January 11, 2008

Hasbro Tries To Shut Down Scrabulous

Erick Schonfeld

95 comments »

“Is Hasbro just a stupid Potato Head? Or is this a brilliant game of Stratego?” That’s the big question Fortune’s Josh Quittner (my former boss) asks as he reports that Hasbro, the toy company that owns Scrabble, is trying to shut down Scrabulous,
one of the most popular Facebook apps. Scrabulous lets you play an online version of Scrabble with your Facebook friends. The app boasts 569,000 daily active user, ranking it No. 9 right after Slide’s SuperPoke, No. 8, and ahead of iLike, No. 10.

Scrabulous co-founder Jayant Agarwalla, 21, confirms that Hasbro “sent a notice to Facebook about two weeks ago. The lawyers are working on it.” Quittner suggests that someone start a Facebook group to save Scrabulous, but we all know how much good that is likely to do.

Update: It’s official. See coverage here

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Comments

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Erik Schwartz

January 11th, 2008 at 11:14 am

I’m surprised it took this long.

We tried to add Scrabble to Yahoo! Games in early 1998, but they wouldn’t license it to us.
Allen Stern

January 11th, 2008 at 11:15 am

I wish they would just take the Q and the Z - I always struggle with those!
Everett

January 11th, 2008 at 11:18 am

Battleship would’ve been a better game or Connect Four
Zaid

January 11th, 2008 at 11:20 am

Awesome show of stupidity on Hasbro’s part.

Just acquiring the app might be cheaper(AND strategically meaningful) than throwing their lawyers at this.
HG

January 11th, 2008 at 11:27 am

Allen
I saw some friends playing something that looked like a cross between Battleship and Connect 4 on facebook the other day.

HG
Jeremy Wright

January 11th, 2008 at 11:27 am

Damn straight they did. Per #1, I’m surprised it took this long. Sure, buying them would be an option, but then in some ways you’re rewarding people for stealing trademarks and brand names.
Tessa

January 11th, 2008 at 11:28 am

@Zaid Completely agree. If they attempted to acquire it, we may also see a pretty interesting effort from traditional game companies (board games, puzzles, etc) in transitioning/ adapting/ playing online in the new online environment many young people (and old!) are reaching towards for entertainment.
Jason

January 11th, 2008 at 11:33 am

Erick
What is your source for the Facebook app statistics … im interested to see what the top 10 apps are.

Jason
Erik Schwartz

January 11th, 2008 at 11:38 am

#6, The buyout offer will be simple.

The Agarwalla brothers turn over Scrabulous to Hasbro and the application lives on.

Hasbro doesn’t sue the Agarwalla brothers and Facebook.
Chris

January 11th, 2008 at 11:39 am

@Jason

http://www.facebook.com/apps/
then click on the ‘Most Active Users’ tab

*you probably need to be logged in to facebook to see these stats
Bejoy

January 11th, 2008 at 11:41 am

Well i think Hasbro is trying to make a history. This would definately be a huge gold mine for hasbro. And i agree with Erik, scrabulous is lucky to get this far.
Shervin

January 11th, 2008 at 11:43 am

Your information is not totally correct. Message me later. Scrabulous is a great game.

Also check out our Warbook game which has 15 million pageviews a day (more pageviews than Scrabulous).

http://apps.facebook.com/warbook/

We also have StreetRace and FightClub (over 1.4m installs):

http://apps.facebook.com/streetrace/?sideNav=1

http://apps.facebook.com/fight-club/

Game on!

