@Lovejoy said:
That excuse is pure bullocks and unacceptable, you know dang well they knew what they were doing.
They're publishing hundreds of games from a web based HTML5 arcade to a mobile device. Has anyone actually done that before? It's going to be an incredibly complex procedure, both technically and administratively. I'm not one to let GameSalad slide when I feel they've done something wrong, but in this case it seems like an honest mistake that they're working immediately to rectify. A big mistake. And one that will take a lot of making right - perhaps more than they realise right now. But claiming they did it deliberately is just ridiculous.
@Armelline said:
They're publishing hundreds of games from a web based HTML5 arcade to a mobile device. Has anyone actually done that before?
Doesn't matter if it hasn't been done before, does not excuse the mistake of checking your work.
It's going to be an incredibly complex procedure, both technically and administratively.
Agreed.
I'm not one to let GameSalad slide when I feel they've done something wrong, but in this case it seems like an honest mistake that they're working immediately to rectify.
"honest mistake" as in what? Oops we didn't check all the apps we were submitting. Thats laughable and something that should not happen in the first place. Inexcusable .
A big mistake. And one that will take a lot of making right - perhaps more than they realise right now. But claiming they did it deliberately is just ridiculous.
They made a deal with amazon for a certain number of apps. As @DeepBlueApps mentioned, the devs got sold out and weren't thought off. All that was a concern is getting that paper.
@DeepBlueApps said: @Armelline You calling this "relatively minor" is a joke and you clearly have no idea the harm GS has done by doing this.
You sound like a record company claiming every download is a lost sale. With the size of the Kindle user-base and the number of games posted, it's unlikely your games have been downloaded even a few dozen times in this short period of time with no direct advertising. Exactly what terrible harm has been done?
You then go on to say we wouldn't last if i was banned? WTF? You have no idea kid.
If GameSalad wanted to drive you out of business they could. (I see 27 trademark violations on your front page alone.) It's naive to claim otherwise. And please don't condescend me by calling me a kid because I'm responding to things more calmly and rationally than you are.
@Lovejoy said:
Thats laughable and something that should not happen in the first place. Inexcusable .
You're right, it shouldn't have happened in the first place. But to claim they did it deliberately is just conspiracy theories. If they signed a contract guaranteeing a certain number of games in a certain timeframe they were very foolish, but I think we can safely apply Hanlow's razor here.
@Armelline said:
You're right, it shouldn't have happened in the first place. But to claim they did it deliberately is just conspiracy theories. If they signed a contract guaranteeing a certain number of games in a certain timeframe they were very foolish, but I think we can safely apply Hanlow's razor here.
I guess we can both agree to disagree on the reasoning behind it.
This is no mistake, no slip up and nothing minor. It's a clear breach of copyright law and a direct attack at the users that make Gamesalad games.
Not all of us do this for the fun of making games. For some this is the core business that they base their income on. To have GS take 'the liberty' and put these games up for free without even contacting the developers of those games is undermining the hard work put into those games by the respective developer, artist and sound guys.
@Armeline - you are either in the very lucky position not to have to care about your work or you are just naive fanboy.
"I see 27 trademark violations on your front page alone." I would love to hear those. Are you even sure what the term trademark means and what's involved and that game play as such can not be trademarked?
It's not a matter of the financial harm done by this action. The impact financially might be small for most developers individually. The fact remains, that GS received money for the release of games that they (at least in parts) had no rights to. The even bigger harm is done by the complete loss of trust in GS as a reliable partner in a business relation. You can not screw the users that create your showcase pieces like this.
@Lovejoy - stupidity in business has consequence just like malice. There is no excuse for being stupid and doing the wrong thing. It's still something that has harmed people and that the users should not just let go.
I just asked for the removal of one of the games I was working on a few years back. I know for sure that GS has no right to that game. I am also considering legal action as they clearly infringed on my copyright.
DeepBlueApps is using game concepts from popular games and recreate them in Gamesalad for their templates using their own art. You might argue about the moral side of recreating a game's mechanics but that issues is a completely different topic and a widespread problem (see all the flappy birds clones out in the stores).
