Interesting piece. The fact is that even if Hasbro read this article, they have too much pride to go with such an entrepreunerial idea.
Nicki B.
· 1 year ago
If Hasbro wants to potentially increase profits and popularity, they'd be stupid not to take Don's advice.
Shawn Farner
· 1 year ago
Dead on. I couldn't agree more. I actually thought myself that an acquisition would be on the horizon because, well, that would be the SMART thing to do. That is why these corporate suits make way more than I do, right? They are supposed to be smart enough to make the right move in this situation.
They'll be paying for this.
Stephen Kelly
· 1 year ago
Its still working from Australia.
So if anyone is REALLY keen on playing it - they may just have to move down under :)
Steve
Dave Mastio
· 1 year ago
If Scrabulous was intellectual property piracy, the pirates weren't very good.
Pirates don't spend money turning what they steal into a new and better business for the victim. Rather than pirates, the scrabulous guys were more like free R&D and no-risk start-up capital for Hasbro.
These pirates should be getting a medal.
Nanda
· 1 year ago
Good article, but Scrabulous is not dead yet, what about us non us/canada users who can still play? do we count?
Sara
· 1 year ago
you won't be playing for long so revel in it
Jay Heiser
· 1 year ago
I can only imagine the in-house conversations at Hasbro. Lots of people must have wanted to accommodate the realities of the web, and I'm sure somebody suggesting just buying these two guys out, and hiring them to create an authorized version.
Its very difficult for a company to cannibalize its own babies, though. I think they made a mistake, and I hope they rethink this decision, and I especially hope that what they really intend is to create their own version of the game implemented in a manner or place such that nobody uses it.
Erik Giberti
· 1 year ago
Actually, the developers posted that note (likely to comply with a legal request) but the app is still very much there and Facebook itself post this message. Notice that this page is actually a "Scrabulous" page.
Mike B-C
· 1 year ago
Why would Hasbro pay for something that is legally theirs? The cost of Hasbro developing a Scrabble app for Facebook would likely be less than that of acquiring the app from Mssrs. Aggarwalla. Will they lose some of that 500,000 player pool in the process? Yes. But will they get some of that player pool back? I think so, provided that the app they do develop is free to play. This may also lead them to start coming out with FaceBook versions of some of their other board games.
Bree
· 1 year ago
Hasbro already did develop their own official version and it's not nearly as popular as Scrabulous. Probably for a number of reasons: 2nd on the block, technically buggy, etc. And maybe a bigger reason that Don is pointing out a new Brand.
I agree with your point that maybe it isn't right that they should pay something that is legally theirs, but they should have approached this as an opportunity, not a problem.
Imagine if they bought/merged with Scrabulous or gone about it any other way as an opportunity. They would have added one or two more features and then we would all be reading a blog post here about how awesome Hasbro is by making a cool online game cooler.
Adam
· 1 year ago
I'm pretty sure Hasbro has an exclusive licensing agreement with EA that would prevent them from purchasing scrabulous and running their own electronic version of Scrabble.
Alicia
· 1 year ago
sorry, i feel like you're missing the point. Scrabble is Hasbro's IP, they own it. I firmly believe that Scrabulous should be taken down and Scrabble can have their own game available on Facebook. do you also think that widget makers can just pull IP from other sources? clips from spiderman? or passages from Harry Potter? these are owned by people and companies for a reason.
Marko Bon
· 1 year ago
Hasbro should read-up on the key takeaways of the music industry's crash. Don't be the Cable Company that sits while Slingbox gets developed. And reimburse me for the Scrabble iPhone app that I loved but went from often-crashy to simply-inoperable. I bet any money the Scrabulous developers could make me a better one. You have an opportunity right now Hasbro, don't screw it up.
Dave
· 1 year ago
From what I understand, Hasbro and EA tried to buy the game but the pirates demanded a totally unreasonable sum that actually made it cheaper for Hasbro and EA to write their own version.