Cheers,

Shervin
SGN
Peter Antypas

January 11th, 2008 at 11:48 am

What do you expect from a company run by a 64-year-old CEO? I bet this guy still dictates emails to his secretaries.
David

January 11th, 2008 at 11:53 am

Agreed that they should just shut it down and not reward someone who steals IP without permission. I think the anti-big-company group will say Hasbro’s being stupid, but you need to seriously think about how you’d answer this question: What takes more creativity, coming up with the game of Scrabble or putting something on Facebook?
Doug

January 11th, 2008 at 12:01 pm

The worst thing that could be done is for Scrabbulous to put its code in the public domain. Hasbro should buy scrabbulous if they want to keep them quiet. They actually have fewer options to manage this situation than Jayant. I’m pretty sure they couldn’t sue everyone who recreates scrabbulous - given the millions of programmers throughout the world - from the public code. I’d say $3 Million would be a more than fair price (I would push for $5 Mil myself, but that’s just me).
David B.

January 11th, 2008 at 12:10 pm

Hey, if Hasbro owns Scrabble and these guys not only used Hasbro’s intellectual property without permission - and then made money with it - Hasbro has every right to shut them down AND seize any profits. This isn’t China for cryin’ out loud. At least not yet…

David B.
User447

January 11th, 2008 at 12:12 pm

@9

If they didn’t want to license it in 1998, what makes you think they will want to have an online version today?
Allen Stern

January 11th, 2008 at 12:15 pm

I’d like to challenge Erick to a battle of the bloggers in Scrabble sometime in NYC!
Steve

January 11th, 2008 at 12:22 pm

@13

According to Wikipedia, Alfred Mosher Butts invented Scrabble in 1938 and he died in 1993.

Since the game’s creator is no longer alive, the question about creativity should be: What takes more creativity, putting something on Facebook or hiring a bunch of lawyers?
Erik Schwartz

January 11th, 2008 at 12:26 pm

#16 …because in 1998 Y! Games was an unproven entity. We were still behind MSFT Zone. Pogo was still TEN and not doing casual games. AOL had just bailed out of casual games. Y! was not to pay a license fee to Hasbro. They didn’t want to do a barter/rev share deal.

Things have changed a lot in the last 10 years. The Scrabulous app is proven. They should be able to get it for free (or force facebook to take it down).

The Scrabulous website (hosted in India I believe) will be harder to take down.
Technicle

January 11th, 2008 at 12:27 pm

A lot of newspapers publish crossword puzzles… are they violating anything?
Zaid

January 11th, 2008 at 12:30 pm

@16
*A lot* has changed since 1998. The Internet isn’t just a “cool new thing” anymore. Many companies once hesitant about the web have changed their attitudes over the years. And rightly so.
David

January 11th, 2008 at 12:41 pm

@ Steve:

Should creativity’s effect only exist when the author is alive? What do you say to a company who hires someone for his creativity and pays a premium?

It’s moot to argue which one is more creative, because hiring lawyers who understand intellectual property law does not break the law, whereas putting Scrabble on Facebook without permission does.
jro

January 11th, 2008 at 12:44 pm

As much as I like the game and as much as I can see a biz opp for Hasbro in this, Jayant’s biggest upside will be avoiding his own legal fees. From Hasbro’s perspective, paying this guy even a fraction of money would have other developers coming out of the woodwork building {insert-hasbro-game-here} knockoff facebook apps, and consequently lining up for their payday. The fact that they’re old school fuddy duddys doesn’t give us cool techies privilege to implement anything.
David

January 11th, 2008 at 12:46 pm

I know after a certain amount of time songs become public domain. Can the same apply to board games?
bhc3

January 11th, 2008 at 12:49 pm

Supposing Hasbro did want to pay…Adonomics has the Scrabulous valuation at $2.9 million (thanks to Center Networks for pointing to that site). FWIW…

http://tinyurl.com/36xwrv

Hasbro could look at this as paying for a technology trial they didn’t have to deal with. Now they might see their inventory of games has a whole new “value”. “Value” in the sense of spreading the word about their games. Not sure how many people would pay to use the games.
Matt

January 11th, 2008 at 12:50 pm

how about, this is a company who is trying to protect their intellectual property.

You know, can we please **abandon this notion** that “it’s stupid to sue a website for copying your product online… it’s only giving you exposure… free exposure… duh. what a moron company that doesn’t know what’s good for them. if they were half as smart as me they would acquire this thing and put it to use for themselves…” ….

