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The Courts Government Censorship Entertainment Games News

HardOCP Declares Win vs. Infinium Labs 234

Posted by Zonk from the power-to-the-people! dept.
Bill Bagel writes "Many of us have watched Infinium Labs' attempt to quash HardOCP's First Amendment right for the last year. HardOCP wrote this story on the Infinium Labs CEO, Tim Roberts, that was based on his own resume and some Google research. IL sued HardOCP, a home-based webpage business for $20M in Florida, and HardOCP fought back in a Federal Court in Texas for a declaratory judgment. HardOCP basically won when Infinium Labs finally gave up the fight citing great expenses involved in fighting the declaratory suit. The judge's order can be found here." The Cliff's Notes version can be found on WhereisPhantom.com.
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HardOCP Declares Win vs. Infinium Labs More

HardOCP Declares Win vs. Infinium Labs

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  • Judge's signature (Score:5, Funny)

    by mr.henry ( 618818 ) * on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @12:23PM (#11264193) Journal
    It's worth RTFA just to see the judge's funky signature. I guess I can make out the first name, but I don't see how you can get "KAPLAN" from a lowercase "a" followed by 13 "u"s.

    Anyhow, congrats to Kyle & HardOCP.

    • Definitely a unique signature. Maybe he was a Doctor before becoming a judge?
      • The connection between the legible and non legible signatures is directly related to the amount of times you have to sign something. There are exceptions but for the most part, that seems to be the trend. Doctors being the extreme example and entertainers and sports figures being the general exception as they want their name to remain legible to retain some actual value. When I was in the in the US Navy doing nuclear work, we had to sign and initial multiple documents in multiple places all the time. M
        • I've been trying to explain to my wife why my signature is two letters followed by a lines. (first name/last name)

          I never really thought about the gazillions of times that I had to sign my name during my time in the military. Logs, logs, logs...probably 60+ times per day easily. I'm surprised that more people didn't just resort to using an 'X'.
          • I have friends that are 'proud' of their Arsenio-esque (dating myself) signatures. I see it as a security weak point. My signature is legible and unique. For large purchases, what I write is frequently compared to my drivers' license signature. The easier it is to duplicate, the less security you've afforded yourself. Seems kind of counterproductive.

    • Re:Judge's signature (Score:5, Funny)

      by GoofyBoy ( 44399 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @12:42PM (#11264370) Journal
      Maybe he just wanted to see if anyone would notice.

      http://www.zug.com/pranks/credit/ [zug.com]
    • He most likely signs that way to fill in the signature line completely, sorta like drawing a long line on a paper check to fully take up the "amount" field.

      Why that would be necessary I dont know, but there you have it.
    • Well, it actually appears that he was writing "J. Kaplan", but that does not explain all the u's. Maybe it's not a bunch of u's but a really large 'n' at the end of his name. I remember once there a news case about a man sentenced to death row who appealed because the judge put a smiley face in one of the o's in his name. The arguement was that the levity was inappropriate under the circumstances and therefore, the sentence should be commuted to life. The appeal failed. The judge's explanation was that
    • It's a play on Gooooooooooooogle, he just forgot to add PWND at the end of his sig.

  • Correction for Editors (Score:3, Informative)

    by JamesD_UK ( 721413 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @12:26PM (#11264231) Homepage
    WhereisPhatom.com should read WhereisPhantom.com, luckily it's correct in the link.

  • What does this say about... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by samdu ( 114873 ) <samdu AT ronintech DOT com> on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @12:26PM (#11264233) Homepage
    ...the pockets of Infinium? Surely a "company" that's preparing to "release" a new "game system" should have enough "money" in the bank to fight a legal battle like this.
    • ...the pockets of Infinium? Surely a "company" that's preparing to "release" a new "game system" should have enough "money" in the bank to fight a legal battle like this.

      Maybe this is exactly the point of this stunt. Since they couldn't find any suckers with the capital they needed, they decided to go the "legal" route.

    • Re:What does this say about... (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Hopefully, it says that people were smart enough NOT to given this loser their money.

      The whole point of the HardOCP article was "based on the track record, this guy will take your money, blow it without producing anything of value, and skip out on the bankruptcy."
    • More importantly, it shows what kind of a guy is running the company. The fact that the owner decided to throw that much of the company's resources at something that honestly not going to effect it shows that it's got it's priorities in the wrong place.

