Court Dumps Almost All Of A New York Sax Player's Lawsuit Against Fortnite Over Use Of His 'Likeness'

from the beginning-of-the-end-of-emote-based-litigation dept

Last year, a New York saxophonist decided Fortnite was going to make him rich. He wasn't going to livestream his gameplay or join the development team. Instead he, like far too many others, decided a Fortnite "emote" had ripped off something of his: his "likeness."

Joining such illustrious and aggrieved stars like Alfonso Ribeiro and… um… "Backpack Kid," Leo Pellegrino decided a sax-playing emote took his personality and gave it away to Fortnite players. His legal reps managed to ignore the fact the "emote" played a tenor sax, rather than Pellegrino's signature bass sax, along with some recorded evidence that the emote in question might actually be an homage to a completely different saxophonist.

The court has now weighed in on Pellegrino's suit and found there's (almost) nothing in it he can sue about. Eric Goldman's post on the ruling opens with this fun fact about the plaintiff.

Pellegrino is a saxophone player with “externally rotatable feet,” which has helped him develop a nifty “signature” dance move while playing.

So, Pellegrino has that going for him. But really nothing else. The court [PDF] has this to say about the alleged use of Pellegrino's "likeness" by Fortnite.

Applying the test as articulated in Hart, we observe that the Complaint does not allege that the Fortnite avatars equipped with the Phone It In emote, i.e., Pellegrino’s likeness, share Pellegrino’s appearance or biographical information. Indeed, the Complaint contains a picture of a Fortnite avatar equipped with the Phone It In emote, and the avatar does not bear a strong resemblance to Pellegrino. The Complaint also alleges that Fortnite players can customize their avatars with “new characters” and a variety of emotes mimicking celebrities other than Pellegrino. The Complaint further alleges that the avatars fight in a battle royale and can execute emotes like Phone It In “while in the Fortnite Universe,” amidst “us[ing] weapons and violence to eliminate the competition,", whereas Pellegrino is alleged to be a musical performer who executes his Signature Move at musical performances. These allegations establish that the avatars in Fortnite do not share Pellegrino’s identity nor do what Pellegrino does in real life. We therefore conclude that Epic’s use of Pellegrino’s likeness is sufficiently transformative under the Transformative Use Test to provide it with First Amendment protections that are not outweighed by Pellegrino’s interests in his likeness.

Pellegrino's right to publicity and privacy claims are dead, partially undone by Pellegrino's own filing which inadvertently pointed out the transformative aspects of the Fortnite emote. His unjust enrichment claim is equally faulty as Pellegrino can't show any agreement was reached between him and Epic Games, making it impossible for Fortnite to have unlawfully taken anything it had agreed to give to Pellegrino.

There's no judicial sympathy for Pellegrino's extremely-distended unfair competition claims either.

Epic maintains that the Complaint alleges that Epic is a video game publisher and that Pellegrino is a saxophone player, and thus, the parties supply different goods. Indeed, the Complaint alleges that Pellegrino is a saxophone player, a member of “two brass-based musical groups” and performs music at musical performances. In contrast, the Complaint alleges that Epic develops and sells video games. Based on these allegations, it is plain that the parties do not supply similar goods or services. Pellegrino nevertheless maintains that the parties are competitors “in the field of selling dance performances” because Epic sells emotes that are “virtual dance performances.” Pellegrino, however, provides no case law, and we are aware of no case law, that would support such a broad construction of “competitor.

The only thing that survives the court's examination is Pellegrino's "false endorsement" claim. And that just barely does. The court says it could be argued the use of Pellegrino's likeness falsely suggests Pellegrino endorses Fortnite, but since the court has already said the use is transformative, it's unlikely Fortnite players are drawing this conclusion from the Phone It emote.

Every other claim is dismissed with prejudice, with the court pointing out there's zero chance Pellegrino could somehow amend his complaint into something actionable. This was an opportunistic lawsuit, pushed by an opportunistic firm. It should have been dead after the first motion to dismiss. That it wasn't isn't a reflection on the merits of Pellegrino's lawsuit. Allowing one claim to move forward is only going to cost Pellegrino more money while giving him almost no chance of succeeding. If Epic moves for a fee shift after prevailing, it will cost him even more.