Honesty.. it takes an idiot to believe that notion… Hasbro has every right to shut this thing down.

How would you feel, Erick, if a new, non-hasbro product was launched on physical store shelves called “Scrabulous” and was like scrabble in every way? Uh.. im pretty sure you’d call foul on that one… (regardless of who is trying to save it.)

I’m rooting for Hasbro on this one because they own Scrabble and never authorized this ninny to make any use of the games attributes (including butchering the name of the product publicly). This guy should be not only have his app removed but he should slapped with a trout (old skool) for being too numb in the cranial area to simply come up with a unique name for his game (exactly what yahoo did in the face of no Scrabble Liscence… release Scrabble, call it something else… DUH!!!!)

Simple Fact: He was counting on the Scarbble name to increase interest in his project, that is a serious weakness and should simply not be tolerated… not by Hasbro and certainly not by any of you fine folks.

and also big LOL to the $3-$5 million (”i would push for $5m myself” … no you wouldn’t. for all the reasons I just stated, no you wouldn’t.)
Shane

January 11th, 2008 at 1:02 pm

Call me libertarian, but board layouts and rules shouldn’t get copyrights. Wouldn’t nintendo be able to sue every sidescrolling game after mario. Or how about every shooting game after duck hunt. If Scrabulous had added one more row and column, would this still be an issue? Also, what real damage does this do to scrabble’s potential online market. I’d argue none, as they’ve done nothing in the social space, and until they do and fail, I’d assume they just just don’t have it in the scope of their business.

Now arguing Scrabulous is jocking their name…maybe.
Erik Schwartz

January 11th, 2008 at 1:06 pm

If Scrabulous had added one more row and column, would this still be an issue?

No.
TechNewsSource

January 11th, 2008 at 1:07 pm

If Scrabulous didn’t have the permission of Hasbro then there is really no reason why they shouldn’t either shut them down or use the app to their benefit.

Well, there is my worthless .02 cents. Now I’m off to play Scrabulous!
Erik Schwartz

January 11th, 2008 at 1:12 pm

http://scrabble.com/
Jean-Michel Decombe

January 11th, 2008 at 1:14 pm

From the Scrabulous creators’ own account, they make only $18,000 from their Facebook app every month: very nice for a small group of passionate developers, but totally irrelevant to Hasbro. However, they would be silly to fail to leverage the power of this little app; it actually *sells* boards, and has gotten many people interested or reinterested in playing Scrabble at home. Lastly, please note that Hasbro only owns the rights for North America. Mattel owns the right for the rest of the world, as the scrabble.com intro page makes clear.
Max

January 11th, 2008 at 1:20 pm

This should be a fun thread…haters of copyright and intellectual property, haters of lawyers, haters of Facebook and its app developers, haters of 60 year old CEOs, just plain haters– all get to come together in a big mud wrestling match!
Nayberz

January 11th, 2008 at 1:20 pm

I think Hasbro may want to shut it down. They may see it as diverting sales away from the physical version of the game (not that I see many folks buying it these days). If they could sieze it and then monetize it or come up with a membership scheme that could work within Facebook, then they may want to let it live.
M.S. Babaei

January 11th, 2008 at 1:21 pm

I hate them….
Travell Perkins

January 11th, 2008 at 1:22 pm

I’m with Hasbro on this one as well. Also realize that these laws are in place to protect the little guys as well. If Jayant was the one with the IP he could shut Hasbro down and be able to file an injunction with no out of money expense. Lawyers would be all over it to cash out at 30% commission or more.
Big Bopper

January 11th, 2008 at 1:31 pm

@ #26, Matt: I’m with you. IP creators will naturally attempt to protect their IP and Scrabulous is obviously leeching off of the Scrabble IP in both name and gameplay. How much money it makes and/or whether it actually benefits the core IP are irrelevant points. The IP creator has the right to dictate how their IP is used and benefit from it. I predict Hasbro will win this.

