How to alienate your community
CreateDigitalMusic is reporting on Gibson Guitar’s latest round of lawsuits, and I thought it’d be a great time to show how a bold move like this can (and should) completely backfire from a community perspective.
To summarize the situation, Gibson Guitar is suing the makers of popular video games “Guitar Hero” and “Rock Band” for an alleged violation of a patent on simulating participation in a concert. Nevermind the frivolity of the whole deal - the fun doesn’t stop there. They are also suing
2 things make this interesting from a community perspective. First, Rock Band has licensed the use of the Gibson logo for both on-screen use and on the actual “guitar” controller that ships with the game. So Gibson has launched an attack at a paying partner - not good for partnership community. Additionally, they’re suing major retailers of the game including Amazon.com, KMart, WalMart, Target, etc. They’re also suing parent companies of the video game makers.
Second, I posit this volley of legal threats will have a big negative impact on gamers see the guitar giant. These people play air guitar because it’s fun and because they some day envision themselves on stage with a six string in hand thrashing away. Unfortunately, they’re going to see Gibson as a mega-company, the man, the establishment, the company that took away their Rock Band. And we all know how musicians love the man :).
This is a classic case of ill considered ripple effect. I’ll be shocked if the community doesn’t lash back in an uproar over the shear insanity of this whole mess.
Good luck with that, Gibson.