The fact that you advocate somebody being able to profit from others work shows what is really wrong with the internet.
modemlooper
· 1 year ago
they are also paying for the users as well not just app dev
chris
· 1 year ago
I can't believe that some of you guys agree that Hasbro is totally in the wrong here. Yes, they are a dumb giant corporation that can't figure out a way to stay relevant. Yes, the guys in India found a hole that Hasbro didn't and took advantage of it. However, it was wrong for the brothers to blatantly copy the trademarked idea of scrabble. Why should they profit from a trademarked idea, just because they couldn't innovate and create an entirely new game? And to think they wanted 10 million dollars for it!
They should have just sold it to Hasbro at cost. Both parties are at fault here: Hasbro should have pulled their head out of their asses sooner and the brothers shouldn't have been so greedy.
Brian
· 1 year ago
Even if scrabble is Hasbro's IP, I think the company benefits by having something like scrabulous out there. It's a great promoting tool that they paid $0.00 for, and it's more than likely bringing in new buyers for the real product sold in stores.
From the users perspective its free and easy to install. You can being playing "scrabble" with a friend in seconds, even if someone just wanted to try scrabble for the first time. This was a perfect way to generate new interest in a product that's probably experiencing deteriorating profits.
Intosh
· 1 year ago
There were reports that Hasbro/Matel offered a 7-figure sum but those guys asked 8-figure. X million $ for your work, which was heavily inspired by someone else's original idea isn't bad, is it? I'd take the money and run if I were them. Smells greed.
Tony T
· 1 year ago
I really don't think scrabulous made THAT many people purchase real versions of scrabble. Scrabble is Hasbro's IP and they should not have to pay for it. Those guys are just greedy and people will totally forget scrabulous in a year or two and replace it with EA/Hasbro's version. Do you think people really care about their fight? They will just play whatever version is available, free and has their friends on it.
Marko Bon
· 1 year ago
The larger point here is that brands are starting to take the Social Networking space more seriously, they're willing to kill a popular App to presumably replace it with their own, and they may charge a monthly / annual fee. Does anyone *really* have a problem with Hasbro making a FB Scrabble App, and charging for it?
magnusdopus
· 1 year ago
If the Scrabulous guys got offered $1 million + on top of their expenses, then that's a pretty fair deal. Right now, all that's happening is negotiating. Scrabulous will be back, once Scrabble is unable to recoup the same amount of traffic. And once the Agarwalla's start seeing their legal fees grow. I predict that either a rev-share deal will be hammered out, or some kind of 7-figure deal will go through.
Letting Scrabulous and all the clones do whatever they want with Hasbro's IP is equally dumb. If the new guard just represents cheap knock-offs and greed, then count me out.
willfoxy
· 1 year ago
more interesting is the effect on facebook users. i know quite a few people who only still log-on to facebook for scrabulous, so what will happen now that it's no longer there?
Patrick Williams
· 1 year ago
- Hasbro owns the Scrabble brand, Scrabulous was infringing on that property, Hasbro had an obligation to file suit. I would hope the designers of Scrabulous would also file suit if someone was co-opting their intellectual property. If intellectual property isn't protected we lose the incentive to put in the huge amount of work necessary to bring new ideas and products to the market (Facebook is a for-profit market and nothing other than a for-profit market).
What's stupid about protecting your property? Just because you don't agree with their actions doesn't make them stupid.
DRS
· 1 year ago
Hasbro has every right, and actually an obligation to defend their trademarks. If you don't defend them you can lose them.
Dumber
· 1 year ago
"Don Reisinger weighs in on side of pirates, Makes Mashable Look Stupider"
I assume Pete would be fine with me starting a site called Mashable that offers second rate coverage of online news vagualy related to social networking?
faryl
· 1 year ago
I'm not saying it doesn't suck - but aside from Hasbro needing to defend their trademark so they don't get kleenex/xerox/etc. Hasbro may have contractual obligations to EA, if EA's been granted exclusive distribution rights.
Just because they've been around for a while and staff is older than 30 may not mean they're evil - just not as spin savvy as some other companies may be.
modemlooper
· 1 year ago
when ever I here scrabulous I think hasbro board game not two Indian guys. Hasbro messed up. Now when I here it all I think is corporate lawsuit.
sazar
· 1 year ago
I wonder if the author of this lovely diatribe about Hasbro and Scrabble bothered to read into the actual events whereby the brothers REJECTED the offer of Hasbro to PURCHASE what is a blatant rip-off of their IP. Read the CNN article on this.