      Not that I was planing on investing in them before, but now I'm really not going to. Even if they put out a kick ass product (yeah, right) it looks like the corporate structure is FUBAR.
      • Uhh, what corporate structure are you referring to? If you read the original HardOCP report, you'd know that there appears to be *no* company. It's just this Roberts guy ripping investors off as he has apparently done several times before. I sincerely hope you were kidding about even considering investing in Infinium.

    • Re:What does this say about... (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      This was not a David vs. Goliath battle as the story suggests. Infinium Labs is a pitifully small and weak company. HardOCP's original article made much of the fact that they didn't even have a storefront or office, and a quick glance at their financial info reveals a small business in a weak financial position. HardOCP may have been the "underdog" in the sense that they probably don't have as much legal experience, but with their very large readership, they do have a very strong base of moral (and potentia

  • 'bout time (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Audigy ( 552883 )
    I wonder how long it'll be before IL throws in the towel completely... probably not until they milk every last bit of money from their investors.

    Have fun watching their stock [yahoo.com] flipflop over the next few weeks as the pump&dump crowd has fun with it. :)
    • I wonder how long it'll be before IL throws in the towel completely... probably not until they milk every last bit of money from their investors.

      Don't forget about the sob story they'll tell about how this is all HardOCP's fault from slander to court fees. The longer they drag it out the more they can say they tried but it wasn't their fault. Sickening.

    • Re:'bout time (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Bill Walker ( 835082 )
      Unfortunately, there's barely any market for it. I've been watching the ticks on it for the last 5 minutes or so, and it's all tiny lots, usually less than 2000 shares at a time.

      I don't think the 'pump and dump crowd' would bother with this one, frankly. With volume that low, it'd take a trader all day to get in an out with enough shares to make it worth his while.

      One wonders, who the hell is investing? It's not insider movements, either (at least, nothing big registered with the SEC). You can't even

    • Stock Splits? (Score:3, Interesting)

      by digitalamish ( 449285 )
      If you look at the yahoo link and show the past 1 year of trading you should see that the stock has split, TWICE! The first one was last Jan, a 5 for 1 split, and the second was May, a 4 for 1 split. And the stock has never gone over $2.50. So, even though the price is low, someone (hmmm, wonder who?) is sitting on 20x the stock they had last year. My guess is that after the next 'big announcement' about the product, someone will resign, then take the money and run.

  • This is exactly what I was going to say (Score:3, Funny)

    by umrgregg ( 192838 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @12:27PM (#11264244) Homepage
    Who signed that order? I could have been anyone: Jesus The Christuuuuuuuu, Jed Clampetuuuuuuuu, Justin Timberlakeuuuuuuu? Who knows...?

    • fhtang! (Score:3, Funny)

      by Scrameustache ( 459504 )
      Who signed that order? I could have been anyone: Jesus The Christuuuuuuuu, Jed Clampetuuuuuuuu, Justin Timberlakeuuuuuuu? Who knows...?

      The Great Chtulhuuuuuuuuu knows...
  • Even when you win a decision, you still lose because you have to pay thousands to a lawyer for defense. Is it possible for HardOCP to countersue to recoup those fees?

    • Re:What about lawyer's fees? (Score:2, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      How about reading the decision. It specifically mentions what they have to do to recoup legal fees.
    • Read the article or the order the judge signed, that's the only remaining issue.

    • Those are to be submitted to the Judge within 15 days of the opinion. This *IS* the countersuit, BTW. (No, IANAL)

    • Re: infinite loop (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      If HardOCP countersues to recoup legal fees it will result in an infinite loop, since the countersuit itself will result in more legal fees that will need to be recouped with a countersuit.

      • Re: infinite loop (Score:5, Funny)

        by Speare ( 84249 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @12:42PM (#11264372) Homepage Journal
        If HardOCP countersues to recoup legal fees it will result in an infinite loop...

        Don't you mean an Infinium Loop?

      • I can't tell if you're being stupid, or just making a bad attempt at a joke. Apparently at least one mod agrees with me in both directions, since as of right now the post is "Score:1, Funny", which means its both gained and lost at least one mod point.

        For those inclined, you don't need to countersue for damages. While you can, its generally more effective to just move for costs. That said, judges are extremely loathe to provide costs to winning defendants, since it discourages lawsuits (you heard me).
  • Kudos to Kyle for standing up to the bullying tactics that seem to become more and more pervasive each year. Also, it is just absolutely astounding that IL would go after a site that caters news to a potential customer base easily in the tens of thousands for them. Guess they weren't planning on succeeding with their vaporous Phantom in the first place. ....unless it was to be the ultimate platform for the ultimate vapor-sequel, Duke Nukem....

