Coleco strong-arming homebrew publishers and fan sites

[+Tarzilla]

Heh, we are only 2050 topics and 83,001 posts behind the Intellivision Forum. Me thinks these threads dealing with all this should help close the gap rather quickly.

 

Look out Rev!!!

Numbers are funny, aren't they...

AtariAge, basically the home of EVERYTHING pre-NES

3,752,684 Total Posts 42,384 Total Members

 

CV Fan, largest Facebook site of the device formally known (to the people that have kept it alive all these years) as the Colecovision

28,880

 

Colecotoys

6058

 

I'm sure among the retro programmers with the Z80/TMS9928A expertise, of which there are a very limited number, the number important to us is

2

(see post #402)

[Bmack36]

The "violations" aren't affecting the current status in that it is not down, but Facebook could choose to shut it down if more violations were reported.

 

Rescinding the allegations allows a buffer for the site to resolve any similar fraudulent allegations without having facebook shut the page down.

[cardo1]

This is a completely rational and respectable post. It's a shame this way of thinking wasn't presented days ago to avoid all of what has transpired since.

 

That being said I'm still waiting for the email that would retract the claims on my page that were wrongly targeted at me.

 

Wouldn't it be nice for me to be able to report that Coleco worked toward resolving that issue?

 

That is all I have asked for this entire time. Nothing else.

 

Your move.

 

We do believe that these discussions were offered on at least two occasions privately concerning this matter.

 

 

On May 17th at 4:33 An offer was made to discuss this matter over the phone with Coleco.

On May 18th at 4:35 PM - An offer was made to work towards a productive collaboration.

 

These emails were both prior to the publishing of this post. Perhaps it was not a good time for you, but none the less, offers to discuss were made.

[TPR]

Do the violation affect the Facebook page? It seems as though the page is up and thriving (as many of you pointed out).

 

That is irrelevant. The fact that your company made erroneous claims against my page and refuses to retract them. That is the issue here. This is about principals and the fact that you won't retract them makes me question if Coleco even has any. The right thing to do is to retract the claims. But yours and your company's stubbornness is what is responsible for everything that has happened regarding this incident this past week. The only people who can change that is you. Yet you refuse. That IMO does not make you or your company look very smart.

[Albert]

I know some of you are not happy with Coleco, but please make your case without resorting to name calling. I will not tolerate such behavior, and you'll find yourself expelled from this thread if you continue.

 

Thank you,

 

..Al

[cardo1]

Well, there were violations and the games were being promoted as "go buy this." The intent is not worth debating. Unfortunately, to take them back as you could image would serve to validate the games utilizing the marks. As a former producer and business owner, I am sure that you can understand this cannot be done. At the time we offered to talk, but we were turned away.

 

Just curious though, you have an extensive stable of well known games that you have produced. Would those all be fair game for the community here or no? I am assuming that you wouldn't be happy if i tossed them all on a mini, royalty free. Rhetorical --- but you get the point.

[TPR]

We do believe that these discussions were offered on at least two occasions privately concerning this matter.

 

 

On May 17th at 4:33 An offer was made to discuss this matter over the phone with Coleco.

On May 18th at 4:35 PM - An offer was made to work towards a productive collaboration.

 

These emails were both prior to the publishing of this post. Perhaps it was not a good time for you, but none the less, offers to discuss were made.

 

Bullshit. I told you the only response I would accept was to retract the claims. I even sent you the email that only required you to copy/paste and send to Facebook, and this would have never happened. Yet you still refused. Your emails came with conditions that I refuse to comply with because YOU WRONGLY MADE CLAIMS on my page and that is not acceptable. At no point was I going to agree to ANY conditions and the only acceptable response was for you to retract those claims.

 

Again, and let me repeat myself once more, this could have all been avoided.

 

Let's not forget one thing here...

 

You continue to claim that the only issues you had with our page was the "adult content" and the Nintendo licensed property. But you claimed posts that represented 63 different games, 5 different homebrewers and 3 different online communities. And of those 63 games, most of which did NOT include adult content or Nintendo licensed property. So why not just retract all the other claims? My offer is reasonable, yet you still refuse.