Considering that they would technically by paying for their very own product for all intents and purposes, that makes no sense.
The only thing the brothers did was create an online format for Scrabble, that is it. The rules, points, layout and every single other thing is a blatant rip-off of the game.
Now, I do enjoy the app and have indulged in games online and personally I do think a FAIR agreement would be to license the online IP from the brothers since they obviously have a superior product to EA's bug-ridden mess and provide the brother's with compensation accordingly for their work. Everyone, except EA, would be happy.
Robert
· 1 year ago
While this proposal makes some level of business sense, the author is failing to look at it from a strategic legal perspective. If Hasbro buys the two out (and this is forgetting that EA owns the digital rights in North America) what they are doing is sending a message that a good way to get rich is to commit copyright infringement and hope you're doing it well enough that instead of being sued into oblivion they'll want to buy your product. There's a new business paradigm that we're slowly and painfully moving toward. I agree that Hasbro's decision might not have been the best, but offering a straight up buyout for a right price isn't in their best interest either. Personally, what I would have done is agree not to pursue litigation in exchange for a cheap buy-out price and extend an invitation to these two young men to come work for the company and help lead an expansion of Hasbro's IP into the digital world. Scrabulous may have had 500K users, but it's hard to monetize facebook users. Let's face it, most of them are broke high school and college students. It's definitely worth something, but I don't think the suggestions of a 7 figure deal are spouting the correct valuation of Scrabulous.
Dennis
· 1 year ago
This is the problem with trademarks, patents, etc... The people who have the idea are not necessarily the best to develop them. The guys from India made a better Scrabble than the people who "own" the IP.
Now I realize it's not quite the same, but if I "owned" the cure to cancer, and no one else was allowed to take my idea and make a actual product out of it, and I did a really bad or incomplete job of it, how would my "owning" the idea benefit society. Do I really have a right to control it because I was the first to have the idea? Too far a stretch? How about air-bags or seat-belts -- what if GM was the only one who could use them? Drugs? The US pays 10+ times the cost of drugs because pharmaceutical companies have the rights to them -- but in Canada and elsewhere generics are allowed to make them too, at much reduced cost. All because someone "owns" an idea.
Patents, IP, etc are an archaic idea that was suppose to give incentives to the respective owners to pursue taking an idea and creating a product from it without risk of others infringing on their "hard work" of developing the idea. Unfortunately, this often backfires and the idea gets into a half-baked product. They don't have to be good because no-one else can offer alternatives. Most of the world acknowledges that monopolies stifle markets and screw the consumer, while free markets and competition promote better products and prices.
This is exactly what happened with Scrabble/Scrabulous. While Hasbro has the "rights" to the idea, Scrabulous produced a better product. Actions (finished) speak louder that words (IP). While under the current system, Hasbro MUST defend their IP, or they'll lose it -- it's time that concept is abandoned for the betterment of the world, beit applied to a game, a product, a process or whatever.
magnusdopus
· 1 year ago
I'm just wondering what your opinion of Microsoft is. Sometimes it's not the best product, but the one easiest to market.
Mark Z
· 1 year ago
well, looks like it wasn't so stupid for hasbro -- i don't think they'll lose the loyalty of their fans. the fact is, the game is popular and will sell itself. hasbro has been working on their own scrabble application and waiting to file the injunctions until their launch date was set.
Below is the new app. Bet you'll click and add the app.
I was so pissed when I woke up this morning to make my next move... Oh well.
The two dudes should be in jai
· 1 year ago
Gee... Let's rally around acknowledged counterfitters! WooHoo! Yeah! They totally should have kept running their program! Who cares that they violated a company's right to sell what's theirs! Who cares that they're profitting off of something they didn't really make by selling ads! More people used it than the legitimate version, so therefore, they're right and the real owner is wrong! ... ...
...
...
I hate my generation.
Seriously people. It's the law. I hope the two thieves wind up in jail, and/or bankrupt when Hasbro wins their suit against them.