That said, if you look at casual game cloning it has been shown that game mechanics have proven tough to patent or protect. While you can’t copy Bejeweled outright, it appears that you can legally swap the art and call it JewelGameX. If the Scrabulous guys had made some changes to the game’s look, feel, or rule set, they’d have a leg to stand on. As it is, they’re screwed.
Jeremy Wright

January 11th, 2008 at 1:47 pm

This would be different if the game didn’t use the Scrabble name, same points system, same scoring system, same board layout, same bonuses, etc.

So, yeah, @27, this is totally different. This is more like a Web 2.0 company coming up with a “new game” called “Mariotacular” which is a side-scroller with the same enemies, maps, etc, where you can play Super Mario with a friend and it tracks high scores.

While I LOVE Scrabulous, that’s all they’ve done. They copied every pixel of Scrabble, added multiplayer/ranking/help components and then attempted to market it. If it happened offline, everyone in the world would deride them. Just because it’s online doesn’t make it somehow okay.

Again, if they’d changed the look, rules, layout or something I’d be totally fine. Being “inspired” by a game and creating your own take is totally fine by me. Outright theft is not.
Steel

January 11th, 2008 at 1:51 pm

Hasbro is an American corporate institution. They have the right to shut this site down and not required to buy it. Whether it makes sense to all of you free loaders is not the issue. EVERYTHING in life isn’t free. Contrary to popular belief, everything on the internet isn’t free and shouldn’t be. I am amazed at the mentality of web addicts.
ohnopirates

January 11th, 2008 at 1:52 pm

I tried the boggle app in facebook.
I won, a lot.
I was banned within a day for “using a boggle solving web site.”

I tried Scrabulous.
Same thing.

Social Media Casual Gaming - enforcing mediocrity since 2006.
David Spark

January 11th, 2008 at 1:56 pm

I love Scrabulous. And yes, if Scrabble got their sh*t together and actually made an application for Facebook I would play it. The problem is those clowns are too slow on the uptake. It’s a classic case of would you like to play it for free or pay us money to play it? The Hasbro Scrabble is a pay-for program. Scrabulous isn’t. It’s ad supported. Something Hasbro should have done. They still can.

David
Damien D.

January 11th, 2008 at 2:09 pm

Anyone else notice the thing about the Yahoo!/Hasbro/Scrabble conversation…that Yahoo! still has Literati which Hasbro has not come after…even though it’s still almost the exact same game.
jedifighter

January 11th, 2008 at 2:12 pm

I’m going to have to try this…
Mike B

January 11th, 2008 at 2:18 pm

I hope Hasbro sees this as a good opportunity to take all of their games on to Facebook and similar sites. They could make a mint if they did it right.
Ex-journalist

January 11th, 2008 at 2:30 pm

Matt is right. Doesn’t sound like many of you have ever created valuable IP, certainly not the people who speculate on what it’s worth.
bettyrocker

January 11th, 2008 at 2:35 pm

I agree with Jean-Michele Decombe — Hasbro should realize that the more people play Scrabulous, the more people will buy boards. This is a dumb move that makes them look out of touch and reactionary.
Steel

January 11th, 2008 at 2:40 pm

No Betty, you’re the one out of touch. WHat these guys did is illegal, last time I checked. WTF have you been smoking, wheaties?
Bali

January 11th, 2008 at 2:45 pm

If you’re thinking about getting life insurance, term life insurance may just be the kind of insurance you’re looking for. Term life insurance provides you with the insurance you need for a limited period of time.
Big Bopper

January 11th, 2008 at 2:47 pm

@ bettyrocker. The more people play a game online, the more they will play it offline? Sez who? I personally think the opposite is true. Did MP3s increase CD sales?

