Well, shit... (G:AR Kickstarter)

[Mec]

https://www.kickstarter.com/dmca/goblin ... by-goblins
Kickstarter's copy of Thunt's letter to Kickstarter demanding the removal of the Kickstarter page.

Thunt isn't going to get anywhere claiming that Evertide ran the Kickstarter project without the rights to Goblins. Thunt knew about the project, endorsed it, and advertised it to his fans.

Evertide hired Kickstarter to do a job. Kickstarter earned their commission properly. Evertide took the money and did not deliver games but that's not Kickstarter's fault.

[Krulle]

Evertide does not own the rights _anymore_ (according to the information given by Thunt).
When the kickstarter ran, they did have the right to use the name and images.
When they failed to deliver, they lost the right, according to THunt's previous posts about this subject.

Taking the whole page down is pretty hefty, and may be going too far, but having the link removed is just one small amendment, but would be a change in a creators page, something Kickstarter simply does not do. For them it's all or nothing.

[nikohl]

Didn't I hear mention somewhere that Evertide -leased- the rights, and that lease was set to expire in the event of nonproduction of the game after some period of time?

I don't know where I got that from (and am at work on my break so can't check) so it might be wrong. But perhaps this is where the "this is not his right any more" element stems from.

Edit: ninjad by Krulle!

[Krulle]

"As of now, Evertide is no longer involved with the Kickstarter or G:AR and IÔÇÖm taking on all efforts and responsibilities. Also, last week marked the contractual deadline for the release of the game. Which means that every aspect of G:AR, even the parts designed and created by Evertide, became legally mine."

For convenience:
The links to his blog updates:

Pre-kickstarter:
26/05/2012: goblins-alternate-realities-gar-the-card-game-update
04/05/2013: free-comic-book-day-have-a-free-pdf
08/05/2013: goblins-alternate-realities-update-on-the-card-game
13/05/2013: more-goblins-game-announcements
21/05/2013: goblins-alternate-realities-kickstarter-delay
28/05/2013: big-changes-for-goblins

From now on Kickstarter runs.
04/06/2013: the-kickstarter-lives
11/06/2013: i-just-had-to-say-thank-you-again
21/06/2013: 10-days-left
26/06/2013: our-kickstarter-is-ending-so-naturally-i-must-do-a-live-marathon
30/06/2013: new-incentive

After Kickstarter:
07/08/2013: the-new-site-layout-gencon
12/08/2013: gencon
23/01/2014: unofficial-gar-update

Then it went sour:
03/12/2014: lowtide-update-for-goblins-alternate-realities
04/12/2014: lowtide-gar-second-update
11/12/2014: lowtide-the-undead-kickstarter-campaign-third-update
30/01/2015: Another letter Thunt sent to Kickstarter
30/03/2015: goblins-alternate-realities-update (youtube videos)
15/04/2015: kickstarter-theyre-like-wreck-it-ralph-in-a-china-shop-and-each-piece-of-china-is-a-backer
18/04/2015: Letter sent by Thunt to Kickstarter after they've sent his personal address to everyone
11/06/2015: lowtide-update, the FTC has started research into failed kickstarters, and Evertide/Richard may become a target.

I purposefully did not refer to twitter tweets (otherwise than that one letter), as the subjects there concern gameplay, or tidbits of information that's in the blog posts anyway.

Did I miss anything? (I'm sure there are missing a few from before it went sour, and the announcement phase. But his blog archive is horribly difficult/annoying to search and navigate.)


The wiki is also still online:
http://gar.goblinscomic.org/rules/index ... =Main_Page

PS: While I was at it: last update for arwepregnant was 15 June 2013.

[edit]
I'll try to keep this list up to date with later new blog posts or letters.
[/edit]

[Krulle]

I think the best Thunt can hope for is that they will turn it into a dead link, so only they, him, us and the affected people will learn what happend (if it is not already in some google search engine memory)

You mean, like this? :?

Thanks, that allowed me to look up the Kickstarting funding collected.

[mustache_man]

Evertide does not own the rights _anymore_ (according to the information given by Thunt).
When the kickstarter ran, they did have the right to use the name and images.
When they failed to deliver, they lost the right, according to THunt's previous posts about this subject.

Taking the whole page down is pretty hefty, and may be going too far, but having the link removed is just one small amendment, but would be a change in a creators page, something Kickstarter simply does not do. For them it's all or nothing.

Evertide lost the rights according to a contract between Evertide and Thunt. Ks has nothing to do with it. Their own contract is or was with Evertide. They dont really care about Evertide losing the rights due to a clause in another contract and they will not care a whole lot before a judge tells them to. They are not going to "just do the right thing", because unfortunately "the right thing" does not always have a place in a court of law.

And they will most definitely never ever give back whatvever amount of money they made off this project. Their part in the deal was completely fulfilled.

[Guus]

It would be unfair to expect KS to give a refund. That'd be like making the guy who owns the train that runs between the coal mine and the factory pay for the fact that the factory exploded.

[nikohl]

I imagine the references to KS' share of the money are in there mostly for completeness, and in part due to a measure of lost patience on Thunt's part - he's still feeling unjustly obstructed, and so on. I doubt he genuinely wants them to return that, as like Guus says, they did their job back while the project was underway.

[mustache_man]

I imagine the references to KS' share of the money are in there mostly for completeness, and in part due to a measure of lost patience on Thunt's part - he's still feeling unjustly obstructed, and so on. I doubt he genuinely wants them to return that, as like Guus says, they did their job back while the project was underway.