  • Good! Now if only... (Score:4, Funny)

    by Chordonblue ( 585047 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @12:28PM (#11264261) Journal
    ...we can get a similar judgement with SCO.

    Yes sir... 2005 is shaping up to be a GREAT year!

  • Rights? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by dcw3 ( 649211 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @12:31PM (#11264283) Journal
    Can someone please explain to me why corporations are afforded constitutional rights? Was that really the intention of the framers? I was under the impression that rights were for individuals, not companies. Obviously, IANAL, so please correct me if I'm misguided.
    • You are essentially correct, but legally wrong. The framers may have only had individuals in mind, and I think that they did, but AFAIK, that was changed with an amendment somewhere back in the late 1800's/early 1900's.

      I personally think it was a poor decision on the part of congress. Corporations should not have more than a limited set of rights, although the individuals running the corporations should NOT have their own rights abridged by virtue of running the corporation. Rather, they should be liabl

      • There was no amendment (Score:5, Informative)

        by phr2 ( 545169 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @12:53PM (#11264463)
        and no act of Congress turning corporations into persons. There was not even a supreme court decision.

        Rather, the notion of corporate personhood got written into some other supreme court decision in the 1870's, by a former railroad executive who was working as a clerk at the Supreme Court. It wasn't part of the actual Court opinion but rather was part of the introduction or something like that, but regardless, later court decisions quoted it and it became binding law.

        The Supreme Court in that era was very corrupt, even worse than now. The 14th amendment (resulting from the Civil War) spelled out a bunch of rights guaranteed to all "persons", i.e. all people (previously, only white people had rights). Corporations realized that they wanted to get in on the action and have those rights themselves, so after sufficient palm greasing, the decisions came down.

        For more info, see the movie "The Corporation", which is really excellent.

        See also: wikipedia on corporate personhood [wikipedia.org].

        • all people (previously, only white people had rights).

          Wrong. Anyone who was not a slave had rights. Freed slaves had rights. Non-whites that weren't slaves had rights.
          • Wrong. Only land-owning freemen had rights. Non-whites that (a) weren't slaves and (b) owned land and (c) were working had rights. Violate any of those, and you were free-game. The southern states had, in fact, conscription laws which allowed that if you found a black man who didn't have land and didn't seem to be working, you could legally claim him as a slave.
      • Rather, they should be liable for the actions of the corporation when an illegal act is performed.
        If this was the case, you wouldn't find anyone who would take a job as CEO. If an employee commits a crime without the consent or knowledge of the CEO, should the CEO really go to jail? CEOs can already be charged criminally if they permit employess to commit crimes on behalf of the corporation.

      • Re:Rights? (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Tassach ( 137772 )

        That was changed with an amendment somewhere back in the late 1800's/early 1900's.

        And what's the number of this "corporate rights amendment"? Come on, it's not THAT hard to actually READ the frigging Constitution [archives.gov], is it?

        The legal concept of a corporation as a "person" which has Constitutional rights came from a Supreme Court decision, Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad Company [tourolaw.edu] in 1886.

        FYI, It only took me about three seconds to find this with a Google search [slashdot.org]. There's no excuse to sp

        • Re:Rights? (Score:4, Informative)

          by Tassach ( 137772 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @01:25PM (#11264771)
          Corrected Google Link [google.com], before someone jumps on me for it.

        • Re:Rights? (Score:3, Insightful)

          by gstoddart ( 321705 )

          And what's the number of this "corporate rights amendment"? Come on, it's not THAT hard to actually READ the frigging Constitution [archives.gov], is it?

          The legal concept of a corporation as a "person" which has Constitutional rights came from a Supreme Court decision, Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad Company [tourolaw.edu] in 1886.

          OK. You seem knowledgeable about this, and I"ve yet to see anyone expound on this further ....

          Has there been any legal basis to challenge/uphold this interpre

    • If you're genuinely interested in such matters, I found this book [amazon.com] a most intriguing read on the subject...
    • Technically a corporation is an artificial person. I can't defend myself in court if my corporation was one of the parties because technically that would mean I'm representing another person, practicing law without a license.

      I agree with the sentiment that it might be time to look at changing some of those rules. Seeing a corporation as an instrument of business and not a person.

  • What in the hell is this article about, exactly? The articles are unclear, at best. There's nothing about a government clampdown on free speech (which is what the first amendment is about). Who are these companies, and what do they do? Slashdot's editorial ability (not that it was ever good) is just getting worse.
    • There's nothing about a government clampdown on free speech

      One company (Infinum) asked the courts to prevent a person (and to drain 20 mil from him in the process) from stating embarassing facts about it's executives.

