3 Count: Late Christmas

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1: Nexon–Ironmace Copyright Dispute over ‘Dark and Darker’ Heads to Supreme Court

First off today, the Korea Bizwire reports that the ongoing legal fight between Nexon and its competitor Ironmace is heading to the South Korean Supreme Court.

Ironmace was founded by a group of former Nexon employees who went on to release a game entitled Dark and Darker. Nexon sued, alleging that the employees took material from a canceled game they were working on to create Dark and Darker.

A lower court ruled in favor of Nexon, but only on the issue of trade secret, not copyright. Both sides appealed and the appeals court expanded the trade secret issues, but reduced the overall damages from 8.5 billion won to 5.7 billion won ($4.4 million). Now Nexon has appealed the case to the country’s Supreme Court., hoping to overturn the copyright decision and increase damages.

2: Homebound vs Homebound: Author Accuses Dharma Film of Copyright Infringement

Next up today, Tatsam Mukherjee at The Wire India reports that, in India independent journalist Puja Changoiwala claims that the hit film Homebound is a copyright infringement of his book with the same title.

In 2021, Changoiwala published a book entitled Homebound chronicling the journey of a family of migrant laborers across the country. The film, directed by Neeraj Ghaywan, was released in 2025 and features not just the same title, but a very similar story. The film was picked as India’s submission to the Oscars this year.

At the moment, Changoiwala has not filed a lawsuit, only a legal notice. However, he claims that the response he received revealed that work on the film began in 2022, one year after the book was released.

3: Mariah Carey Awarded $92,000 from Dismissed ‘All I Want for Christmas’ Lawsuit

Finally today, Larisha Paul at Rolling Stone reports that musician Mariah Carey has been awarded $92,300 in attorneys fees and other costs following the dismissal of a lawsuit filed against her by artist Vince Vance.

Stone filed the lawsuit November 2023 alleging that Carey’s 1998 hit song All I Want for Christmas is You is an infringement of his song with the same name that he released one year earlier. However, other than the titles, the two songs have nothing in common, prompting the court to dismiss the case.

Now the court is ordering Vance to pay attorneys fees due to “egregious” conduct by him and his attorneys. In addition to the award for Carey, the judge also ordered them to pay more than $14,000 to Sony, a codefendant. Other codefendants received smaller amounts, totaling, $109,983 in total fees.

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