Atari is making dickish moves to shut down its most devoted fans. Is this trademark protection gone too far?
I'm generally considered one of those calm people, the type that can often be found sipping iced tea in a recliner with his modest pot belly creeping cheekily out from under a well worn singlet (sweet Jesus, are you mentally scarred?) It takes a lot to get me riled up and there are many carefully constructed stages between content and enraged.
Atari has managed to bypass most of these subtle steps, and turn me straight into a raving, seething ball of pissed.
As a huge fan of retro gaming in all its forms, I consider Atari to be a spiritual centrepiece of the gaming world, the brand name itself a holy symbol. The Atari I celebrate is the one that gave us the Atari 2600 six-switch "woody", the powerful but ultimately underutilised Jaguar and a whole host of amazing gaming experiences.
Forget the Atari of today (despite some cracking game titles) the reason so many of us cherish Atari is because of the pioneer of old. This brand-of-yesteryear power wielded knowingly by Atari is still going strong today in large part thanks to a vibrant and loyal collection of retro gaming fans who collect, play on and in some cases even extend the abilities and library of Atari’s console greats.
It would make sense then, to cultivate this community, right? Game developers have made a wholesale shift over the last few years towards embracing and providing for the modding community after realising their non-commercial efforts strengthen their own intellectual property. By the same token, it’d make perfect sense for Atari to cultivate – or at the very least leave undisturbed – the retro gaming scene. These are the people who are keeping the spirit of Atari alive, burning a bright flame for the brand.
Atari however, doesn’t see it this way.
The company has been on a vendetta recently against the use of the Atari name, logo and association on the web, with its most recent target the atari2600.org site. Registered since 2000 by Andrew Davie as a launch pad for his Atari 2600 programming wizardry, Atari – via General Counsel Kristen Keller – has made demands that the website be handed over to them as the domain name contains the Atari brand. From all reports Andrew is understandably disappointed in Atari’s position and as a result, considering his own.
The atari2600.org affair is a recent development, but Atari’s apparent determination to alienate its followers through legal arsehattery isn’t an entirely new gig. It has also gone after other non-commercial pockets of the internet devoted to it, including ppsberlin.de – a site devoted to Atari emulation and the production of demos for the 8-bit platform – for “infringement of its copyright and other intellectual property rights”. In each instance, Atari has adopted a cease, desist and give us your domain pronto attitude.
From a purely legal standpoint, it would seem reasonable for Atari to protect its brand, but waving a rusty fork at the fiercely devoted retro community is going to net the exact opposite effect. Alienating the people who expend their time and whacky effort to renewing and regenerating the Atari legacy could be the final nail in the branding coffin of a company that seems intent on finding new ways to crap on its own legacy.
Like a wild animal Atari has suddenly snapped after allowing Atari sites and groups to operate undisturbed for years. No-one has any solid theory on the ‘why’ of this descent into snarling legality, but with calls to boycott and a sea of angry nerds, it’s a sad state of affairs for retro gamers, Atari fans and anyone who appreciates the ingenuity of developing for unsupported platforms.
Issue: 137 | June, 2012