Help: Magnavox Vs. Bally

[ballyalley]

While going through the Astrocade patents I stumbled upon a lawsuit that is Magnavox vs. Bally from 1975. It deals with the Odyssey patent. Or, at least, I think that it deals with that "console" from 1972. Does anyone know the details about this lawsuit?

Here are some possibly helpful links:

Magnavox Vs. Activision (1983):

https://www.ipmall.info/sites/default/files/hosted_resources/Activision_Litigation_Documents/12-29-82_to_02-04-83/Civil_Action_C82_5270_Teh_10Am_10Jan83.pdf

Copy Game for High Score: The First Video Game Lawsuit, by William K. Ford (2012):

https://digitalcommons.law.uga.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=https://www.google.com/&httpsredir=1&article=1035&context=jipl

Can anyone find the original lawsuit? Did Bally get a license from Magnavox/Sanders to make the Bally Arcade home system?

Adam

 

(The was originally posted Nov 6, 2018 as BallyAlley Yahoo Group message #16138.)

[mr_me]

I think that's the Sanders Television Gaming and Training Apparatus patent. Sanders was the company Ralph Baer worked for and Magnavox had an exclusive license. I think Baer pushed Magnavox to go after all these video game companies.

 

If it's 1975 it must be about a Midway arcade game. There's a witness deposition that talks about spaceships and torpedoes. I was trying to figure out which game that is. If they settled out of court you might not find much information. Everyone paid for the license, atari, mattel, nintendo.

 

Were arcade manufacturers subject to the patent? Their arguement was that removing the receiver from the tv means it's no longer a television.

Edited April 18, 2019 by mr_me

[ballyalley]

Were arcade manufacturers subject to the patent? Their arguement was that removing the receiver from the tv means it's no longer a television.

Did that argument work out for them?

 

Adam

[mr_me]

My guess is that it didn't. Ralph Baer mentions he covered monitors in his patent.

http://ralphbaer.com/how_video_games.htm

 

I think the spaceships game in that deposition is Spacewar on the pdp-1. They were probably trying to establish prior art. Spacewar and Higinbotham's Tennis for Two have been brought up in court. I'm surprised that didn't work.