OSU, Motorcycle Safety Foundation resolve lawsuit
MSF claimed that Team Oregon Motorcycle Safety Program was a rip-off of their curriculum
Aleks Cherednichenko
Issue date: 1/29/09 Section: News
Litigation which started over five years ago has finally come to an end.
The copyright infringement lawsuit brought on by The Motorcycle Safety Foundation against Dr. Edward Ray, on behalf of Oregon State University, and Stephen Garets, operator of the Team Oregon Motorcycle Safety Program, was settled on Dec. 19, 2008.
The issue at the center of the litigation was MSF's claim that Team Oregon Motorcycle Safety Program curriculum was a knock off from MSF's copyrighted works.
"They [MSF] essentially claimed that Team Oregon's curriculum was just a rewrite of their work," said Tony Green, director of communication and policy for the Oregon Department of Justice.
Team Oregon Motorcycle Safety Program has been a part of OSU since 1984, and has used educational materials produced by MSF since 1986. A few years ago MSF changed the content of its program and Team Oregon found its standards to be sub-par.
"MSF materials didn't meet our needs anymore," said Stephen Garets, operator of the Team Oregon Motorcycle Safety Program. "We ran a year of testing and found that MSF's new material wasn't equal to or better than their prior material."
"We were in discussion with MSF from 2001 through 2003, about this change, and MSF said that we could only use their new materials, which put us in a bind," said Charles Fletcher, associate general council of President Ed Ray's office.
"The only way we saw out of this was to start from scratch and create our own program," Fletcher said. "We started out from a blank piece of paper."
After Team Oregon released their new program, MSF filed a lawsuit claiming infringement of copyrights.
"They claimed that we used their materials, but I don't see how you can copyright something that describes the location of the clutch," Garets said.
"We had a long discussion with a number of experts if there was a chance of infringement on MSF material and the answer was no," Fletcher said. "Team Oregon's materials were original."
The copyright infringement lawsuit brought on by The Motorcycle Safety Foundation against Dr. Edward Ray, on behalf of Oregon State University, and Stephen Garets, operator of the Team Oregon Motorcycle Safety Program, was settled on Dec. 19, 2008.
The issue at the center of the litigation was MSF's claim that Team Oregon Motorcycle Safety Program curriculum was a knock off from MSF's copyrighted works.
"They [MSF] essentially claimed that Team Oregon's curriculum was just a rewrite of their work," said Tony Green, director of communication and policy for the Oregon Department of Justice.
Team Oregon Motorcycle Safety Program has been a part of OSU since 1984, and has used educational materials produced by MSF since 1986. A few years ago MSF changed the content of its program and Team Oregon found its standards to be sub-par.
"MSF materials didn't meet our needs anymore," said Stephen Garets, operator of the Team Oregon Motorcycle Safety Program. "We ran a year of testing and found that MSF's new material wasn't equal to or better than their prior material."
"We were in discussion with MSF from 2001 through 2003, about this change, and MSF said that we could only use their new materials, which put us in a bind," said Charles Fletcher, associate general council of President Ed Ray's office.
"The only way we saw out of this was to start from scratch and create our own program," Fletcher said. "We started out from a blank piece of paper."
After Team Oregon released their new program, MSF filed a lawsuit claiming infringement of copyrights.
"They claimed that we used their materials, but I don't see how you can copyright something that describes the location of the clutch," Garets said.
"We had a long discussion with a number of experts if there was a chance of infringement on MSF material and the answer was no," Fletcher said. "Team Oregon's materials were original."
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