@SpriteAttack I think you might have misunderstood my last post quote. I am in no way justifying these actions, nor do i believe it was by mistake. Im on the plaintiff side of things regarding this mess.
I am a little pissed off at the moment after finding out about this major screw-up, the total lack of understanding by GS for the users and the major breach of trust. I have had my art stolen countless times and most of the time you have no way to get anything other than headaches and lawyer's bills. In this case those there is a clear culprit, with an address and contact details, who used material they had no rights to in a business deal. I am seriously thinking about not swallowing the anger and instead let my lawyer have a good go at GS ( if Amazon won't get to them first - as I just noticed that the link to all the games is no longer available - just minutes after I sent my request to take off my game).
@SpriteAttack said:
Armeline - you are either in the very lucky position not to have to care about your work or you are just naive fanboy.
Or I gave them permission to use my games for promotional purposes.
"I see 27 trademark violations on your front page alone." I would love to hear those. Are you even sure what the term trademark means and what's involved and that game play as such can not be trademarked?
The GameSalad name and logo are trademarked and DBA are using them to make money. Nothing to do with games. I've been around a long time and I'm fully aware gameplay cannot be trademarked (which would make no sense anyway). Perhaps it's you a little unclear on your terminology.
The fact remains, that GS received money for the release of games that they (at least in parts) had no rights to.
You just don't know that. You're jumping to wild conclusions.
I just asked for the removal of one of the games I was working on a few years back. I know for sure that GS has no right to that game. I am also considering legal action as they clearly infringed on my copyright.
What is very concerning is how long it is taking to rectify this. I genuinely believe it was a mistake, but it's one that should have been fixed within hours, not days or weeks.
"Or I gave them permission to use my games for promotional purposes."
They didn't get permission from us, the check box wasn't even there when we uploaded Bumps and i think promotional purposes is a little different from releasing free to a store that has conflict with the same games your trying to sell on the store.
@DeepBlueApps said:
It's wrong and should never of happened.
Never claimed otherwise. This was a crappy situation. The point I've argued against is that it was done knowingly and deliberately by GameSalad. Perhaps it was. Perhaps that'll be proved in the lawsuits you guys are talking about. But it's just not something we can assume, especially not with GameSalad's track record of... minor errors.
@Armelline said:
The point I've argued against is that it was done knowingly and deliberately by GameSalad. Perhaps it was. Perhaps that'll be proved in the lawsuits you guys are talking about. But it's just not something we can assume, especially not with GameSalad's track record of... minor errors.
How can a whole bunch of games end up going to Amazon without anyone knowing. It's not like someone presses a button by mistake and woosh all those games are on Amazon. You would have to enter each item to the Amazon store. As much as you like to see the 'innocent side' of GS in this, it's a little too far fetched for my liking.
You assumption that this deal was not based on some financial gain for GS (whether directly or indirectly through access to next gen devices) seem a little naive. Why would you go to all the work of publishing a huge pile of games on this platform, spend a lot of time doing so, when there is no gain whatsoever? It doesn't make sense.
As for the use of the gamesalad and corona logo - which are trademarked - deep blue apps is in no way misusing them. If there was a breach of trademark rights and dba would impersonate either company, it would be up to the trademark owner to claim their right. GS is well aware of dba and the use of their logo to identify the templates, that also benefit GS itself.
@SpriteAttack said:
It's not like someone presses a button by mistake and woosh all those games are on Amazon.
The process was almost certainly automated. It would be insane to do it one by one. But I'm not going to keep arguing with you about this. You can keep having your little rage-on about it and I'll just ignore you.
GS is well aware of dba and the use of their logo to identify the templates, that also benefit GS itself.
GameSalad allow it to happen because it benefits them, but they could absolutely refuse to allow DBA to keep using their name and logo if they wanted to. No ifs and buts. Think you need to do a bit more reading up about trademarks and how they can and can't be used legally.