But, either way, it still doesn’t matter. The IP owner has the right to determine what the IP strategy is - not some random guy out on the ‘net somewhere who takes it upon himself to create a copy of your product.
TechNewsSource

January 11th, 2008 at 2:51 pm

@Betty

How do you know more people will go out and buy boards. I play Scrabulous a few times during the week and it keeps me from going out and buying a board.

Either way you want to view what they did was illegal and something has to be done.

Oh and Bali, WTF? Are you that desperate for backlinks?
Vince

January 11th, 2008 at 2:52 pm

The bottom line is that “we, the people” want to play Scrabulous and a solution should be found which makes that the major consideration.
Jean-Michel Decombe

January 11th, 2008 at 3:10 pm

The comparison to CD sales is silly. CD sales may be down, but iPod sales are definitely not. You cannot compare apples and oranges (lame pun intended). As for board sales, I personally bought a new board because of Scrabulous, and I know several people who did the same. Surely, that is not enough evidence to support the assumption that sales took off for Hasbro as a result, but it is an interesting observation nonetheless.

Scrabulous has rejuvenated interest in the game, pure and simple. Look at the numbers on Facebook. Now, nobody’s saying (or at least,not me) that Hasbro should not defend their rights, but simply that they should look at this little app that managed to become one of the most active on Facebook, with 500,000+ members, and not punish all the members who are enjoying it by shutting down the site; instead, they should acquire it and rebrand it, or maybe quickly write their own and brand it Hasbro. Fine, nobody cares what it is called. What people care about is having fun playing Scrabble. If Hasbro act like asses and shut everything down just because they can, I can tell you I will never buy any Hasbro product in the future, clear and simple. Customers rule, period.

Also, note that the Scrabulous author mentioned that they repeatedly sent requests to Hasbro to obtain the necessary rights. So, at least, they will have that in their favor, even though the lack of response surely did not give them the right to proceed with copyright infringement. At any rate, copyright law is extremely complex, and any black and white statement regarding the matter is simply uninformed. Cheers!
Jean-Michel Decombe

January 11th, 2008 at 3:13 pm

@Vince: Exactly right. I wish I could be that concise sometimes ;-).
dale

January 11th, 2008 at 3:14 pm

cool idea!!
Paul

January 11th, 2008 at 4:03 pm

I’d still play it. I don’t care who runs it. Keep it alive Hasbro.
Paul

January 11th, 2008 at 4:05 pm

FWIW. I did buy 3 games of Scrabble (for friends and myself) this xmas because I remembered what fun Scrabble is after playing scrabulous.
jb

January 11th, 2008 at 4:07 pm

I think you guys are off the mark. If it was a physical board game it would be different–it would be competing with sales and taking money out of their pocket. But it’s not. It’s virtual and if anything makes people more interested in Scrabble, introduces it to this younger generation, and sparks board sales.

The point of copyright is to protect people’s ability to make money with their product. If it doesn’t hurt the brand and hamper the ability to to monetize it then it should be fair use.
Alex

January 11th, 2008 at 4:30 pm

How about ISC? You don’t see *them* getting sued. http://www.isc.ro
Big Bopper

January 11th, 2008 at 4:36 pm

@ Jean-Michel & Vince. While I appreciate the sentiment, I don’t think it takes into account the realities of the marketplace. Yes, people want to play and perhaps Scrabulous had a positive effect on the Scrabble brand. But, let’s not forget that Scrabulous is riding on the coat-tails of DECADES of brand stewardship by Hasbro/Mattel. Part of that brand stewardship is aggressively protecting your IP when others step on your rights. Just like they are right now with Scrabulous. Whining @ Hasbro for doing this is like complaining about water being wet.

