Entertainment Software Association testimony on AB 1921

On June 29, 2026, the Entertainment Software Association (ESA) told a California Senate committee that community-hosted video game servers are illegal & that the trade group considers them piracy, in testimony opposing the Protect Our Games Act (Assembly Bill 1921), a bill that would require game publishers to give buyers an end-of-life plan before they disable a purchased game. The ESA's witness was Jennifer Gibbons, its vice president of state government affairs, who also told the committee that the United States Trade Representative's Notorious Markets report had named some of these big private servers as a notorious market. Microsoft distributes free Minecraft server software for self-hosting, & the 2025 USTR Notorious Markets report does not use the term private servers. The committee failed to pass AB 1921 on a 4 to 3 vote, with four of its eleven members not voting, & then granted reconsideration, leaving the bill alive.However, the bill has not been reconsidered, and will be restarted at next year's legislative session.

Background

Main article: Protect Our Games Act

The Protect Our Games Act, Assembly Bill 1921 by Assemblymember Chris Ward, would bar a publisher from selling a single-purchase digital game & later disabling the access that keeps it playable, unless it first gives buyers an end-of-life plan. That plan is 60 days' notice plus at least one remedy: an offline version, a patch for independent use, the tools or software to run a community server, or a refund. The Assembly passed the bill 43 to 16 on May 27, 2026; the Senate Privacy, Digital Technologies, and Consumer Protection Committee debated, amended, and passed the bill 6 to 2 on June 22, 2026; it reached the Senate Business, Professions and Economic Development Committee on June 29, 2026.

The ESA, the trade association for the video game industry, opposed the bill. Its lead opposition witness was Jennifer Gibbons, the ESA's vice president of state government affairs, who joined the group in 2024 after serving as senior vice president of government affairs at the Toy Association & earlier as a chief of staff & communications director in the California State Assembly.

Gibbons's testimony

Gibbons said the bill rested on two flawed premises. The first, in her words:

that consumers who purchase a license for a video game should have access to it indefinitely. No other digital product is subject to that standard. Books, movies, music, software, and online services are not required to remain available forever, yet this bill would apply that obligation to video games.

The second premise she challenged was the bill's assumption that publishers routinely take games from buyers without notice or compensation, which she called inaccurate; she described the bill as addressing a question of consumer satisfaction, not consumer protection. She said the bill's compliance options would move gameplay into environments outside of publisher oversight, moderation, and security controls, which raises serious safety issues. She said the ESA had suggested the committee look at the approach Assemblymember Irwin took in AB 2426 on digital goods.

The Senate Business, Professions and Economic Development Committee heard AB 1921 on June 29, 2026, the hearing where the Entertainment Software Association's witness called community-hosted game servers illegal and described them as piracy.

Community servers and the piracy characterization

One of the bill's compliance options would let a publisher satisfy the law by giving buyers the tools or software to run their own community servers. During questioning about that option, Minecraft & Call of Duty community servers were named as existing examples. Gibbons responded:

They're illegal, and they are not in any way affiliated with Microsoft. Microsoft for Minecraft has gotten a lot of criticism because of those community servers not employing the same safety standards that Microsoft does on their Minecraft servers.

Asked whether the practice was like a black market for video games, she answered:

Yes. In fact, we consider it piracy. We have lawsuits, two pending lawsuits against private servers right now ...

Microsoft, through its Mojang Studios subsidiary, distributes free Minecraft server software so players can host their own multiplayer games. Its official download page, headed Download the Minecraft: Java Edition server, offers both a Java Edition multiplayer server & a Bedrock dedicated server.

Mojang's official Minecraft page, headed Download the Minecraft: Java Edition server, invites players who want to set up a multiplayer server to download and run one.

The Minecraft EULA includes explicit permission giving end users permission to install and host 'Minecraft: Java Edition Server' on their own hardware.

"For the server version of Minecraft: Java Edition, you can install it on a server and host online play."

Following up the hearing, in a statement to PC Gamer, the ESA wrote:

“Private servers infringe on the intellectual property (IP) rights of game publishers. Publishers reserve the right to exercise their rights against them.”

and another follow up on a Kotaku article:

“Private servers that host or distribute copyrighted game content without authorization infringe on the intellectual property (IP) rights of game publishers,” [...] “While publishers may take different approaches, all publishers reserve the right to exercise their rights against IP infringement.”

