MSF & Team Oregon Settle Lawsuit

Not sure how many of you were aware of the lawsuit brought by the MSF against Team Oregon for copyright infringement involving Oregon's Basic Rider Training course and the MSF's Basic Rider Course.


NEWS RELEASE

TEAM OREGON MOTORCYCLE SAFETY PROGRAM LAWSUIT SETTLED

A lawsuit brought against the TEAM OREGON Motorcycle Safety Program at Oregon State University has been settled. The action, filed December 14, 2006 by the Motorcycle Safety Foundation, alleged copyright and intellectual property infringements of MSF works. Dr. Ed Ray, President of OSU and Stephen Garets, TEAM OREGON Director were named in their official capacities.

A settlement conference was held in federal court in Santa Ana, California on May 21, 2008. The summary terms of settlement are:

1. MSF has agreed to dismiss its lawsuit with prejudice.
2. Neither party will pay compensation, costs, or fees to the other.
3. Team Oregon will be entitled to continue using its current curriculum without restriction.
4. MSF will acknowledge that Team Oregon owns valid copyrights in Team Oregon course materials.
5. Team Oregon will acknowledge that MSF owns valid copyrights in MSF course materials.
6. Neither Team Oregon nor MSF will disparage the other.
7. MSF will give Team Oregon a free license to use MSF materials in Team Oregon curricular materials, and Team Oregon will note that license in future Team Oregon publications. Team Oregon will continue to deny that it needs any such license.

8. Team Oregon will continue its practice of not marketing its program outside Oregon and will not grant permission for others to reproduce its materials.

9. The parties will release each other from all claims either may have against the other.

“I’m relieved and grateful to have reached this settlement,” said Stephen Garets, Director of TEAM OREGON and a named defendant. “We’re proud and fully supportive of the programs we’ve designed that treat the specific safety and training needs of Oregon’s riders. This settlement allows us to now devote full attention to the pressing needs of Oregon’s riders.”

Contact teamoregon.orst.edu for more information about TEAM OREGON training.

I'm not sure there was any winner here. Team Oregon has been vindicated in that it's been agreed that they did not infringe on any copyrighted material. The MSF gets to keep their nearly national lock on for profit motorcycle safety training and has seemingly managed to keep the Team Oregon program from spreading to other states.

Of course, nothing can change the fact that Oregon's motorcycle safety training program has been judged to be the best program in the US. I'll have to look around to see who made this pronouncement.

KZCSI

This whole dispute started in 2004 when Hawaii, Idaho and Oregon refused to switch over to the MSF’s latest curriculum product the BRC. All three state programs, it should be noted, were in the highest category of the recent National Highway Safety Traffic Administration’s “Best Practices” study. In fact, Oregon was number one in the nation.

KZCSI

I thought the MSF course was a blatant rip-off of David Houghs columns?

If I remember correctly David Hough was involved with the MSF years ago.

At the risk of repeating myself:

How many of you know that the Motorcycle Safety Foundation and the Motorcycle Industry Council have their offices in the same building, share the same president and are owned by an association of motorcycle manufacturers?

Are you also aware that the MSF's plan to divide the US into for profit franchises was exposed in 2005 in a series of articles in MCN?

How about the reason why the MSF has been working to stop state licensing fees from being used to subsidize motorcycle safety training is directly related to trying to make motorcycle safety training a viable economic enterprise that would be franchiseable.

Can you guess who would sell the franchises?

KZCSI

The franchise bit is what Wendy Moon discussions in her blog quite often, although I haven't read it in some time. I read David Hough's book a few months before taking the MSF course and the similarity is striking.

I see now that the Kansas motorcycle handbook is an MSF publication. For whatever that's worth.

It's all about the money. I bet none of the people mentioned gives two shits about rider safety. Maybe I'm just jealous.