Nintendo won its case against Lik-Sang

The High Court of Hong Kong decided that a Hong Kong-based mail order company Lik-Sang to stop immediately selling devices that could be used to make backups of Nintendo Game Boy's console games.

The devices and tools, called Flash Cards and Flash Linkers, were used, according to Nintendo, to copy the game ROM images to PC and distrubute the ROM files over the Net and copy them to blank game cartridges, therefor causing monetary damages to Nintendo (who, as all console manufacturers nowadays, gets a share of each game sold to its console platforms) and its game publisher partners.

Court awarded preliminary damages of HK$5 million to Nintendo. Lik-Sang also needs to pay Nintendo's legal bills. Lik-Sang dropped selling these devices in September 2002 when a lower court issued an injunction against the company.

Source: The Register/gi

Written by: Petteri Pyyny @ 19 Jun 2003 15:37

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4 comments

carlitob

thats just wrong. Are there no ther uses for the flash cards and flash linkers?

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20.6.2003 10:08 #1

Bladestor

Thats bull! There are lots of people who use them for legitimate purposes, me being one of them. They shouldnt be able to make a case out of pure assumption!

20.6.2003 13:40 #2

Jorel

Xbox-Scene.com received this from Alex Kampl (Lik-Sang) concerning the recent Nintendo press release:

"Comments regarding the High Court Action brought by Nintendo

I hope with the following Information I am able to give you a little insight into the recent happenings and about the misleading press release of Nintendo.

Before the Nintendo Press release has been distributed, I have delivered a Notice of Appeal to Nintendo, as well as to the High Court of Hong Kong. I am not exactly sure why Nintendo�s press department didn�t mention a word about it. The Judgment was not a real trial yet, it was a Summary Judgment with a single Judge. Usually such Summary Judgments are in case of bounced bank checks where no trial is needed and everything is straight forward.

With all due respect to the High Court of Hong Kong, but no Intellectual Property (IP) specialist was assigned to this case. Already at the first hearing the Judge mentioned that it�s a pity Hong Kong has no IP specialist anymore and that he finds the Copyright Law of Hong Kong very confusing. After some research, it looks like the Judge is a specialist for maritime laws. He made several comments during the hearings which seemed to observers like this was his first IP case ever.

The Summary Judgment itself was based on the Section 273 of the Hong Kong Copyright Ordinance about �circumventing a copy-protection�. No copy-protection exists in the Gameboy or Gameboy Advance game cartridges. The Judge didn�t hear a specialist or at least an independent 3rd party expert opinion - he took it for granted from the explanations by Nintendo that there is a copy-protection.

Furthermore, the Judge found that �by analogy with drugs, it[the setcion 273] is not aimed at the drug addict but at the drug trafficker�. I fail to understand his logic, as this would mean that the drug store selling the injection needles to drug addicts or maybe even the manufacturer of the container where the drug addict keeps the drug could be held liable?

After legal actions in the USA against Bung Enterprises in the late nineties (for selling and manufacturing videogame development and backup equipment) this was the second Court Judgment ever regarding products of this nature. Regarding information made available to me in the Court Room, the case against Bung and its US distributor Carl Industries Inc was brought to an end in their disfavor by Bung not complying with Court Orders and not paying ordered penalties. The actual judgment was written by Nintendo representatives, without the Judge properly going through the arguments. The legality or illegality of the products in question has therefore never been argued in a real trial anywhere in the world. A serious trial, with competent Judges, is now definitely needed to settle the question once and for all. This is why I have decided to appeal.

I am not happy about the direction where this is heading, neither are supporters and legitimate users of the tools. Again, I have to stress once more, that the very same hardware under attack is used by thousands of hobbyist users and even professional developers for legitimate purpose. Very embarrassing for Nintendo: even the large publisher, who made the original game used in Court for demonstrating purpose, bought hundreds and hundreds of Flash Cartridges from my company for beta testing. And so did numerous other top 10 publishers listed in the stock market.

The products I have sold are not circumventing any copy protections, same as a Floppy Disk Drive and a 3.5" Disk doesn't � in fact there is no copy-protection existing, as commonly known by the gaming industry.

I completely understand Nintendo�s fight against piracy, but I believe they are aiming at the wrong targets. With Digital Media and the Internet nowadays, publishers will have to change their strategy. They just can�t win the fight against the Progress without removing our primary rights: presumption of innocence and the right for backup. Nintendo doesn�t need to prove you are a pirate anymore, it is assumed you all are if you have the technical means to copy."

21.6.2003 21:22 #3

Dnola3

That's BS, Pretty much boils down to this:

Sporting Goods Store Sells Good Ole Johnny a Hunting rifle.

Good Ole Johnny Uses Hunting Rifle that Sporting Goods Store Sold him to Shoot his ex-wife.

Court finds Sporting Goods liable for the Murder because they sold Good Ole Johnny The rifle.

Way F-ed Up if you ask me, But that's China for you. they're a crooked people.

18.9.2006 03:19 #4

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