links you to the League of Legends terms of use... they forgot to replace the URL in the document, so it was rather easy to discover

This must really help their case on the whole "we didn't copy DayZ, it's all just a big coincidence"

 

[xptn40S]

While this doesn't seem like something to become particularly pissed about, it certainly makes Arktos come across as lazy in my eyes.

Like...Zynga level of lazy.

Or maybe this is way more common among game-companies than I'm aware of, and if that's the case, I don't have much else to say.

Well, except maybe their desire of wanting to capitalise on DayZ's popularity by making their own Zombie Sandbox game and for their own convenience claiming that they started working on it before DayZ was a thing, but that's nothing that hasn't already been said.

 

[RhombusHatesYou]

It could potentially be classed as copyright infringement

No, it couldn't, Legal Documents aren't covered by IP law.

To apply IP law to things as dependent on form, function and procedure as legal documents are would be farcical.

Not to mention that under IP law all legal documents would be considered derivative works of the laws they pertain to, meaning IP rights rest with the 'owners' of the Law and in a democracy that means, in theory if not practice, The People own the Law.

 

[Daverson]

Great. Now we're going to have to start agreeing to the EULA's EULA before we can agree to the EULA!

 

[antipunt]

wait...so..about this commas having the capacity to completely screw you over..

someone explain dis to me :0

sounds nerve wrecking..

 

[Valanthe]

Will this get them in legal trouble? no, but it does raise red flags about the legitimacy of the WarZ project. I won't go into detail about that, as it's been documented by people far more articulate than myself, but let's just say this is just another blemish on a long list of troubles Arktos has been writing for themselves.

 

[jackinmydaniels]

Who cares? Really like, its a terms of service thing, if the company gets into legal trouble over this I will be appalled.

 

[Hassan Ingram]

Wait, so you go through business papers to find out who may of copies a little of it? who the fuck gives a shit? What is gaming coming to? fanboys going around saying "oi oi look he copies and pastes!"

Get a life and stop spamming us with your rubbish......

No construction in Gaming these days i swear......