IN RE NCAA STUDENT-ATHLETE NAME & LIKENESS

No. 10-15387.

724 F.3d 1268 (2013)

In re NCAA STUDENT-ATHLETE NAME & LIKENESS LICENSING LITIGATION, Samuel Michael Keller; Edward C. O'bannon, Jr.; Byron Bishop; Michael Anderson; Danny Wimprine; Ishmael Thrower; Craig Newsome; Damien Rhodes; Samuel Jacobson, Plaintiffs-Appellees, v. Electronic Arts Inc., Defendant-Appellant, and National Collegiate Athletic Association; Collegiate Licensing Company, Defendants.

United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.

Submission Vacated February 18, 2011.

Argued and Resubmitted July 13, 2012.

Filed July 31, 2013.


Attorney(s) appearing for the Case

Kelli L. Sager (argued), Alonzo Wickers IV , Karen A. Henry , Lisa J. Kohn and Anna R. Buono , Davis Wright Tremaine LLP, Los Angeles, CA; Robert A. Van Nest , Steven A. Hirsch and R. James Slaughter , Keker & Van Nest, LLP, San Francisco, CA, for Defendant-Appellant.

Steve W. Berman (argued) and Erin K. Flory , Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro LLP, Seattle, WA; Robert Carey and Leonard Aragon , Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro LLP, Phoenix, AZ, for Plaintiffs-Appellees.

Douglas E. Mirell , Loeb & Loeb LLP, Los Angeles, CA, for Amicus Curiae Motion Picture Association of America, Inc.

Amy E. Margolin , Bien & Summers, San Francisco, CA; Michael Rubin and P. Casey Pitts , Altshuler Berzon LLP, San Francisco, CA, for Amici Curiae National Football League Players Association, Major League Baseball Players Association, National Basketball Players Association, National Hockey League Players' Association, and Major League Soccer Players Union.

Thomas R. Carpenter and Purvi Patel , American Federation of Television & Radio Artists, AFL-CIO, New York, NY; Duncan Crabtree-Ireland and Danielle S. Van Lier , Screen Actors Guild, Inc., Los Angeles, CA, for Amici Curiae Screen Actors Guild, Inc., American Federation of Television & Radio Artists, AFL-CIO, Writers Guild of America, West, Inc., Creative Property Rights Alliance, Fifty Six Hope Road Music Ltd., Luminary Group LLC, Thomas Steinbeck, and Gail Knight Steinbeck.

Nathan Siegel and Lee Levine , Levine Sullivan Koch & Schulz, L.L.P., Washington, District of Columbia, for Amici Curiae Advance Publications, A & E Television Networks, Allied Daily Newspapers of Washington, Association of American Publishers, Activision, California Newspaper Publishers Association, Capcom USA, Comic Book Legal Defense Fund, E! Entertainment Television, ESPN, First Amendment Coalition, First Amendment Project, Freedom Communications, The Gannett Company, Gawker Media, Hybrid Films, ITV Studios, Konami Digital Entertainment, The Los Angeles Times, The McClatchy Company, Namco Bandai Games America, Original Productions, The Press-Enterprise Company, Radio Television Digital News Association, Sirens Media, Take Two Interactive Software, Thq, Viacom, The Washington Newspaper Publishers Association, and Wenner Media.

Gregory L. Cutner and Robert J. Wierenga , Schiff Harden, LLP, Ann Arbor, MI; Rocky N. Unruh , Schiff Hardin, LLP, San Francisco, CA, for Amicus Curiae National Collegiate Athletic Association.*

Before: SIDNEY R. THOMAS and JAY S. BYBEE, Circuit Judges, and GORDON J. QUIST, Senior District Judge.


OPINION

BYBEE, Circuit Judge:

Video games are entitled to the full protections of the First Amendment, because "[l]ike the protected books, plays, and movies that preceded them, video games communicate ideas — and even social messages — through many familiar literary devices (such as characters, dialogue, plot, and music) and through features distinctive to the medium (such as the player's interaction...

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