Maybe I'm allucinating but I thought he mentioned that KS made money illegally off the project. Maybe I'm misremembering or he edited it out. Either way, you are probably right and he is probably out of patience and feeling wronged by them, but if he's really serious about taking legal action, that's the kind of behaviour he needs to keep in check. Of course, if I'm just imagining it you can forget this post entirely.

[nikohl]

It doesn't say anything about KS doing anything illegal. It talks about rights. The only mention of illegality is directed at Evertide, from what I can see. And to be fair, leaving a pre-order page up for a game you've admitted you're never going to make is pretty frickin' fraudulent, so there is definitely a "questionable legality" component which Thunt can by rights call attention to. That pre-order page was accessible via a link on the KS page, but aside from that indirect involvement which he'd asked for removal of, I don't think actual accusations are being made or anything.

Having said that, I agree with you that a calm and collected (and calculated - yay, alliteration!) approach to online communication is what's needed going forward, especially if legal action is going to be taken. There are too many ways of accidentally and indelibly shooting oneself in the foot on the internet

[RocketScientist]

On the bright side, if he's getting e-mails from backers, then at least he has contact information from said backers. And he can tell them what is really going on. Sure, it's his word against Kickstarter. But with Kickstarter's admission of an IP dispute, plus their "the check is in the mail" attitude, who are the backers going to believe?

[Aegis J Hyena]

It looks like Thunt mailed them one more time.

http://www.twitlonger.com/show/n_1slqces

I say if Kickstarter doesn't respond in a timely fashion to try to help Thunt out, or if they doesn't respond, period... then I say it's time to go to the media. I don't want to sound like some bratty idiot but "If I can't have satisfaction, nobody will give you their money." (bad choice of words, but you know what I mean, and the media loves a story like this). This has gone beyond kicking Thunt under the bus; this is the bus backing up over him in reverse at 60 MPH.

[spiderwrangler]

Media probably won't care.

[Liesmith]

Christ, Kickstarter is a gaggle of incompetence. They absolutely refused to help until he threatened legal action, then they promptly doxxed him by sending his home address to all the backers who will never receive the product, while at the same time promising that said product is on the way. There has got to be some degree of illegality within that behavior; if not, there sure as shit should be.

[Aegis J Hyena]

Y'know, Liesmith, your signature is awfully close to what I imagine Thunt must be feeling at times these days.

Spider: I dunno. Unless Canadian TV isn't as "sensational" as US TV, I think they would find it an "interesting" story, because no one ever hears of KS doing wrong...

[Liesmith]

That 'Sound of Music' gif is how I imagine a Canadian Joker would act.

[Stardance]

So perhaps someone can enlighten me because I am not seeing it. Maybe it is an early morning thing. Where exactly has kickstarter given out Thunt's home address? Not that I want to find it, I just did not see it in the email from kickstarter or in the links the email provided.

Now that I think of it, a sufficient 'yes it is there' will suffice. I don't think directions should be posted here to his home address either. The more in the dark the better.

But for the record, I never saw his address from Kickstarters email.

Edit: I didn't check the links until this morning, so they could have removed Thunt's personal information.

[Stardance]

Oh,

And I think it is safe to say that if Thunt does have a lawyer, Thunt should cease personal emails to Kickstarter. That should be the lawyers job. Just my opinion. I don't want to see him get in unnecessary trouble. I sincerely hope he is not doing the Intellectual Property dispute all by himself. Given the international component (Canada and US) it is already pretty complicated.

[spiderwrangler]

A copy of the letter he sent them was posted with his name redacted, but address intact.

[nikohl]

It is still there, too.

[Mec]

Like Stardance said, Thunt should hire a lawyer to send his DMCA takedown notices. It looks like he wrote it himself and used his home address for the required contact information.

[Sessine]

>.<

I had not followed the links. They did publish his private address, and it is still there. Damn.

But you're right, Stardance. Thunt needs to stop trying to handle this himself! He keeps trying to make it a personal, common-sense thing, and that is simply not going to work. Big corporations are not set up to deal on a personal level. They can't be. Their procedures have to be set up to handle many people. It seems Thunt has not yet reached the point where employees are allowed to deviate from one-size-fits-all rules. This suggests that Kickstarter gets a quite a lot of intellectual property dispute claims. Their email, as we all recognize here, was a canned response. It included, as would normally be quite proper, a link to the text of the takedown letter.

Thunt didn't foresee this consequence because he's naive about how corporations work. Moreover, even trained lawyers know that it's dangerous to try to represent themselves in a legal matter. If that takedown letter had been sent by his lawyer, the sender's address that would have been published would only have been the lawyer's office.


Edit: Ninja'd by Mec!

[DocMesa]

Can Thunt actually afford to hire a lawyer though? Maybe he's handling all this by himself because he doesn't actually have a choice.

[Guus]

I like how they edited out his name in the address but not in the letter

[Mec]

This is bugging more than it should.

My (unsolicited) advice is that Thunt should read this sentence from his Patreon page about 10 times:

I'm a nice guy who makes a neato comic but terrible business decisions.

He should get a lawyer and get a business advisor. If he can't figure out how to get one, he could ask his Twitter feed for advice, or ask the forum on this board that's especially set up for Thunt to ask for advice.

To be sure, Thunt's business life is not my business (except for the part where I'm a Patreon subscriber so I can kvetch about late or missing Patreon rewards, but that's separate from this). I just hate watching him spend his energy fighting with Kickstarter.