GMO Gamecenter USA, Inc. v. Whinstone US, Inc.
- John Cronan
- 1:22-cv-05974
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 2
GMO Gamecenter USA v. Whinstone US: Judge Parker denied Whinstone’s sealing motion and issued discovery directions.
GMO Gamecenter USA, Inc., GMO Internet, Inc., and Whinstone US, Corporation were affected by the discovery and case-management directions. Whinstone was specifically affected by the privilege-log requirement and the denial of its sealing motion; Riot’s corporate deposition topics were also addressed.
What happened
In GMO Gamecenter USA, Inc. and GMO Internet, Inc. v. Whinstone US, Corporation, the court issued directions after an April 7, 2025, case-management conference. The parties had disputes about preserving miner and phone data, a deposition, power curtailment, and a deposition of Riot’s corporate representative.
The court set deadlines for any sanctions motions and any protective-order motion, directed the parties to meet and confer about several disputes, revised one deposition topic, overruled an objection to another topic, and required Whinstone to log certain post-lawsuit documents and communications. The court also denied Whinstone’s motion to seal deposition testimony, directed the Clerk to terminate that motion, and directed the letter to be unsealed.
Judge Katharine H. Parker scheduled another case-management conference for May 8, 2025, and ordered the other case-management and discovery steps described above.
The detailed version
- GMO Gamecenter USA, Inc. v. Whinstone US, Inc. · No. 1:22-cv-05974
- John Cronan
- Apr. 8, 2025
Background
The order followed a case-management conference held on April 7, 2025. It addressed several discovery and case-management disputes involving the preservation of miner data and Chad Harris’s phone data, a possible protective order concerning the deposition of Masatoshi Kumagai, curtailment of power that resulted in payment to Whinstone, and disputed topics for a deposition of Riot’s corporate representative.
Court’s Directions
The court set May 7, 2025, as the deadline for any motion concerning sanctions for the preservation issues or any motion by GMO for a protective order concerning the Kumagai deposition. Oppositions were due May 21, 2025, and replies were due May 28, 2025.
Regarding the power-curtailment dispute, the parties were directed to meet and confer. Whinstone was directed to determine what other sources, if any, served as the basis for statistics reported in Riot’s public disclosures. If the parties could not resolve the issue by the end of fact discovery, they were directed to file a letter with the court by April 22, 2025.
For Riot’s deposition under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 30(b)(6), the court revised Topic 6 to address Riot’s understanding of terms in the hosting agreement between Whinstone and Riot that was in effect between 2021 and 2022. The court overruled Riot’s objection to Topic 9 and directed the parties to meet and confer about Topic 12.
The court also required Whinstone to include in its privilege log documents and communications created after the lawsuit was filed. Whinstone could use a categorical log, but the categories had to be narrowly tailored.
Sealing Motion and Disposition
Whinstone’s motion to seal deposition testimony from GMO’s corporate representative was denied because the proposed redactions were not consistent with the standard identified in Lugosch v. Pyramid Co. of Onondaga. The Clerk of Court was directed to terminate the motion at ECF No. 310 and unseal the letter at ECF No. 312.
The court scheduled another case-management conference for May 8, 2025, at 2:30 p.m. in Courtroom 17-D of the United States Courthouse at 500 Pearl Street, New York, New York.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.