@Armelline "Or I gave them permission to use my games for promotional purposes"
I ticked that box, as it was required, for entries in the Jams, and I did so in good faith.. Believing that the games were going to be used on GameSalad Arcade, and on an HTML5 channel hosted by Amazon. Had I known, or been told that GameSalad intended to publish the games as Android apps, I wouldn't have entered the competition, and would definately not have ticked that box.
We were misled... Plain and simple, and it's been a massive abuse of our trust by Gamesalad. Whether we ticked that box or not, GameSalad has overstepped the mark here, and really shown, yet again, that they can't be trusted.
Again, I'm more than happy for my games to be used for promotional purposes on the Arcade, and on restricted HTML5 channels... That's what I submitted as... But I'm not happy at all that GameSalad thinks its ok to just publish them wholesale as Android apps...
Even more so in the shoddy way they've published them, that actually make them run worse... Which adds insult to injury.
@Chunkypixels said:
Armelline "Or I gave them permission to use my games for promotional purposes"
I ticked that box, as it was required, for entries in the Jams, and I did so in good faith.. Believing that the games were going to be used on GameSalad Arcade, and on an HTML5 channel hosted by Amazon. Had I known, or been told that GameSalad intended to publish the games as Android apps, I wouldn't have entered the competition, and would definately not have ticked that box.
We were misled... Plain and simple, and it's been a massive abuse of our trust by Gamesalad. Whether we ticked that box or not, GameSalad has overstepped the mark here, and really shown, yet again, that they can't be trusted.
Again, I'm more than happy for my games to be used for promotional purposes on the Arcade, and on restricted HTML5 channels... That's what I submitted as... But I'm not happy at all that GameSalad thinks its ok to just publish them wholesale as Android apps...
Even more so in the shoddy way they've published them, that actually make them run worse... Which adds insult to injury.
I see little to argue with here. Perhaps now we're getting to some valid points.
@Armelline - I totally agree. Let's just ignore each other as there is really no need to prove to me what a smart-ass you are. I am just a silly, little artist who just happened to be around for a while making games for a living long before there was GS or even Amazon.
@SpriteAttack said:
Armelline - I totally agree. Let's just ignore each other as there is really no need to prove to me what a smart-ass you are. I am just a silly, little artist who just happened to be around for a while making games for a living long before there was GS or even Amazon.
Putting aside our disagreements, I'm genuinely interested in hearing about your experiences working on games in the early 90s. The golden age of gaming, in my opinion.
Im a little unsure as to how automated it actually was too....
Not all apps on the Arcade have been published to Amazon... Take the Jam entries. Not all have been submitted.... Not all of the winners have... And they're the ones meant to be getting Additional promotion. Also, some of the winners have been published listing the developers name.... Some haven't.
So there's some inconsistencies.... Which makes me question how automated it was...
I'm annoyed that 6 of my games have been published like this.... yet some people have been lucky and haven't had any of theirs abused in this incident.
I'm not happy that GameSalad pulls stunts like this....
@jonmulcahy - very rational but this is not something as simple as sending out automated emails. Then again, we are talking about GS here and their track history of 'minor mistakes' and 'slightly gone wrong' approaches.
Still... it's nothing your would leave your apprentice in charge of. Even with the tick box in place - I am not convinced that a free to download post on Amazon qualifies as a normal 'promotional use'.
tatiangMember, Sous Chef, PRO, Senior Sous-ChefPosts: 11,949
I haven't commented on this because it doesn't directly affect me since I don't publish to the Arcade and my game jam attempt was completed a day after the deadline. But I do find it disconcerting that the term "media" was used so widely as to allow for downloadable versions of the games. Even reading over the terms of service I would not have expected that to be the case.
Playing devil advocate again, however. No one reads this stuff.
Try reading...if you a couple years spare time...the Rights you give away with Facebook. Its no different. We just click ok.
