CDR: Supremes defer Sony vs. Fair Use soft emulator

[David Honig]

Oct 2, 2000 - 10:31 AM 

            Supreme Court Sidesteps
            PlayStation Dispute 
            By Laurie Asseo
            Associated Press Writer

            WASHINGTON (AP) - The Supreme Court stayed out of
            a dispute between Sony and another company whose
            software allows people to run Sony PlayStation games
            on personal computers. 

            The court, without comment Monday, let Connectix
            continue selling its Virtual Game Station until a lower
            court rules on Sony's claim of unfair competition. 

            Sony has sold 50 million PlayStations - small computers
            with hand controls - that plug into a television set and
            allow consumers to play games inserted into the
            computer on a compact disc. The PlayStation's
            software program is protected by copyright. 

            In January 1999, Connectix of San Mateo, Calif., began
            selling the Virtual Game Station, which allows people to
            run PlayStation games on their own personal
            computers. 

            The Virtual Game Station software does not contain any
            of Sony's copyright material. But in developing it,
            Connectix used the PlayStation's software program by
            extracting its code from a chip and copying it repeatedly
            on its own computer to see how it worked. 

            Sony filed a copyright-infringement lawsuit, and a
            federal judge in San Francisco halted sales of the
            Virtual Game Station in April 1999 pending a ruling. 

            The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals lifted that order
            last February, saying Connectix's action amounted to a
            "fair use" of Sony's software. 

            The court said Connectix was a "legitimate competitor"
            in creating computer platforms on which Sony games
            can be played, adding that copyright law does not allow
            Sony to monopolize that market. 

            In the appeal acted on Monday, Sony's lawyers said the
            ruling erodes copyright protection for computer
            programs. 

            Connectix's actions were "pure free-riding, using the
            protected work to develop a substitute far more quickly
            and inexpensively than the original," Sony's lawyers
            said. Sony invested three years and $500 million to
            develop the PlayStation, its lawyers said, while
            Connectix took six months and $150,000 to create its
            product. 

            Connectix's lawyers said the company created "an
            entirely new environment" for playing PlayStation
            games. A 1998 federal law boosting copyright
            protections for the computer industry endorsed the
            process used by Connectix, the lawyers said. 

            In May, a federal judge in San Francisco threw out
            seven of Sony's nine allegations against Connectix in
            the copyright case, allowing Sony to pursue claims of
            violating trade secrets and unfair competition. 

            The case is Sony Computer Entertainment v. Connectix,
            00-11. 
http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGAEWJW8UDC.html
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