Exclusive Update: MMO Glider Lawsuit

Donnelly, Blizzard at Odds for Months

The pending motion for summary judgment sought in the US District Court of Arizona that was made a little more known last week was not the beginning of a messy and nasty dispute between Glider bot developer Michael Donnelly of MDY Industries. Instead, it could signal the closing chapter of a months long legal battle.

Many blog entries and news postings (including ours, admittedly) made the lawsuit out to be a recent matter. In truth, when tssz|news dug a little deeper, we found out the legal troubles with the World of Warcraft publisher and developer has been plaguing Donnelly for about 18 months–a year and a half.  This motion may end the controversy once and for all, without the need for a trial.

A special Legal forum on Glider’s website is not publicly available for viewing; one must register. Only there is this lengthy legal battle detailed, in part perhaps by Donnelly himself, under the alias Mercury.

We’ve found this document, which states MDY Industries as the plaintiff, the party filing a complaint, with Blizzard and Vivendi Games as the defendants. The document, dated October 25th, 2006, details the confrontation Donnelly had with Vivendi’s legal team and purported threats. The complaint had requested a jury trial on all counts, and also asked for relief in the form of a judicial decree that Glider did not infringe on the gaming companies’ copyrights. A restraining order was also sought; it intended to bar the two organizations from making such statements and threatening MDY Industries with litigation or otherwise. Only when this complaint was filed was when Blizzard and Vivendi Games pursued a counterclaim of copyright infringement.

The case hearing and developments have evidently been pushed back for so long in an effort by Vivendi and Blizzard to deplete Donnelly’s legal fund. Eventually, judge David G. Campbell allowed one final delay in a hearing–noting he would not allow another–and it was then that motions for summary judgment were filed.

Overwhelmingly the legal forum, which mostly consists of Glider users, speaks in support of Donnelly’s defense. efforts. But many are speculating about what will occur in a judgment one way or another. If Donnelly and MDY Industries prevail, will WoW no longer have the power to ban players who use Glider or any other mod, bot, or alteration to the program? Most agree this won’t happen, as the license agreement to play the game is pretty air tight–and even Glider’s FAQ concedes the bot is unauthorized, and players take a risk by purchasing and using it in the game. Further, many of those players have been caught and banned by the system, despite paying flat or monthly fees to MDY Industries for Glider.

If Blizzard and Vivendi prevail in the motion, a worst-case scenario has been conceived, where Donnelly would have to turn over contact information for all who have purchased the bot. In turn, presumably they would be banned from WoW or worse. Financially, Blizzard and Vivendi claim in the motion Glider has cost the companies “Loss of customer goodwill”, as well as up to over $2.4 million in costs surrounding bot protection, and $10.5 million in lost subscription fees. Their concluding statement in the motion signals the companies may try to get some or all of that money back:

MDY’s creation, promotion, and support of Glider encourages and enables a significant community of cheaters to infringe Blizzard’s copyrights, breach their contracts, and conceal their harmful acts from Blizzard, all to the detriment of rule-abiding players and Blizzard’s premier product and good name. For the reasons stated herein, Blizzard respectfully requests this Court enter summary judgment on Blizzard’s copyright, DMCA and tort claims.

Donnelly has been as vocal as he can on the matter in the semi-private forum, under the guidance of his attorneys. His most recent presumed statement as Mercury shows he doesn’t have hard feelings for Blizzard or Vivendi:

I originally offered to shut down Glider and walk away when we filed in October of 06, since I had a couple other non-game business ideas worth pursuing. Blizzard declined that choice and decided they wanted to go after me personally, so I was pretty much trapped into growing Glider to pay for the legal bills. Starting a new company while trying to defend a lawsuit with no revenue would be suicide.

I still don’t see them as “the enemy”, despite the legal situation. It’s natural to fall into that mode, given how much work we have to do with respect to Warden, but that’s within a game. We are a company, we do business according to what is the best thing for the company to make a profit. No need for bullet-proof glass with us, although there are plenty of other crazies (nerfed druids and shamans) that may go off the deep end.

Judge Campbell’s decision is pending; it could be weeks or months away.  When we know it, we will bring you the details and put it in plain language for you to understand.