Now, does this suck for the consumer? Yes. Hasbro has not exactly been innovating with their properties. And now they’re smacking down the guys that are. Sucks. But this does not change the fact that not only is this their right, it is naive to assume they’d behave any other way.
james

January 11th, 2008 at 4:39 pm

Scrabulous became so popular so quickly because it was brilliantly designed & well presented, easy to use with some very good applications.
I like to play scrabble but I get sick of having to wait to get people together to play it & then when I do, they often take ages over their turn. The 10m games etc on scrabulous are superb & with the dictionaries handy for reference you can improve your game by up to 100points in no time.
Anyway, I think Hasbro should do a deal with the guys, probably drop the name but something like this would be a great addition to scrabble.com, would increase the traffic to their site drammatically & with a handy little link to buy the board game (which you can enjoy with friends on the couch over a bottle of wine etc) sales would benefit tremendously - lots of people improving their game online, wanting to show off in front of their real friends. Hasbro has no choice now but to offer an online version, close these guys down without a substitute & more knock-offs will just appear.
james

January 11th, 2008 at 4:49 pm

Hasbro only own the rights to the game in North America it would appear. They may only be able to block North American players anyway??
SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro.
bob

January 11th, 2008 at 5:13 pm

ISC is much better anyways… I guess that’s why they’re using that .ro (Romanian) domain.
Kevin

January 11th, 2008 at 5:39 pm

Jean-Michel Decombe’s #52, speaks the truth. One of the best explanations on this topic.. The mere fact that Scrabulous is in the top 10 apps means that it’s obviously getting the adds. This app has turned around and encouraged my friends to play this more in real life on a weekly basis.. I’ve had this game as a kid and now 10 years later I’m starting to play it again.. it’s obviously attracting the attention of many again.. I hope this sticks around on facebook since it definitely helps the days at work go by a bit faster.
Jonathan Cohen

January 11th, 2008 at 9:59 pm

I did create a Facebook group - “Save Scrabulous” - you can join at:

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=30933730272
Jon

January 11th, 2008 at 10:39 pm

This is mainly about the name. Gameplay and all that are quite a bit more difficult to litigate, but the name is clearly a ripoff, and pretty clearly would cause confusion for the consumer. With a name like Scrabulous, wouldn’t it be reasonable to think that many consumers might believe that it is created or affiliated with Hasbro? Certainly.

Had they come up with a different name, I’m guessing they could probably skate. But then, I’m sure the usage numbers wouldn’t be as high.
vmoser

January 12th, 2008 at 1:05 am

hasbro paid for IP of the game and the name and so forth. it is understood that they not only own the name but the nature of the game. these people come along and copy the nature of the game and then when caught revert to all sorts of arguments (it boosts your sales, look i added a new row, etc). in a court of law people are rational and will see what these people have done for what it is.

the crowd who plays this game online is not very likely on average to go buy the game in the real world (despite what you people post here). so the end effect is that it trivializes the property of someone else.

laws for protection came along hundreds of years ago because people realised the fundamental fact that this kind of behaviour is not sustainable in the long run. this is something you see when you are 60 years old and why people put your name in history books and respect you.
jmplisson

January 12th, 2008 at 3:57 am

Hasbro is already ridiculous in France while making vote the Net surfers to change the name of the streets of Monopoly. It’s the village of Montcuq (my ass) which arrived first. Hasbro has not held account of the vote in spite of his engagements.
james

January 12th, 2008 at 6:04 am

‘the crowd who plays this game online is not very likely on average to go buy the game in the real world (despite what you people post here). so the end effect is that it trivializes the property of someone else.’

Imo this is incorrect. I am one of those who played a lot of scrabulous so as a result I went out & bought the board game so I could play it with friends. As discussed earlier in comments, this application has helped to make scrabble popular/trendy again & then when you hear people like Jessica Biel are staying home to play scrabble in the evening, it gives it even more cred. The same can be said for other games (maybe not always music) but chess for example. I watched most of the episodes of Flight of the Conchords on youtube. I liked it so much I went & bought 3 copies for Xmas, one for myself & the others for friends - it can work both ways, in this scrabble example, I think it helps the overall popularity & may indeed help board sales.
vmoser

January 12th, 2008 at 6:40 am

the issue is the generality of your experience: i don’t know, you don’t know but hasbro knows and i assume they chose rationally.

