Thoughts tagged "Yuga Labs"

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Yuga Labs has asked the court to sanction Ryder Ripps for destroying private keys to wallets containing RR/BAYC NFTs, despite knowing he would likely be subject to an injunction requiring him to transfer or burn the NFTs.

Ripps claims he did this in order to "permanently ensure that [he] did not inadvertently engage in any activity on any cryptocurrency wallet that could be interpreted as violating the Court's earlier October 25, 2023 injunction."

Yuga's not buying that at all:

Mr. Ripps’ actions only further harm Yuga Labs by frustrating the purpose of the Court’s injunction. To be clear, simply deleting private keys only means that Mr. Ripps can no longer access the infringing NFTs in his wallets—he still owns the NFTs, and they are still associated with him. The effect of Mr. Ripps’ actions is to leave the infringing RR/BAYC NFTs forever in his wallets, which undermines Yuga Labs’ ability to “regain control over the instrumentalities of commerce that bear its BAYC Marks and allow Yuga to protect its brand and prevent future harm.” Dkt. 431 at 21-22. To add insult to injury, certain of those infringing RR/BAYC NFTs are now forever held in a wallet publicly known as ryder-ripps.eth and held alongside a genuine Yuga Labs NFT, further damaging Yuga Labs’ brand. 3. Mr. Ripps Lacks a Good-Faith Excuse for His Actions It is not credible that Mr. Ripps would delete his private keys to inadvertently avoid violating the order when he continued to use at least one of the wallets for 45 days after the Court’s order. Mr. Ripps signed seven transactions involving a wallet containing RR/BAYC NFTs after October 25, 2023—including swapping $23,000 in cryptocurrencies, purchasing a Yuga Labs Mutant Ape Yacht Club NFT, and withdrawing his remaining cryptocurrency to an exchange on December 9, 2023.7 Mr. Ripps’ technological sophistication undermines any contention that this was the only viable path to compliance or to prevent violation of the Court’s orders.8 A cryptocurrency/NFT wallet must be deliberately used, because wallet transactions must be deliberately signed with a private key. There is no plausible 

They've also asked the court to sanction both Ripps and his co-defendant Jeremy Cahen for not transferring $120,000 within two weeks, as stipulated. Counsel for Ripps and Cahen say the two are unable to pay, and that Yuga needs to obtain a writ of execution to enforce the judgment.

Yuga doesn't seem to buy that Ripps and Cahen can't afford the $120K, claiming that since the court order they've seen Cahen withdraw $30,000 from a crypto wallet he owns to an exchange, and drop $11,200 on an NFT.

A CryptoPunk NFT showing a pixel art head with a goatee, stringy black hair, and sunglasses smoking a pipe