      The article is about the fact that the U.S. have not yet completely turned into the Incorporated States of America. Rejoice.
      • One company (Infinum) asked the courts to prevent a person

        Infinum sued HardOCP. HardOCP is a company not an individual. Therefore your sentence should read: "One company (Infinum) asked the courts to prevent another company (and to drain 20 mil from it in the process) from stating embarassing facts about it's executives."


    • Slashdot's editorial ability (not that it was ever good) is just getting worse.

      Since when do Slashdot editors routinely provide an entire background on a subject? It's nice when the submitter adds some links to background. But otherwise, I suppose you'll have to beat that inert laziness and type "hardocp infinitum" in to google yourself.
  • The one with the smaller pile of funds folds..

    The system is fatally flawed.. and its the lawyers fault.
    • See also the number of lawyers who go into politics. It isn't going to get fixed any time soon.
    • How is this related to the article? Are you saying that it was a bad thing that Infinium lost?
      • It has nothing to do with this particlar case.

        My post was more of an overall comment on how money now determines the winners and losers, not the law.
    • Or maybe its really the fault of the politicans who pass the laws and the people who hire lawyers to sue for them. Or yet another way to put it, do guns kill or do people kill?
      Kill all of the lawyers fine. You'll still have the crappy laws on the books and horrible people who are actually the ones who bring suit.
  • In more ways than one. You couldn't make this stuff up if you were writing for Arrested Development.

  • But it's an attractive concept (Score:5, Interesting)

    by gbulmash ( 688770 ) * <semi_famous@ya h o o .com> on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @12:56PM (#11264495) Homepage Journal
    What's interesting to me in all this is that the console is an attractive concept. Roberts did his market research and crafted, if nothing else, a set of specs that got techies, gamers, and investors excited.

    It wasn't Roomba, iBot, and XBox 8 all rolled up in one. It was a feature set that got a certain subset of the population excited while having the technical underpinnings to make it possible that it could see the light of day at a reasonable price point.

    Call him a con-man or a snake oil salesman if you will, but give him some props for being able to identify the pavlovian triggers that have suckered investors into believing his concepts had merit over and over again. - Greg

  • Parent is Uninformative and WRONG. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by bmo ( 77928 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @01:17PM (#11264684)
    "HardOCP basically won when Infinium Labs finally gave up the fight citing great expenses involved in fighting the declaratory suit"

    Don't the people who submit the stories RTFA? I mean CRIPES. No, they didn't give up because of expenses, they gave up BECAUSE THEY DID NOT HAVE A CASE. RTFA! I mean GEEZ....

    To wit:

    "..does not constitute unfair competition under U.S.C 1125 or an unfair business practice, trade disparagement, trade libel, and tortious interference with contract under Texas law, and that plaintiffs' use of Infinium's trademarks from September 7 2003 through February 19,2004 in connection with the article does not constitute dilution or infringement of those marks or otherwise give rise to liability under federal or state law. Because defendants have ADMITTED (emphasis mine) that plaintiffs are entitled to declaratory relief, they move for judgement on the pleadings in favor of the plaintiffs pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. P. (Federal Rules for Civil Procedures) 12(c)."

    I mean, c'mon...there's nothing about cost of litigation. It's all the Infinium being full of horse manure.

    --
    BMO
  • The "Phantom Game Console" is aptly named,
    be your cup of tea irony, or soliloquy.
  • Sounds like a way to clean money if you ask me. Has anyone looked into the vendors of these so-called companies?

  • Endgame: Fees and Chapter 7 (Score:3, Insightful)

    by blueZhift ( 652272 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @03:22PM (#11266565) Homepage Journal
    Infinium Labs basically has no money for attorney's fees or anything else since the last I heard, they had failed to get any additional investor funding. So I think throwing in the towel on the lawsuit is part of their endgame strategy. Don't be surprised if this is soon followed by Chapter 7 Bankruptcy following CES. Unless they get more money real soon, they are DEAD and the show is over. I think whatever they show at CES is their last chance. Though I still wonder if success was ever even an option [proliphus.com].


  • WANFORCE was an aftermarket networking equipment company based in the St. Louis area. I saw this article, called a friend who is still in the business, and Peter Roberts died some time in December. The official cause was listed as 'heart attack', but at age 34 given the other stuff that was going on around these guys we're 99.44% sure it was cocaine overdose that got him.

    My contact said "they're both swindlers, but Tim is better at it than Peter was". A sad epitaph for Peter and hopefully a message

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