I think it was like this - the lawsuit was threatened by Gibson against the makers of Ibanez guitars about 1977, no legal action just a threat. In the end Gibson got nothing except a ?gentleman?s agreement? for Ibanez to change the wavy shape at the top of the headstock (so-called ?open book? shape or ?moustache? shape), several other Japanese makers initially followed suit & changed shape, but after a year or two many of them changed back to the exact open-book shape ? Tokai began making electrics in 77 or 78 & always made the whole thing ?exact?. I guess Gibson really had no case in Law, or at least couldn?t make it stick outside the US. The Fender story was a bit different, instead of trying a lawsuit they made an agreement, again with Ibanez, to manufacture ?real? Strats & Teles in Japan (first as "JV Squier") ? agreement meant these guitars not for sale in the US (sales confined to Japan & Europe), point being to stop US buyers getting cheaper Japanese copies (keep them buying expensive US Fender).
Really the term ?Lawsuit? has now become thoroughly worthless ie just used as a sales pitch. As Ned says, it now refers to any of the more exact looking copies made in 1970?s-80?s, and main effect was to wake up Gibson & Fender,? eg by 1977-78 Tokai already made a very precise copy of 1958-60 Les Paul, however, at that time Gibson themselves were only just beginning to experiment with ?re-issues? like the rare Jimmy Wallace models & Strings & Things models (all dealer requests), but it was not until 1980-82 that Gibson really got going with their Heritage-80 model (fine guitar, but far from exact copy/re-issue). 2-cents :-? .
Ian.
