[Prodigy9]

If Mojang has a good team of Quake players, they might have had a chance against Bethesda. But in any case, I agree that Bethesda's chances are a lot worse in court than in the game (unless there's something weird in Swedish law about being uber-protective of trademarks).

My take on it: Bethesda, unlike Mojang, is a serious company, where everyone has a serious face and eats serious cake... perhaps they figured that settling disputes over a friendly game would be unprofessional, or something like that.
Or maybe they really do think they have a strong legal case?

[CirJohn]

This whole thing is just an example of corporate privateering by Bethesda's legal department. It happens all the time, but it's rarely this public.

[Wookiee]

Ah, copyright law.

I cannot fault Bethesda, nor should you IMO. Unless Bethesda pursues every potential infringement on a copyright they hold, they can lose the copyright.

There's no backroom corporate malice, no profit mongering warlords wringing their hands together gleefully while counting stacks of 20s. Bethesda is playing by the same copyright rules as everyone else, because they must, to protect their intellectual property. Happens all the time, except quieter because its usually boring.

I predict lots of happy lawers getting paid and Mojang getting to keep the word "Scrolls" for their project. We shall see.

They should have fragged for it.

ymmv

[Prodigy9]

Ah, copyright law.

I cannot fault Bethesda, nor should you IMO. Unless Bethesda pursues every potential infringement on a copyright they hold, they can lose the copyright.

There's no backroom corporate malice, no profit mongering warlords wringing their hands together gleefully while counting stacks of 20s. Bethesda is playing by the same copyright rules as everyone else, because they must, to protect their intellectual property. Happens all the time, except quieter because its usually boring.

I predict lots of happy lawers getting paid and Mojang getting to keep the word "Scrolls" for their project. We shall see.

They should have fragged for it.

ymmv

I knew this was the case for trademarks (e.g. we now have "escalators" instead of "Escalator brand moving staircases")... do copyrights work under the same principles?