Bundestag continues to support esports

While sports federations reject esports, politicians continue to put their money where their mouth is and continue to advocate esports. Now the Petitions Committee of the Bundestag has advocated for the recognition of Esports as a separate sport with club and association rights.

In this morning’s session, with the votes of the CDU/CSU, SPD, FDP, Left Party and Green Party parliamentary groups, MPs passed a petition calling for sports competitions involving video and computer games (e-sports) to be recognized as sports.

To this end, the sports support programs of the German Armed Forces, the German Federal Police and Customs are also to be opened up for the purpose. The AfD parliamentary group introduced its own vote, in which it is in favor of recognition as a sport, but rejects inclusion in the said sports funding programs.

To justify their request, the petitioners point out that esports is a virtual competition in which two teams, each with the same number of players, compete against each other. In the process, the teams needed “well-thought-out tactics and moves as well as trained fine motor skills to prevail against the competing team.” Such competitions mostly take place via the Internet at official professional tournaments, but also increasingly in large halls in front of an audience, the petition says.

In the view of the petitioners, esports must be recognized as a sport, as the criteria specified by the German Olympic Sports Confederation (DOSB) are met. The main criterion, “physical and motor activity,” is not fulfilled in the conventional sense. However, he said, there are other motor processes that constitute physical activity. Thus, the hands would have to fulfill precision movements while playing. In addition, he said, the eye-hand coordination required is equivalent to that of sport shooting.

So all in all: It does work!

Author: Marian Härtel

Marian Härtel ist Rechtsanwalt und Fachanwalt für IT-Recht mit einer über 25-jährigen Erfahrung als Unternehmer und Berater in den Bereichen Games, E-Sport, Blockchain, SaaS und Künstliche Intelligenz. Seine Beratungsschwerpunkte umfassen neben dem IT-Recht insbesondere das Urheberrecht, Medienrecht sowie Wettbewerbsrecht. Er betreut schwerpunktmäßig Start-ups, Agenturen und Influencer, die er in strategischen Fragen, komplexen Vertragsangelegenheiten sowie bei Investitionsprojekten begleitet. Dabei zeichnet sich seine Beratung durch einen interdisziplinären Ansatz aus, der juristische Expertise und langjährige unternehmerische Erfahrung miteinander verbindet. Ziel seiner Tätigkeit ist stets, Mandanten praxisorientierte Lösungen anzubieten und rechtlich fundierte Unterstützung bei der Umsetzung innovativer Geschäftsmodelle zu gewährleisten.