Rights Granted by you: By entering this content you understand that GameSalad, anyone acting on behalf of GameSalad, or its respective licensees, successors and assigns will have the right, where permitted by law, without any further notice, review or consent to print, publish, broadcast, distribute, and use, worldwide in any media now known or hereafter in perpetuity and throughout the World, your entry, including, without limitation, the entry and winner's name, portrait, picture, voice, likeness, image or statements about the Sweepstakes, and biographical information as news, publicity or information and for trade, advertising, public relations and promotional purposes without any further compensation.
Regardless how it may have affected you, as in your ok with it or not to the extreme...Im asking politely...if you would reveal...wether you read the terms of the gamejam or even the terms publishing to the arcade?
After spending about 10-15 mins looking over the thread and discussions...as well as answers from @dgackey I have to say everyone entering the Jams should have pretty much known they were going to do this.
I am not refering to games not entered into the Jams and that were previously published to the arcade...unless the terms of publishing to the arcade are stated the same...which I cannot find any terms yet for publishing to the arcade.
It woukd appear the promotion was not suppose to be permenant.
Comments
They're publishing hundreds of games from a web based HTML5 arcade to a mobile device. Has anyone actually done that before? It's going to be an incredibly complex procedure, both technically and administratively. I'm not one to let GameSalad slide when I feel they've done something wrong, but in this case it seems like an honest mistake that they're working immediately to rectify. A big mistake. And one that will take a lot of making right - perhaps more than they realise right now. But claiming they did it deliberately is just ridiculous.
Contact me for custom work - Expert GS developer with 15 years of GS experience - Skype: armelline.support
Doesn't matter if it hasn't been done before, does not excuse the mistake of checking your work.
Agreed.
"honest mistake" as in what? Oops we didn't check all the apps we were submitting. Thats laughable and something that should not happen in the first place. Inexcusable .
They made a deal with amazon for a certain number of apps. As @DeepBlueApps mentioned, the devs got sold out and weren't thought off. All that was a concern is getting that paper.
Fortuna Infortuna Forti Una
@Armelline You calling this "relatively minor" is a joke and you clearly have no idea the harm GS has done by doing this.
You then go on to say we wouldn't last if i was banned? WTF? You have no idea kid.
You sound like a record company claiming every download is a lost sale. With the size of the Kindle user-base and the number of games posted, it's unlikely your games have been downloaded even a few dozen times in this short period of time with no direct advertising. Exactly what terrible harm has been done?
If GameSalad wanted to drive you out of business they could. (I see 27 trademark violations on your front page alone.) It's naive to claim otherwise. And please don't condescend me by calling me a kid because I'm responding to things more calmly and rationally than you are.
Contact me for custom work - Expert GS developer with 15 years of GS experience - Skype: armelline.support
You're right, it shouldn't have happened in the first place. But to claim they did it deliberately is just conspiracy theories. If they signed a contract guaranteeing a certain number of games in a certain timeframe they were very foolish, but I think we can safely apply Hanlow's razor here.
Contact me for custom work - Expert GS developer with 15 years of GS experience - Skype: armelline.support
I guess we can both agree to disagree on the reasoning behind it.
Fortuna Infortuna Forti Una
but cant we all just agree....to call this "Jammer-Gate"?
#JammerGate2015
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Hanlon's Razor....Hanlon's.
Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.
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Well spotted! Silly mistake there
Contact me for custom work - Expert GS developer with 15 years of GS experience - Skype: armelline.support
Fortuna Infortuna Forti Una
This is no mistake, no slip up and nothing minor. It's a clear breach of copyright law and a direct attack at the users that make Gamesalad games.
Not all of us do this for the fun of making games. For some this is the core business that they base their income on. To have GS take 'the liberty' and put these games up for free without even contacting the developers of those games is undermining the hard work put into those games by the respective developer, artist and sound guys.
@Armeline - you are either in the very lucky position not to have to care about your work or you are just naive fanboy.
"I see 27 trademark violations on your front page alone." I would love to hear those. Are you even sure what the term trademark means and what's involved and that game play as such can not be trademarked?