‘i bought it because i use it online’
‘i use it online because i don’t have to buy it’

my life experience points out to people doing the second thing 9/10 times.
these people shut up and all you hear is first thing.
james

January 12th, 2008 at 7:44 am

i wouldn’t say Hasbro knows, to me they haven’t even embraced the internet, for one thing, you can’t even buy their game from their website. (i guess to keep their retailers happy)I would say they are probably a little bit behind the times with their internet strategy & it has taken something like ’scrabulous’ to make them realise this.
i think we will see a reasonable resolution here & I imagine it is more the name thing. i am not saying scrabulous should keep operating the way they are as clearly they have stolen IP. On the other hand I think Hasbro would be foolish not to provide an internet offering as if they don’t, someone else will. Close down scrabulous & some other software developer in India will recreate the same thing & then profit from it. The demand on the internet is clear to see & will always be there - the ability to choose the length of game & play whenever you want against whoever you want is too great to ignore.
jon

January 12th, 2008 at 9:09 am

Scrabulous is so hip hop!

the young cats take something they love and flip it. bring back recognition of the old again. now, while the creators of the new are “profiting off of the backs of the oldschool”, it’s the oldschool simultaneously profiting from and dissing the new.

note though like in music, how the old school only resorts to the lawyering when they see the new being wildly successful.

biggest problem i do have with scrabulous though (and i’m a HUGE fan and addict) is that it would seem they *knew* they were making a knock off (it reminds me of “McDowells” in Coming To America), and capitalized on it by taking in ads and then writing a Facebook app so they could draw in a ton of loot (via ads). That’s Just Not Cool. That’s more like sampling Kool and The Gang and then marketing your ringtone “Congratulation” as featuring Kool and The Guys or some ish, lol.

j.

j.
vmoser

January 12th, 2008 at 10:21 am

hasbro can look at their sales figures and can correlate changes to external factors (scrabulous) with good statistical confidence. they can also see that from 500k players/day you can get about 20k$/month: this is business with very poor value and it is irrational for them to let that replace their high value business. if you look at how widely they license their product it’s clear they know very well what they’re doing.
lefuret

January 12th, 2008 at 10:53 am

Well if I compare screenshots of Scrabulous et Yahoo’s Literati, both clones of Scrabble, given that Yahoo made it without Hasbro authorization and wasn’t suited, I assume that you can reuse the rules of the game but not the layout.

What if Scrabulous just changes the colors of the special squares ?
You guys are dumb

January 12th, 2008 at 10:53 am

I’m surprised it took this long. It’s true you can’t copyright an idea, but you can copyright an expression of an idea. And thus there are various parts of the game Scrabble that are copyrightable such as the layout of the board, even the points on the tiles.

You can’t own the IP rights to the idea of a word game, but you can own the IP rights to elements of your game. Scrabulous flagrantly violates these copyrights–and I do think that their Trademark may be in violation too. It’s not circle R yet, so I’m sure Hasbro is going to try and get it tossed.

Typical bonehaded move by n00b developers.
Peter Roizen

January 12th, 2008 at 12:28 pm

I’m open to licensing this game: http://www.wildwords.us

It’s much more interesting than Scrabble anyway, and I have not heard from their Hasbro lawyers in four years. The game is just too different to be considered an infringement.
iCluck - SEO/SEM

January 12th, 2008 at 12:49 pm

lol This just deserves the word lol — Scrabulous is fun and people enjoy it — Why doesn’t Hasbro just try to buy the Facebook app out? It would do very well to their bottom line, especially considering they would make ad revenue off of it. With that many users, they would be reaping serious ad revenue.
Zack

January 12th, 2008 at 10:15 pm

re peter at #75, maybe you’ll hear from them once you become more successful a la scrabulous, cheers i like yr app

http://afterdarkmytweet.wordpress.com/
Matt

January 13th, 2008 at 1:56 am

If Scrabuolous get’s busted (hope not!) theres another site which I’ve discovered, http://www.betapet.com

Not as many people but very nicely done.
Tommy Vallier

January 13th, 2008 at 5:11 am

Probably one of the silliest things I’ve seen.

