The lights are on
Ubisoft's Innovative Rocksmith guitar technology may not be so innovative after all. Guitar Apprentice, a company that creates guitar tutorials, is accusing Ubisoft of patent infringement in its game Rocksmith for a musical instruction pertaining to users playing an instrument to audio signals.
The news comes courtesy of Patent Arcade (not to be confused with Penny Arcade). Ross Dannenberg of Patent Arcade reports that "the '896 patent was only filed in October 2010, claiming priority to a provisional application file June 30, 2010, so I suspect there is going to be a validity fight based on any prior art out there." Although Guitar Apprentice is a video-based tutorial that can be downloaded on a computer or purchased on a DVD, the method of learning by playing a real guitar along to finger placement is similar in design.
You can read all about USP patent 8,119,896 right here. Ubisoft is already facing Rocksmith-related lawsuits with Game Tank over gameplay technology and UK band Rocksmith for the name of the product. If anyone else has a lawsuit to file, now is the time.
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Screw off Guitar Apprentice, no one likes you.
Ooops.
I don't care when it was patented. Whoever did it better has MY win.
thats bull
Oh no :( Rocksmith was a really good game too.
Why don't they go sue Rock Band and Guitar Hero while they're at it, as well? 'Cause they're video games. There's supposed to be an open market for products, just leave them be.
Hey, that guitar looks like the one that got stolen from me a while back...
LAWSUIT UP.
LEAVE ROCKSMITH ALONE!
well, they should get over themselves. They didn't make a game out of it.
Ummm well I would like to file a lawsuit against Bioware...