Nathan
· 1 year ago
@ Dennis... I take your point about the cancer cure, but let's try a few other comparisons. Let's say you own an acre of land. You have a nice two-bedroom house on it. I live across the street. I look at your land and I realize I could put a twenty-unit apartment building on one corner of it. I go to you and ask you to subdivide and sell me a part of your lot. You refuse, for whatever reason -- let's say you're the "old guard." Do I then have the right to kick you off that part of your property and build on it, because after all you weren't really doing anything with it?
Or, let's say you spent twenty years of hard work developing the formula for a new kind of plastic. You patent it. You spend the next twenty years happily earning your income from the one licensee you've sold the formula to, who makes a little gadget you like. I come along. I suddenly realize that your formula could be put to much broader use making twenty other kinds of gadgets. I go to you and ask you to license the formula to me. You refuse, for whatever reason -- let's say you're just too aged and closed-minded to really understand my brilliant vision for the future of your formula. Does that then give me the right to simply appropriate the formula for my own use, without any compensation or attribution, and begin doing what I want with it? After all, you weren't really using it, right?
Or, let's say you spend five years writing a novel. You haven't published it -- the typescript is sitting in your desk drawer. One day I happen to open the drawer. I see the novel and I start looking through it. "This is brilliant," I say. "You should publish this." "I don't think I really want this to be published," you say, for whatever reason -- let's say you just don't get this newfangled "print" media. Does that give me the right to take it out of your desk when you're not looking and sell it to a publisher under my own name? After all, you weren't really going to ever make anything out of it, right?
Dennis
· 1 year ago
@nbr,
Thank you for bringing these positions up. Let me address them one by one.
1) Kicking me off my land is different then using my idea for the following reason: You can "take" my idea and I still have my original idea. If you take my land, that's theft, because then I won't have my land. Ideas != Product.
2) If you want my formula and can figure out how to make it yourself -- go ahead. If it really took me 20 years to figure it out, but only takes you 6 months, then I'm pretty stupid. (Note: if you perform industrial espionage to steal the formula, that is a criminal matter - in the scrabble case, there was no stealing of secrets, it's there for the world to see). If I publish the formula and the process to make it, but state you can't use it, then that's just my stupidity again. This is why companies have company secrets (ie 11 secret herbs and spices) (Caveat: some formulas/processes must be disclosed to satisfy regulatory bodies, in which case a non-disclosure agreement will be in place with those agencies - that's not the same as making it public)
3) Again, this is a private vs. public issue. Since I have not disclosed my novel, you have violated my privacy to obtain it -- if you came up with the novel BY YOURSELF, possibly after reading a summary of my novel that I made public, then that's fine. If I'm stupid or lazy or disinterested in pursuing it, why should it stop you from pursuing it. Even if I did publish it and you published a novel basically the same after I let you read my novel, let the public decide who wrote it better by voting with their dollars.
Disclaimer: I am in the software and web development business. I fully support open-source application development -- in fact, I owe my career to people who develop and give away their software for free. I have done great things with their ideas that they never would have pursued and made many people happy with it -- none of that could have been done if we held to the old concepts of owning ideas. When I develop something, I fully acknowledge that although I came up with the idea first, others will emulate it -- for the betterment of others. If they're smart, they might even make it better. I could waste my time trying to protect my ideas, or I can spend that time coming up with, and putting into practice, more ideas.
iernst
· 1 year ago
good post.
I share the opinion of some posters here, now negotiation has just begun.
The shutdown might be only a first shot to get a better position. Lets wait and see what comes. :)
Comedy Blog
· 1 year ago
Scrabulous will be back, though i'll probably be playing Wabble, the online scrabble game that has evidently gone under the radar.
John B.
· 1 year ago
What an uninformed article.
1. Facebook did not kill Scrabulous. Facebook received the notice, and the owners of the game voluntarily pulled it before FB even had a chance to respond or take any action of any kind.
2. Hasbro has a very serious obligation to make claims on its intellectual property. As any IP lawyer knows, if Hasbro fails to take action on infringement cases, they may lose their right later to take action if an even more serious infringement case comes to light. By allowing other groups to infringe, however minor the infringement might be, on their IP, eventually anyone could infringe and Hasbro may lose the infringement claim.