It's not a matter of the financial harm done by this action. The impact financially might be small for most developers individually. The fact remains, that GS received money for the release of games that they (at least in parts) had no rights to. The even bigger harm is done by the complete loss of trust in GS as a reliable partner in a business relation. You can not screw the users that create your showcase pieces like this.
@Lovejoy - stupidity in business has consequence just like malice. There is no excuse for being stupid and doing the wrong thing. It's still something that has harmed people and that the users should not just let go.
I just asked for the removal of one of the games I was working on a few years back. I know for sure that GS has no right to that game. I am also considering legal action as they clearly infringed on my copyright.
@Armeline - just a little clarification:
Copyright vs Trademark
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trademark
DeepBlueApps is using game concepts from popular games and recreate them in Gamesalad for their templates using their own art. You might argue about the moral side of recreating a game's mechanics but that issues is a completely different topic and a widespread problem (see all the flappy birds clones out in the stores).
@SpriteAttack I think you might have misunderstood my last post quote. I am in no way justifying these actions, nor do i believe it was by mistake. Im on the plaintiff side of things regarding this mess.
Fortuna Infortuna Forti Una
@Lovejoy - sorry for misunderstanding.
I am a little pissed off at the moment after finding out about this major screw-up, the total lack of understanding by GS for the users and the major breach of trust. I have had my art stolen countless times and most of the time you have no way to get anything other than headaches and lawyer's bills. In this case those there is a clear culprit, with an address and contact details, who used material they had no rights to in a business deal. I am seriously thinking about not swallowing the anger and instead let my lawyer have a good go at GS ( if Amazon won't get to them first - as I just noticed that the link to all the games is no longer available - just minutes after I sent my request to take off my game).
Or I gave them permission to use my games for promotional purposes.
The GameSalad name and logo are trademarked and DBA are using them to make money. Nothing to do with games. I've been around a long time and I'm fully aware gameplay cannot be trademarked (which would make no sense anyway). Perhaps it's you a little unclear on your terminology.
You just don't know that. You're jumping to wild conclusions.
What is very concerning is how long it is taking to rectify this. I genuinely believe it was a mistake, but it's one that should have been fixed within hours, not days or weeks.
Contact me for custom work - Expert GS developer with 15 years of GS experience - Skype: armelline.support
"Or I gave them permission to use my games for promotional purposes."
They didn't get permission from us, the check box wasn't even there when we uploaded Bumps and i think promotional purposes is a little different from releasing free to a store that has conflict with the same games your trying to sell on the store.
It's wrong and should never of happened.
Never claimed otherwise. This was a crappy situation. The point I've argued against is that it was done knowingly and deliberately by GameSalad. Perhaps it was. Perhaps that'll be proved in the lawsuits you guys are talking about. But it's just not something we can assume, especially not with GameSalad's track record of... minor errors.
Contact me for custom work - Expert GS developer with 15 years of GS experience - Skype: armelline.support
How can a whole bunch of games end up going to Amazon without anyone knowing. It's not like someone presses a button by mistake and woosh all those games are on Amazon. You would have to enter each item to the Amazon store. As much as you like to see the 'innocent side' of GS in this, it's a little too far fetched for my liking.
You assumption that this deal was not based on some financial gain for GS (whether directly or indirectly through access to next gen devices) seem a little naive. Why would you go to all the work of publishing a huge pile of games on this platform, spend a lot of time doing so, when there is no gain whatsoever? It doesn't make sense.
As for the use of the gamesalad and corona logo - which are trademarked - deep blue apps is in no way misusing them. If there was a breach of trademark rights and dba would impersonate either company, it would be up to the trademark owner to claim their right. GS is well aware of dba and the use of their logo to identify the templates, that also benefit GS itself.
The process was almost certainly automated. It would be insane to do it one by one. But I'm not going to keep arguing with you about this. You can keep having your little rage-on about it and I'll just ignore you.
GameSalad allow it to happen because it benefits them, but they could absolutely refuse to allow DBA to keep using their name and logo if they wanted to. No ifs and buts. Think you need to do a bit more reading up about trademarks and how they can and can't be used legally.
