Judge ruled that Apple's cinematic adaptation did not copy journalist Dan Ackerman’s book
A New York federal court has shot down tech journalist Dan Ackerman’s copyright infringement suit against Apple over its 2023 “Tetris” movie, reported Reuters.
Ackerman claimed that Apple plagiarized his 2016 book “The Tetris Effect: The Game That Hypnotized the World” in putting the movie together. However, US District Judge Katherine Failla ruled that the book and movie were dissimilar enough to invalidate Ackerman’s allegations.
In the Thursday decision, she explained that the works were similar in terms of the facts about the classic game’s history.
“Since Plaintiff's Book is a work of non-fiction, Defendants were entitled to use the facts contained in his Book in the making of their Film, so long as they did not copy his unique expression of those facts,” Failla said in a statement published by Reuters.
Ackerman’s book detailed Tetris’ Soviet history and the issues regarding its global licensing rights. Ackerman said that he had provided a pre-publication copy to the Tetris Company in 2016; he received a “strongly worded cease and desist letter” thereafter as the company did not want to license its intellectual property for projects related to the book. The company also discouraged the book’s adaptation into film.
Ackerman alleged that in 2017, Tetris Company CEO Maya Rogers and screenwriter Noah Pink pulled from his book as they put together the movie’s screenplay.
Landau Group’s Kevin Landau, Ackerman’s attorney, said in a statement published by Reuters that the judgment was “flawed” and that an appeal would be made. Apple’s spokespeople and attorney did not immediately respond to a request for comment; neither did the Tetris Company.
The case is Ackerman v. Pink, U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, No. 1:23-cv-06952. Loeb & Loeb’s Barry Slotnick and Tal Dickstein acted for the defendants, including both Apple and Tetris Company.