None of this is to say you're wrong on your points, per se; perhaps Hasbro should have purchased Scrabulous. But what would that do? They would change the name anyway. If people love the game, they're not really going to care who provides it.
With all due respect, 'Hasbeen' has not in any way proven their Goliath/David case against the developers of Scrabulous. As they pull the plug on our games with family and friends around the world, I am hopeful that Hasbro/Mattel will feel the full wrath of both the toy, card and board game buying public and the courts. Hasbro did not invent Scrabble, Alfred Butts did.
The following is a direct quote from US Copyright Office FL-108. "The idea for a game is not protected by copyright. The same is true of the name or title given to the game and of the method or methods for playing it.
Copyright protects only the particular manner of an author’s expression in literary, artistic, or musical form. Copyright protection does not extend to any idea, system, method, device, or trademark material involved in the development, merchandising, or playing of a game. Once a game has been made public, nothing in the copyright law prevents others from developing another game based on similar principles."
'Hasbeen's' arrogance in interrupting we Scrabulous game players in the middle of our games is beyond comprehension to me. Instead of seeing an opportunity to reinvigorate their failing games and toy markets through renewed consummer interest, they have totally squandered our good will by "pulling the plug" on Scrabulous.
The absolute stupidity of imposing an under development, low quality EA alternative on us just magnifies their arrogance. Until Scrabulous is restored in its current conception, I plan to totally boycott all Hasbro and Mattel products. Although the lack of toy, card and board game purchases by a single previously solid customer will only be a minor irritant to them, this action multiplied many times over could have a major impact. I certainly hope it does.
Jeff
· 1 year ago
Acquire a group of guys that steal your IP...so make people rich for stealing from you...yeah that makes a lot of sense.
Sure, I agree that Hasbro prob could make a little more by owning scrabulous....but at what cost on the rest of their game portfolio....they basically just say "take all of our game assets and knock them off as you see fit....if you screw our brand in the process...oh well...but if you are a success, we'll make you rich for the theft".
Normally MASH has great stuff....but you guys are just flat wrong on this one.
Amy Too
· 1 year ago
Oh I see. Hasbro wants Scrabulous. The Indian brothers want too much money for it. But maybe they'll go cheaper if Hasbro sues.
I suspect the lawsuit is a chess move, part of the negotiating process.
Debbie Morgan
· 1 year ago
Scrapping Scrabulous is fine with me. That's not why I'm on FaceBook anyway.
There are better places to go for games but FaceBook is hard to beat for soft marketing my safety and security products.
Raising awareness for personal safety is a passion of mind. FaceBook allows me to interact with the people whose safety concerns me and get the message out. No games for me.
All Comments
They'll be paying for this.
So if anyone is REALLY keen on playing it - they may just have to move down under :)
Steve
Pirates don't spend money turning what they steal into a new and better business for the victim. Rather than pirates, the scrabulous guys were more like free R&D and no-risk start-up capital for Hasbro.
These pirates should be getting a medal.
Its very difficult for a company to cannibalize its own babies, though. I think they made a mistake, and I hope they rethink this decision, and I especially hope that what they really intend is to create their own version of the game implemented in a manner or place such that nobody uses it.
I agree with your point that maybe it isn't right that they should pay something that is legally theirs, but they should have approached this as an opportunity, not a problem.
Imagine if they bought/merged with Scrabulous or gone about it any other way as an opportunity. They would have added one or two more features and then we would all be reading a blog post here about how awesome Hasbro is by making a cool online game cooler.
The fact that you advocate somebody being able to profit from others work shows what is really wrong with the internet.
They should have just sold it to Hasbro at cost. Both parties are at fault here: Hasbro should have pulled their head out of their asses sooner and the brothers shouldn't have been so greedy.
From the users perspective its free and easy to install. You can being playing "scrabble" with a friend in seconds, even if someone just wanted to try scrabble for the first time. This was a perfect way to generate new interest in a product that's probably experiencing deteriorating profits.
Letting Scrabulous and all the clones do whatever they want with Hasbro's IP is equally dumb. If the new guard just represents cheap knock-offs and greed, then count me out.