Contact me for custom work - Expert GS developer with 15 years of GS experience - Skype: armelline.support
@Armelline "Or I gave them permission to use my games for promotional purposes"
I ticked that box, as it was required, for entries in the Jams, and I did so in good faith.. Believing that the games were going to be used on GameSalad Arcade, and on an HTML5 channel hosted by Amazon. Had I known, or been told that GameSalad intended to publish the games as Android apps, I wouldn't have entered the competition, and would definately not have ticked that box.
We were misled... Plain and simple, and it's been a massive abuse of our trust by Gamesalad. Whether we ticked that box or not, GameSalad has overstepped the mark here, and really shown, yet again, that they can't be trusted.
Again, I'm more than happy for my games to be used for promotional purposes on the Arcade, and on restricted HTML5 channels... That's what I submitted as... But I'm not happy at all that GameSalad thinks its ok to just publish them wholesale as Android apps...
Even more so in the shoddy way they've published them, that actually make them run worse... Which adds insult to injury.
I see little to argue with here. Perhaps now we're getting to some valid points.
Contact me for custom work - Expert GS developer with 15 years of GS experience - Skype: armelline.support
@Armelline - I totally agree. Let's just ignore each other as there is really no need to prove to me what a smart-ass you are. I am just a silly, little artist who just happened to be around for a while making games for a living long before there was GS or even Amazon.
Putting aside our disagreements, I'm genuinely interested in hearing about your experiences working on games in the early 90s. The golden age of gaming, in my opinion.
Contact me for custom work - Expert GS developer with 15 years of GS experience - Skype: armelline.support
Im a little unsure as to how automated it actually was too....
Not all apps on the Arcade have been published to Amazon... Take the Jam entries. Not all have been submitted.... Not all of the winners have... And they're the ones meant to be getting Additional promotion. Also, some of the winners have been published listing the developers name.... Some haven't.
So there's some inconsistencies.... Which makes me question how automated it was...
I'm annoyed that 6 of my games have been published like this.... yet some people have been lucky and haven't had any of theirs abused in this incident.
I'm not happy that GameSalad pulls stunts like this....
I'm not sure how this went down, but I believe it was automated.
I also believe that the automation tool paid attention to the opt out checkbox that was there during all the game jams.
I further believe that there was an error in logic that said something like:
and the empty values were not false, and were uploaded.
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This makes perfect sense.
The big issue, from what I can see, is why the games are downloadable.
Contact me for custom work - Expert GS developer with 15 years of GS experience - Skype: armelline.support
@jonmulcahy - very rational but this is not something as simple as sending out automated emails. Then again, we are talking about GS here and their track history of 'minor mistakes' and 'slightly gone wrong' approaches.
Still... it's nothing your would leave your apprentice in charge of. Even with the tick box in place - I am not convinced that a free to download post on Amazon qualifies as a normal 'promotional use'.
I haven't commented on this because it doesn't directly affect me since I don't publish to the Arcade and my game jam attempt was completed a day after the deadline. But I do find it disconcerting that the term "media" was used so widely as to allow for downloadable versions of the games. Even reading over the terms of service I would not have expected that to be the case.
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Playing devil advocate again, however. No one reads this stuff.
Try reading...if you a couple years spare time...the Rights you give away with Facebook. Its no different. We just click ok.
Regardless how it may have affected you, as in your ok with it or not to the extreme...Im asking politely...if you would reveal...wether you read the terms of the gamejam or even the terms publishing to the arcade?
After spending about 10-15 mins looking over the thread and discussions...as well as answers from @dgackey I have to say everyone entering the Jams should have pretty much known they were going to do this.
I am not refering to games not entered into the Jams and that were previously published to the arcade...unless the terms of publishing to the arcade are stated the same...which I cannot find any terms yet for publishing to the arcade.
It woukd appear the promotion was not suppose to be permenant.
This sure is a mess though.
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