Arbitration Court of Yakutia I made a decision According to FNTASTIC against the network edition of Yakutia.info. The reason for the trial was the publication of the material entitled “The scandalous Yakut players are trying to whitewash the reputation”, dedicated to the process of creating the game The Day Before, which was criticized by players for inconsistency with trailers. FNTASTIC appealed to the court due to the negative tone of the article, having reinforced her claims with the results of a linguistic research. The interests of the editorial office in court were represented by lawyer and journalist Vitaly Ododin.
Previously, the Yakutia.info publication followed the activities of FNTASTIC, noting the initial successes of the company in the development of video games. However, the launch of The Day Before caused a global scandal, after which the developers had to return the money to all customers. In the light of these events, the editorial office considered it necessary to cover the negative reaction, which was faced with the Gotsevs brothers. Representatives of the publication said that the reputation of FNTASTIC suffered through their own fault, and the lawsuit against Yakutia.info could be an attempt to restore the image using a potential judicial victory as an argument in future trials with other journalists and bloggers.
Nevertheless, the court recognized the position of the plaintiff unreasonable. Vitaliy Ododin noted that “the negative tone of publication in itself does not indicate the spread of false or defamatory information.” According to him, the journalist has the right to express his point of view on events such as fraud, misinformation or violation of the law. To satisfy the claim, evidence was required of the mismatch of the stated facts of reality, but FNTASTIC could not provide them.
The editors of Yakutia.info introduced the court convincing arguments confirming the validity of criticism. Among the evidence was the official recognition of the company itself about the mistakes made, the facts of using third -party software, as well as numerous reviews of dissatisfied players who accused the company of dishonesty and deception of the audience.
According to Vitaly Obodin, the decision to file a lawsuit looked unusual, given the wide resonance and a much more similar negative publications and video materials that have gained dozens and hundreds of thousands of views. It was assumed that the company could count on a slight victory over a small edition, trying to create the appearance of protecting its good name. Perhaps this was due to the FNTASTIC attempt to restore the reputation after moving from Singapore to Kazakhstan.
Judge Valentina Tersky carefully examined all the presented arguments and made a decision, supporting the position of the defendant. According to the court, the damage to the developer was caused by the game The Day Before, being “raw, inferior products, which had to be hastily removed from the sale a few days after the release.” Vitaly Oddwan explained that the lawsuit was built on a linguistic study, while the defense focused on the evidence that a negative attitude to the fact of mass administration of consumers cannot harm a business reputation. She was damaged by the release of a poor -quality product that did not correspond to advertising promises, which the Creator was forced to withdraw from sales.