I assume Pete would be fine with me starting a site called Mashable that offers second rate coverage of online news vagualy related to social networking?
Just because they've been around for a while and staff is older than 30 may not mean they're evil - just not as spin savvy as some other companies may be.
Considering that they would technically by paying for their very own product for all intents and purposes, that makes no sense.
The only thing the brothers did was create an online format for Scrabble, that is it. The rules, points, layout and every single other thing is a blatant rip-off of the game.
Now, I do enjoy the app and have indulged in games online and personally I do think a FAIR agreement would be to license the online IP from the brothers since they obviously have a superior product to EA's bug-ridden mess and provide the brother's with compensation accordingly for their work. Everyone, except EA, would be happy.
There's a new business paradigm that we're slowly and painfully moving toward. I agree that Hasbro's decision might not have been the best, but offering a straight up buyout for a right price isn't in their best interest either.
Personally, what I would have done is agree not to pursue litigation in exchange for a cheap buy-out price and extend an invitation to these two young men to come work for the company and help lead an expansion of Hasbro's IP into the digital world. Scrabulous may have had 500K users, but it's hard to monetize facebook users. Let's face it, most of them are broke high school and college students. It's definitely worth something, but I don't think the suggestions of a 7 figure deal are spouting the correct valuation of Scrabulous.
Now I realize it's not quite the same, but if I "owned" the cure to cancer, and no one else was allowed to take my idea and make a actual product out of it, and I did a really bad or incomplete job of it, how would my "owning" the idea benefit society. Do I really have a right to control it because I was the first to have the idea? Too far a stretch? How about air-bags or seat-belts -- what if GM was the only one who could use them? Drugs? The US pays 10+ times the cost of drugs because pharmaceutical companies have the rights to them -- but in Canada and elsewhere generics are allowed to make them too, at much reduced cost. All because someone "owns" an idea.
Patents, IP, etc are an archaic idea that was suppose to give incentives to the respective owners to pursue taking an idea and creating a product from it without risk of others infringing on their "hard work" of developing the idea. Unfortunately, this often backfires and the idea gets into a half-baked product. They don't have to be good because no-one else can offer alternatives. Most of the world acknowledges that monopolies stifle markets and screw the consumer, while free markets and competition promote better products and prices.
This is exactly what happened with Scrabble/Scrabulous. While Hasbro has the "rights" to the idea, Scrabulous produced a better product. Actions (finished) speak louder that words (IP). While under the current system, Hasbro MUST defend their IP, or they'll lose it -- it's time that concept is abandoned for the betterment of the world, beit applied to a game, a product, a process or whatever.
Below is the new app. Bet you'll click and add the app.
http://www.new.facebook.com/apps/application.ph...
...
...
...
...
I hate my generation.
Seriously people. It's the law. I hope the two thieves wind up in jail, and/or bankrupt when Hasbro wins their suit against them.
Or, let's say you spent twenty years of hard work developing the formula for a new kind of plastic. You patent it. You spend the next twenty years happily earning your income from the one licensee you've sold the formula to, who makes a little gadget you like. I come along. I suddenly realize that your formula could be put to much broader use making twenty other kinds of gadgets. I go to you and ask you to license the formula to me. You refuse, for whatever reason -- let's say you're just too aged and closed-minded to really understand my brilliant vision for the future of your formula. Does that then give me the right to simply appropriate the formula for my own use, without any compensation or attribution, and begin doing what I want with it? After all, you weren't really using it, right?
Or, let's say you spend five years writing a novel. You haven't published it -- the typescript is sitting in your desk drawer. One day I happen to open the drawer. I see the novel and I start looking through it. "This is brilliant," I say. "You should publish this." "I don't think I really want this to be published," you say, for whatever reason -- let's say you just don't get this newfangled "print" media. Does that give me the right to take it out of your desk when you're not looking and sell it to a publisher under my own name? After all, you weren't really going to ever make anything out of it, right?
Thank you for bringing these positions up. Let me address them one by one.
1) Kicking me off my land is different then using my idea for the following reason: You can "take" my idea and I still have my original idea. If you take my land, that's theft, because then I won't have my land. Ideas != Product.