My wife and I play Scrabulous all the time - and actually went out and purchased our first Scrabble board as a DIRECT result of the online game. Then we got a Super Scrabble board. And a Scrabble dictionary.

Hasbro wouldn’t have seen a cent from us had it not been for Scrabulous.
Dizzlexic

January 13th, 2008 at 5:51 am

I have probably purchased upwards of 10 different Scrabble games in my lifetime. Scrabble, Travel Scrabble, even Franklin Mint Scrabble (A very expensive version with gold plated tiles, etc…)

Haven’t they made enough money off of me already? Does this not give me the right to play it when & where I want?

I mean really… another example of greed & big business… as if they don’t have enough money already… give me a break….

I’m now boycotting all Hasbro products and am going to sell my Franklin Mint edition…
Neil Sands

January 13th, 2008 at 3:44 pm

@80
> Haven’t they made enough money off of me already? Does this not give me the right to play it when & where I want?

Of course it doesn’t. It gives you the right to use the things you bought. Nothing more and nothing less.
I Am Not Posting To Spam My Blog

January 14th, 2008 at 2:57 am

I like Scrabulous but Hasbro are 100% in the right, and I was wondering how long it would take for the shoe to drop.

The argument over whether it increases or decreases board sales is completely irrelevant. It’s up to Hasbro whether they want to make their game freely playable online or not, not random third parties. You don’t get to walk into the back of Starbucks, grab two armfuls of coffee cups and start handing them out free to passers by, then tell the store manager that “it’s ok, it’ll boost your sales”, even if it’s true. Their property, their decision.
dottie

January 14th, 2008 at 11:35 am

Hasbro has been so slow on the uptake that it is embarrassing. I’ve never been able to find a Hasbro-endorsed online version of Scrabble and , being somewhat of a Scrabble addict, I’ve looked. So while Hasbro has the moral high ground they get low points for business IQ. They should definitely buy Scrabulous.
Martin

January 15th, 2008 at 9:31 pm

I have no quarrel with a company for wanting to defend its legitimate Intellectual Property. However, most IP does not last forever. Patents expire, copyrights expire. While trademarks can last forever, a trademark violation has only happened if a court agrees that that is what happened.

Too often companies try to abuse the IP protection system via bogus claims. For example, LEGO has periodically tried to claim that the shape of their bricks was part of their trademark — as opposed to their patents (which have expired).

This type of claim is, in my view, NOT a legitimate defence of IP but rather an attempt to claim as private, that which under existing laws properly exists in the public domain. In other words some IP lawsuits are in fact an attempt by a corporation or person to unethically steal from the public at large.
Jennifer H

January 16th, 2008 at 9:55 am

This sucks! My friends and I just LOVE scrabbulous! And I’ve been winning games lately. Bummer!!!!! And I wish Boggilific could be saved too.
Maddy

January 17th, 2008 at 2:19 am

I have bought a game of Scrabble. It’s still in its plastic because I have no-one around to play it with. Scrabulous allowed me to play games whereas otherwise I can’t.

I would suggest that only the makes of Scrabble (TM) know how their sales might have been affected by Scrabulous. I’d be interested to know what the effect, if any, was.
Michael ruggert

January 18th, 2008 at 11:16 am

There is a company called adblade.com that is buying the scrabulous application from the developers.
ROBERT

January 27th, 2008 at 2:50 pm

if its free people will play on line ,if there was to be a charge i wouldnt play it. now since its free it is free advertising for the toy giants and i will pay them and buy it for people who visit but for people far away its time together and there name is said and its a positive this legal bullshit has taken part that away.its a game put it back on and let things go as it was.look lets start a WAR over this. GGGRRROOOWWW UUUPPPP ITS A GAME PLAY IT