Comments (1)

By HB, July 29, 2008 9:47 pm

Scrabulous shut down today. Why? Because Hasbro has decided to send them a take-down notice, sue them, and just generally be really crappy. I sent them a nastygram earlier. Here is their response. Enjoy:

“Hi HB,

We understand your passion for the SCRABBLE brand. In fact, we have been hard at work creating a variety of great new ways to enjoy SCRABBLE, from the classic board game, to playing in the digital space on the iPod, iPhone, pogo.com online game site, and now, social networking on Facebook.

Some people have asked us why we couldn’t coexist with Scrabulous, and compete head-to-head. In the toy and game business, we have many legitimate competitors, and we welcome healthy competition as our industry strives to provide the best entertainment value for consumers everywhere. Scrabulous did not represent legitimate competition. Scrabulous was an infringement, it was unlawful, and we took the necessary action, similar to what the recording industry did when kids were posting music to illegal sites and allowing their friends to copy the music for free.

As you know, Hasbro filed suit on July 24 to protect our intellectual property rights. However, in deference to SCRABBLE fans like you, we waited to take this action until we had an authentic alternative to offer players. We know that many of you are closely scrutinizing the new SCRABBLE application developed by Electronic Arts. Please note that this application remains in a beta stage on Facebook, and both EA and Hasbro are monitoring feedback from fans, which will help us as we continue to improve the experience leading up to the official launch scheduled for the first half of August.

In closing, we want you to know that SCRABBLE is a very important game and brand for Hasbro. We value the passion of our fans, and we promise that we will continue to innovate in providing the best SCRABBLE experiences possible.”

So there you have it. The problem isn’t that Scrabulous was awesome, it was that Scrabulous was ILLEGAL. Just like those kids that post music ILLEGALLY. (Damn kids.) And remember – the official SCRABBLE game on Facebook isn’t sucky and broken… it’s the BEST SCRABBLE EXPERIENCE POSSIBLE. I know because Hasbro told me.

Comments (0)

By admin, March 15, 2008 12:54 am

Here, in the room where I’m typing this. Weston is sitting on the bed across from me, playing the guitar. I am listening to him play, in the quiet, and I feel happy. We just got back to the hostel – we took a trip to Longs to buy earplugs, in case anyone else in the room snores. We also bought milk duds, swedish fish, nerds rope, zours, and pink peeps. Weston bought peeps for me. He loves me more than he hates peeps.

We are at the point Montara lighthouse hostel, right up against the ocean, on Highway 1. I got up early today so I could go to work, finish the projects I needed to finish, and leave early. I was planning on leaving early to go out of town, but ended up leaving work even earlier in order to sing at a funeral. Weston and I (and another friend) were asked to sing together. The family requested the song Some Day, which I had never heard, but I found really moving. It makes me think about the fact that this man is now… somewhere else. He’s not nowhere. He’s just… not here anymore. And even though none of us know what it’s like, we’ll all have to go through it some day… every one. Ready or not.