 

I don't buy for a second that you embrace the homebrew community. Your actions speak for themselves. You come on this page and post all your "conditions and approvals." That's the kind of conditions companies like Nintendo and Sony require of their publishers. But you know what the difference is here? Nintendo and Sony are *REAL COMPANIES* and Coleco is not. Nintendo and Sony have earned the respect that the third parties give them. Coleco has not. Nintendo and Sony are viable mass-market platforms where control is necessary because millions of games are being sold. That is not the same reality for "ColecoVision" but you cannot see the difference. You cannot see the difference between a 1982 defunct system kept alive by a small community of fans and the mass-market Nintendo Switch. Thats is what is really going on here. You want to "pretend" that Coleco is the same as Nintendo, but it's not even close.

 

I'm sorry, Chris, but I don't believe what you're saying for a second and I don't think anyone should accept Coleco's conditions until you can prove to the community that you support it and the community accepts it. And I'd love for you to prove me wrong. Everyone here would.

[cardo1]

TPR you said (Sorry problems with the quotes): "" Bullshit. I told you the only response I would accept was to retract the claims.""

 

Yes, you were unwilling to talk at the time... You Accepted no compromise. We replied with ONE demand.

 

In any event, it appears as though working this out is a moot point with the rest of the group.

 

I'll work on the guide anyway, and present it. If anyone is interested, feel free.

Thank you all for your time. Hopefully Coleco can gain some 'wins' under its belt in the near future and in time we can all make amends.

[TPR]

Thank you all for your time. Hopefully Coleco can gain some 'wins' under its belt in the near future and in time we can all make amends.

 

[DuggerVideoGames]

TPR you said (Sorry problems with the quotes): "" Bullshit. I told you the only response I would accept was to retract the claims.""

 

Yes, you were unwilling to talk at the time... You Accepted no compromise. We replied with ONE demand.

 

In any event, it appears as though working this out is a moot point with the rest of the group.

 

I'll work on the guide anyway, and present it. If anyone is interested, feel free.

Thank you all for your time. Hopefully Coleco can gain some 'wins' under its belt in the near future and in time we can all make amends.

Have fun wasting your time. You sure wasted enough of ours.

[DuggerVideoGames]

Also... why should TPR "compromise" when there was no wrongdoing on his part? Should the victim who was minding his own business on the sidewalk apologize for being hit by a drunk driver? I surely think not!

[Andromeda Stardust]

I made some comparisons of an unnamed individual to various historical dictators, and decided it was better to redact the statement entirely than risk a thread ban. Self moderation might be a wise choice for anyone who might have missed the memo before they posted.

 

I know some of you are not happy with Coleco, but please make your case without resorting to name calling. I will not tolerate such behavior, and you'll find yourself expelled from this thread if you continue.

 

Thank you,

 

..Al

Edited May 24, 2017 by Kosmic Stardust

[DuggerVideoGames]

The community governs itself, but we have a wanna be dictator telling us what we can and cannot do. Cardo1 must really have great respect for outstanding gents who ranked among the greatest leaders of the world, you know, Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini, Joseph Stalin, Fidel Castro, Saddam Hussein, Kim Jung Il / Un, et al.

Even Hitler was a better rapper (Epic Rap battles of history).

[enoofu]

would serve to validate the games utilizing the marks

 

Carts that run on a toy made by Coleco Industries with their old trade dress which is now merged with Hasbro, and not Coleco Holding

[Mindfield]

 

As a developer we understand that you may see the words ‘Licensed’ as ‘pay me’ , but we are more concerned with content of the games. Chances are that if you are simply developing a game for the use on the ol’ system, then we would not request much more than the ‘ability to buy the game from you at cost,’ or ‘ability to produce the same games.’

 

Wait. Hold on. You would, for example, allow a developer of homebrew games to use the Coleco mark if they sell you the game at cost? So the developer makes no money? Or you get permission to reproduce the games yourself, again, giving the developer no money?

 

 

I know homebrewing is a labour of love, but this is just balls-out arrogant and stupid. What possible incentive would any developer have to do any business with you at all? Do you really think this is the way to get back into the community's good graces?