The next day, on July 1st 2026, the Minecraft creator Markus Persson (Notch), while replying to a post asking for Microsoft and Mojang to speak up on the ESA commentary, he defined their move 'incredibly scummy' and 'borderline evil'.

“I'm not part of either any more, but I feel like the ESA is being incredibly scummy by pulling this. I've never liked them, but even less so now. I did not wish for my work to be used against people. This is borderline evil.“

Call of Duty: Black Ops III and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 both come with dedicated server downloads for users who own the game on Steam.

Notorious Markets reports

In the same exchange, Gibbons cited the federal government's Notorious Markets report:

[T]he United States Trade Representative in their notorious markets reports on counterfeiting [and] piracy has named some of these big private servers as a notorious market.

The most recent such report, the USTR's 2025 Review of Notorious Markets for Counterfeiting and Piracy, does not use the terms private servers, pirate servers, or grey shards. Its game-related listings are NSW2U, a site distributing infringing copies of Nintendo Switch games that the FBI seized in July 2025; FitGirl-Repacks, a site offering compressed copies of pirated games; & UnknownCheats, a site for submitting & downloading video game cheat codes. The phrase does appear in a footnote in the USTR's 2015 Out-of-Cycle Review of Notorious Markets, which described molten-wow.com, a site that had provided unauthorized access to a multiplayer online role-playing game, reappearing under the successor name warmane.com, & referred to unauthorized private servers, also called pirate servers or grey shards. That 2015 review listed molten-wow.com among positive developments because it had reportedly closed.

Refunds and the bill's remedies

On the bill's refund remedy, Gibbons told the committee:

Where compliance is impossible, this bill is going to require refunds that bear no relationship to the years of entertainment that the consumer may have received.

Under the bill's text, a refund is one of several remedies a publisher may choose, alongside an offline version, a patch for independent use, or server tools, & the refund equals the highest price the publisher charged for the game in the 12 months before it stops providing those services. Those requirements would apply only to games first sold or rereleased on or after January 1, 2028. In a June 9, 2026 op-ed, ESA president & CEO Stan Pierre-Louis characterized the bill as suggesting online video games should last forever.

Committee vote

The committee voted on AB 1921 on June 29, 2026. The motion was to pass the bill & re-refer it to the Appropriations Committee; it drew 4 ayes & 3 noes, with four of the committee's eleven members not voting, & failed.

More members voted for the bill than against it, but that was not enough to pass it. Under the rules of the California Legislature, a bill cannot leave a committee unless a majority of the committee's full membership votes for it: A majority of all members is required to report a bill out of committee. The committee has eleven members, so six aye votes were needed. AB 1921 received four, so it failed for lack of the six ayes it needed, regardless of the three noes.

The four members who did not vote, Archuleta, Grayson, Menjivar, & Smallwood-Cuevas, were marked No Vote Recorded, or NVR. California's records do not separate a member who is absent from one who is present but does not vote; the nonpartisan newsroom CalMatters reports that the California Legislature does not distinguish between a lawmaker who is absent ... and a legislator who is present but does not vote, and that both count the same as a no vote. A member who does not vote aye therefore has the same effect on the outcome as one who votes no.

In this case the four were present, not absent. The hearing recording shows each taking part in the committee's other business that day, & Senator Archuleta cast an aye on the bill heard immediately before AB 1921, seconds before its roll call; when their names were called on AB 1921, none of the four cast a vote.

After the bill failed, the committee granted reconsideration, which the California State Senate glossary defines as a motion giving the opportunity to take another vote on a matter previously decided in a committee hearing or floor session. That keeps AB 1921 alive for one more committee vote if its author brings it back. As of June 30, 2026, AB 1921 had not advanced past the committee.

The Senate Business, Professions and Economic Development Committee record shows AB 1921 failing on June 29, 2026 by 4 ayes to 3 noes, with four members not voting.

See also

• Stop Killing Games
• Video game preservation
• Planned obsolescence