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Filed Under: avatars, dance moves, emotes, false endorsement, fortnite, leo pellegrino, likeness rights, publicity rights
Companies: epic games


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  1. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 10 Apr 2020 @ 9:53am

    The real surprise is that he found a lawyer for this claim

    I'm honestly surprised he was able to find a lawyer willing to sacrifice their reputation by filing this. I guess new lows will be achieved in every field, even law.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 10 Apr 2020 @ 10:38am

    Sounds like Pellegrino suffered an Epic loss.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  3. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 10 Apr 2020 @ 11:06am

    Please!
    What is the basic problem with US law that allows this level of trash to be accepted by the US legal system as valid?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  4. identicon
    Agammamon, 10 Apr 2020 @ 11:14am

    Re: The real surprise is that he found a lawyer for this claim

    That shouldn't be a surprise at all. There were probably hundreds of ambulance chasers knocking on his door.

    It would have been utterly shocking if he couldn't find one to take the case.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  5. identicon
    Agammamon, 10 Apr 2020 @ 11:16am

    Re:

    At some point, someone has to look at the case and decide what does and does not have merit. There's no getting away from that unless you're just going to declare that people with no money can't use the courts - by, for example, requiring a bond to be posted.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  6. identicon
    Agammamon, 10 Apr 2020 @ 11:17am

    Re: Re:

    On the other hand, the basic problem really is that courts are unwilling to sanction lawyers who bring low-probability cases or who do poor prep work.

    More sanctions would certainly help.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  7. icon
    PaulT (profile), 10 Apr 2020 @ 11:31am

    Re: The real surprise is that he found a lawyer for this claim

    Since when did a bad reputation stop lawyers getting paid?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  8. identicon
    Andrew, 10 Apr 2020 @ 8:27pm

    Back in item shop?

    Does this mean it could return to the item shop?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  9. icon
    That One Guy (profile), 10 Apr 2020 @ 11:42pm

    ... have you seen the cases out there?

    Nothing surprising at all really, there are plenty of lawyers(some of them showing up, often multiple times no less, on TD articles) who don't give a damn how garbage a case is so long as they get paid and/or have a chance for a huge payday.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  10. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 11 Apr 2020 @ 2:54am

    Re:

    IP law.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  11. icon
    Tanner Andrews (profile), 11 Apr 2020 @ 4:14am

    Re: Re: Re:

    sanction lawyers who bring low-probability cases

    I do not agree that we should sanction folks like the attys for plaintiffs in Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U.S. 483 (1954), who sued despite a century of precedent following Roberts v. City of Boston, 59 Mass. 198 (1849), Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. 393 (1857), and of course the classic Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U.S. 537 (1896).

    Do you have a different, and workable, definition of low-probability cases?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  12. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 11 Apr 2020 @ 4:35am

    “signature bass sax”
    I’m curious on the source for this, as he is better know for the baritone sax, as stated in the first 10 words on his Wikipedia page.
    I otherwise completely agree, just a pedantic sax player.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  13. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 11 Apr 2020 @ 5:55am

    If a game emote can outcompete your live performance and entire career in just 10 seconds, that means your entire life has essentially been worthless, you should retire immediately and stare at a wall in the old folks home.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  14. icon
    amin9595 (profile), 11 Apr 2020 @ 8:12am

    itemshop return?

    Will it come back to the itemshop or not?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  15. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 11 Apr 2020 @ 12:08pm

    Re: itemshop return?

    I hope so

    link to this | view in thread ]

  16. icon
    zyffyr (profile), 11 Apr 2020 @ 1:34pm

    Re: The real surprise is that he found a lawyer for this claim

    For years, our law schools have been graduating more lawyers than there is actual work for. If you are one of the excess, you take whatever garbage cases you can scrape up - they at least have the potential to pay the bills.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  17. icon
    Norahc (profile), 12 Apr 2020 @ 11:33am

    For some reason, when reading this article I couldn't get "Yakety Sax" out of my head.

    link to this | view in thread ]


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