 

I think the appropriate response here is, "Dig UP, stupid!"

[opcode]

Damn, I should be in bed by now...

Coleco, I have a counter-proposal, and this would work for me, you will have to check with the rest of the homebrew authors:

1) You remove the trademark complains against CVF

2) Considering the ColecoVision is a 30+ years old DEAD platform, you just leave me alone to use the ColecoVision logo (not including the Coleco logo, that is YOURS and I never used, except with the SGM under Mr M. permission) in my games, as long as I make it clear that the use is utilitarian to indicate the platform my game is intended to run on (for example by including "For use only with"). I should also include notices in ALL components of the packaging indicating that the content isn't licensed by Coleco AND we are NOT affiliated to Coleco in any way and that ColecoVision is a trademark of Coleco.

3) In retribution to your magnanimous generosity, I will work with you to promote Coleco when convenient and applicable, including, but not limited to, promoting Coleco during events I attend, with properly licensed products (upon mutual agreement on content), including Coleco promotional material in my games and hardware etc. And yes, I will try really hard to like you a little better, though I can't promise that, but at least I will keep it professional

4) You get some love from my fans, though I can't really guarantee that, but will try my best for sure

5) You provide a proper agreement stating the terms that is more than a simple email, and I will review that with my lawyer

That is how things worked before, and I must say it worked pretty well. I always made good word about Coleco and Mr M. allowing me to use the logo, you can check that in this very forum.

No strings attached, you agree with all the terms, we move this to private, otherwise let's not waste each other's precious time.

Ok, I may have sounded a little sarcastic in a few bits, but I am really serious about this. And this is an great deal I must say, I bet it will revert a lot of bad blood.

EDIT: just fixed "that is YOURS" above. Sorry about that

[128Kgames]

This shit is unreal; its gone way beyond the beyond and I think it warrants an actual news story about COLECO being in bed with that douchebag juice. We should reach out to Kotaku or another gaming site that posts game related news stories (sorry, was the only site I could think of off the top of my head, feel free to pick another).

[Andromeda Stardust]

 

Damn, I should be in bed by now...

Coleco, I have a counter-proposal, and this would work for me, you will have to check with the rest of the homebrew authors:

 

Opcode, just cut all ties with him. It isn't worth getting caught up in this spider web they are spinning.

[retroillucid]

Opcode is doing their own CV compatible console

 

CollectorVision is also working on a CV compatible console

 

 

I mean...... ......what else you (we) guys need?

 

 

The best has yet to come!

[TPR]

This shit is unreal; its gone way beyond the beyond and I think it warrants an actual news story about COLECO being in bed with that douchebag juice. We should reach out to Kotaku or another gaming site that posts game related news stories (sorry, was the only site I could think of off the top of my head, feel free to pick another).

 

I actually 100% agree that the fact that Coleco has communication and possible dealings with Juice should be made public. That is actually FAR WORSE than even the claims they made against our page.

[Jess Ragan]

CV clones are tempting, because the original console was... eccentric, and hasn't gotten any easier to use after 35 years. That four pound power supply with three separate voltages is no fun at all to deal with, man.

 

(Where are the threads about these systems, anyway?)

[DuggerVideoGames]

This shit is unreal; its gone way beyond the beyond and I think it warrants an actual news story about COLECO being in bed with that douchebag juice. We should reach out to Kotaku or another gaming site that posts game related news stories (sorry, was the only site I could think of off the top of my head, feel free to pick another).

Excellent idea. After all, Coleco's shady practices affect not only the community, but the Internet and industry itself.

[DuggerVideoGames]

CV clones are tempting, because the original console was... eccentric, and hasn't gotten any easier to use after 35 years. That four pound power supply with three separate voltages is no fun at all to deal with, man.

 

(Where are the threads about these systems, anyway?)

I got my hands on an Atari 7800 a while back and haven't found out if it works yet. Part of me is afraid to plug it in because I don't know if it'll start a fire or not (boy, those 40-foot long cords sure are something to look at!).

[Keatah]

I would not expect an apology or retraction from Coleco. And people are acting mildly surprised it hasn't happened. If it does great, but don't expect it.

[+frankodragon]

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