2) If you want my formula and can figure out how to make it yourself -- go ahead. If it really took me 20 years to figure it out, but only takes you 6 months, then I'm pretty stupid. (Note: if you perform industrial espionage to steal the formula, that is a criminal matter - in the scrabble case, there was no stealing of secrets, it's there for the world to see). If I publish the formula and the process to make it, but state you can't use it, then that's just my stupidity again. This is why companies have company secrets (ie 11 secret herbs and spices) (Caveat: some formulas/processes must be disclosed to satisfy regulatory bodies, in which case a non-disclosure agreement will be in place with those agencies - that's not the same as making it public)
3) Again, this is a private vs. public issue. Since I have not disclosed my novel, you have violated my privacy to obtain it -- if you came up with the novel BY YOURSELF, possibly after reading a summary of my novel that I made public, then that's fine. If I'm stupid or lazy or disinterested in pursuing it, why should it stop you from pursuing it. Even if I did publish it and you published a novel basically the same after I let you read my novel, let the public decide who wrote it better by voting with their dollars.
Disclaimer: I am in the software and web development business. I fully support open-source application development -- in fact, I owe my career to people who develop and give away their software for free. I have done great things with their ideas that they never would have pursued and made many people happy with it -- none of that could have been done if we held to the old concepts of owning ideas. When I develop something, I fully acknowledge that although I came up with the idea first, others will emulate it -- for the betterment of others. If they're smart, they might even make it better. I could waste my time trying to protect my ideas, or I can spend that time coming up with, and putting into practice, more ideas.
I share the opinion of some posters here, now negotiation has just begun.
The shutdown might be only a first shot to get a better position. Lets wait and see what comes. :)
1. Facebook did not kill Scrabulous. Facebook received the notice, and the owners of the game voluntarily pulled it before FB even had a chance to respond or take any action of any kind.
2. Hasbro has a very serious obligation to make claims on its intellectual property. As any IP lawyer knows, if Hasbro fails to take action on infringement cases, they may lose their right later to take action if an even more serious infringement case comes to light. By allowing other groups to infringe, however minor the infringement might be, on their IP, eventually anyone could infringe and Hasbro may lose the infringement claim.
None of this is to say you're wrong on your points, per se; perhaps Hasbro should have purchased Scrabulous. But what would that do? They would change the name anyway. If people love the game, they're not really going to care who provides it.
http://www.tastesliketv.com/shorts/latest/scrab...
The following is a direct quote from US Copyright Office FL-108.
"The idea for a game is not protected by copyright. The same is true of the name or title given to the game and of the method or methods for playing it.
Copyright protects only the particular manner of an author’s expression in literary, artistic, or musical form. Copyright protection does not extend to any idea, system, method, device, or trademark material involved in the development, merchandising, or playing of a game. Once a game has been made public, nothing in the copyright law prevents others from developing another game based on similar principles."
'Hasbeen's' arrogance in interrupting we Scrabulous game players in the middle of our games is beyond comprehension to me. Instead of seeing an opportunity to reinvigorate their failing games and toy markets through renewed consummer interest, they have totally squandered our good will by "pulling the plug" on Scrabulous.
The absolute stupidity of imposing an under development, low quality EA alternative on us just magnifies their arrogance. Until Scrabulous is restored in its current conception, I plan to totally boycott all Hasbro and Mattel products. Although the lack of toy, card and board game purchases by a single previously solid customer will only be a minor irritant to them, this action multiplied many times over could have a major impact. I certainly hope it does.
Sure, I agree that Hasbro prob could make a little more by owning scrabulous....but at what cost on the rest of their game portfolio....they basically just say "take all of our game assets and knock them off as you see fit....if you screw our brand in the process...oh well...but if you are a success, we'll make you rich for the theft".
Normally MASH has great stuff....but you guys are just flat wrong on this one.
I suspect the lawsuit is a chess move, part of the negotiating process.
There are better places to go for games but FaceBook is hard to beat for soft marketing my safety and security products.
Raising awareness for personal safety is a passion of mind. FaceBook allows me to interact with the people whose safety concerns me and get the message out. No games for me.