Tech journalist Dan Ackerman has filed a lawsuit against Apple, the movie producers, the screenwriter, and The Tetris Company, claiming that the Apple movie Tetris plagiarized his book, The Tetris Effect. The lawsuit, filed in New York federal court, accuses The Tetris Company, its CEO Maya Rogers, and screenwriter Noah Pink of adapting his book without his consent.

The movie Tetris explores the story of how Alexey Pajitnov’s famous puzzle game gained popularity in the West, focusing on Henk Rogers, the Dutch-American entrepreneur responsible for securing the game’s rights for Nintendo’s Game Boy version. According to Ackerman, his book covers the same story, but he is not the first to do so. Similar accounts have been documented in books such as Game Over by David Sheff, a BBC TV documentary called Tetris: From Russia With Love, and a graphic novel by Box Brown.

Ackerman’s lawsuit is based on three claims. Firstly, he asserts that it was his idea to frame the story as a Cold War thriller with political intrigue, with Henk Rogers portrayed as the heroic protagonist. Secondly, he argues that the movie closely follows his book in terms of its storytelling and provides a list of 22 instances that support this claim. Lastly, Ackerman alleges that Maya Rogers, as CEO of The Tetris Company, initiated the development of the film using his work without permission.

Ackerman’s suit seeks compensation of at least 6% of the movie’s estimated $80 million production budget, amounting to around $5 million. In Hollywood, it is common practice to purchase the rights to a book or article when working on a real-life story, providing legal protection against claims like Ackerman’s.

Apple and The Tetris Company may argue that they did not need to secure these rights as they had the creators of the game and the key figures involved in the story, like Henk Rogers and Alexey Pajitnov, as producers. The court will ultimately decide whether the movie infringes on Ackerman’s book or not.

Requests for comments on the matter have been made to Ackerman, The Tetris Company, and Apple.

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