No Doubt and Activision agrees on settlement to end three-year-long legal feud

By: Muhammad Qasim Hassan

  |   October 5th, 2012   |  

Uncategorized

After fighting a legal battle that began in 2009, No Doubt and Activision have agreed on settlement just days before the case was to go before the jury.

According to the report by the Association Press, the two parties have agreed to settle the lawsuit without dragging the matter into the court any further, though the terms of the settlement are not yet revealed.

The whole issue started after the Grammy-winning American rock band had filed a lawsuit against Activision for breaching the contract and using their avatars to perform other bands’ songs in the Guitar Hero spin-off Band Hero that was released on November 3, 2009, for multiple platforms.

No Doubt claimed that the contract had limited their performance to only three songs within the game and were never informed by the publisher that the band’s likeness would be performing on songs originally performed by other bands and artists.

Activision, however, rejected the allegations, contending that the manner in which they used the band’s avatar was perfectly within the limitations of the contract and that they had not breached it.

Instead of simply stopping there, the publisher went on to file a counter-suit against No Doubt, claiming that it was “publically known” that the Guitar Hero franchise allows the in-game characters to be used in all game modes after being unlocked by the player.

It stated that the objection was made by the American rock band well after the game’s code had been finalised and thus there was hardly anything that could be done to appease them.

Activision’s claims of freedom of speech protection were dismissed by the court in April 2010, issuing a tentative ruling that underscored No Doubt’s right of publicity.

Filing for an appeal did not change much as the 2^nd District Court of Appeal in California upheld the ruling issued by the previous court and thus allowed the band’s case against the publisher to proceed.

Despite a couple of rulings going against them, Activision still remained convinced that it was not at fault and attempted to appeal the verdict at Los Angeles Superior Court.

However, things did not go their way this time around either, with the judge upholding the previous decision on May 2012, while assuring that the case would be presented before the jury later in the year.

No Doubt had sought a preliminary injunction at Los Angeles Superior Court, but this was denied by the judge.

The case was going to appear before the jury beginning October 15. However, both No Doubt and Activision agreed on a settlement.

While the band’s attorney Bert Deixler had previously stated that they were only seeking an apology from the publisher and an assurance that the latter would “never mistreat artists in the manner they have mistreated No Doubt and countless others,” it seems unlikely that it is all they settled for in the end.