Mattel Apparently Learned Nothing From Hasbro's Scrabulous Disaster

Tue, Jul 29th 2008 11:46am

Filed Under:
intellectual property, lawsuits, promotions, scrabble, scrabulous

21 Comments | Leave a Comment..

Scrabulous Shuts Itself Down On Facebook

from the too-bad dept

Well, it was bound to happen sooner or later. Following Hasbro's decision to finally actually sue over Scrabulous (though, of course, it waited until it had its own competing game first), the guys behind Scrabulous have shut off access to the game on Facebook for users in the US and Canada. Outside of those countries you can still play it -- or you can go directly to the Scrabulous website itself. Or, of course, you can go use Hasbro's version of Scrabble, though, as the report notes, it doesn't seem to be working very well. And, without any competition, Hasbro doesn't have that much incentive to make sure it gets much better.

Legal Issues

Thu, Jul 24th 2008 1:49pm

Filed Under:
intellectual property, lawsuits, promotions, scrabble, scrabulous

Companies:
facebook, hasbro

33 Comments | Leave a Comment..

Hasbro Sues Scrabulous For Making Scrabble Popular Again

from the don't-you-ever-do-that-again dept

For months, Hasbro and Mattel had been threatening the makers of Scrabulous with a lawsuit for daring to do what the gaming companies had been unwilling to do: make a fun version of Scrabble available on Facebook in a way that got many people playing the game on a regular basis. It took nearly 9 months, but Hasbro finally put a version of Scrabble on Facebook itself, and now that it's up has finally officially filed the lawsuit.

It's rather telling that Hasbro waited until its own version was online to file the lawsuit. What the company is basically admitting is that Scrabulous was a great promotional vehicle for Scrabble (otherwise why leave it up?), but now that Hasbro is competing with Scrabulous online, it wants to cut out that competition. Hasbro's General Counsel is being quite misleading in saying: "Hasbro has an obligation to act appropriately against infringement of our intellectual properties." That's not quite true. There is no "obligation" to sue someone who made your game popular again just because you were late to the game.

Scrabulous showed Hasbro that there was a huge market for their game. There was no indication that Hasbro had any interest in Scrabble for Facebook prior to Scrabulous' success.

Then there's this bizarre quote from Hasbro's GM of digital initiatives: "Hasbro has always had the same two priorities. One is to offer a great playing authentic game for fans and the second is to protect our intellectual property. This was theft of I.P., plain and simple." Really? Your second biggest priority is to protect your IP? Then why did you wait all this time to sue? Clearly there was a benefit in leaving Scrabulous up while your own version was being developed. Clearly the comparison to "theft" is incorrect. No one would let "theft" go on for months on end before suing, just so they could create their own competitive offering.

The Scrabulous/Hasbro situation is a perfect example of Matt Mason's thesis that "piracy" is almost never about "theft." It's almost always a market indicator that the market is unhappy with what's being offered. It's the market showing companies what they want.

Overhype

Mon, Apr 7th 2008 4:21pm

Filed Under:
online games, quality, scrabble

Companies:
facebook, hasbro, mattel, realnetworks

6 Comments | Leave a Comment..

The Way To Beat Scrabulous Is Not With Lawsuits Or Crappy Versions Of Scrabble

from the keep-trying dept

In the ongoing saga of Scrabulous, the unauthorized online version of Scrabble that has found many fans on Facebook but has upset Mattel and Hasbro (who own the rights to Scrabble), it appears that RealNetworks and Mattel have finally put out an official version of Scrabble for Facebook -- but the problem is that it's terrible. As the NY Times reports, "Facebook Scrabble takes a long time to load, does not always quickly update to show recent moves, and the words the game will accept do not reflect standard Scrabble dictionaries, or even the English language." While it's nice to see that Scrabulous still hasn't been forced offline, it seems odd that the authorized version is so terrible. It still probably would have made the most sense to just do a deal with the brothers who created Scrabulous (and there are still rumors that a deal has been discussed, but without a decent resolution), but if that doesn't work, the way to compete is with a better product. Putting out a product that's not very good isn't likely to win over many fans.

News You Could Do Without

Mon, Mar 3rd 2008 6:34am

Filed Under:
board games, promotions, scrabble, scrabulous

Companies:
hasbro, mattel, real networks

48 Comments | Leave a Comment..

How Could A Game That Has Made Scrabble Popular Again Be A 'Bad Precedent' For Mattel?

from the please-explain dept

Back in January, we explored the news that both Hasbro and Mattel (who own the rights to the board game Scrabble in different regions) were upset and threatening to sue about the incredibly popular knockoff version Scrabulous on Facebook. As we pointed out at the time, shutting down the game would quickly piss off 2.3 million Scrabble fans -- many of whom were interested in the game for the first time, most likely leading to real sales of the board game. While the situation still has not been resolved (and Scrabulous remains online), the New York Times has the latest details that suggest that Real Networks is negotiating with Scrabulous' creators. Since Real has a deal to produce an online version of Scrabble (the article first says the deal is with Hasbro, and later says it's with Mattel, so it's not clear who the deal is with), perhaps this will all be worked out for the best. However, the article does mention that executives from Mattel are against the idea of settling with the creators of Scrabulous, fearing that it "would set a bad precedent."

That's lawyers speaking, not marketers. How could a fun online game that has rejuvenated interest in what was seen as a rather dull board game among many folks today, be considered a "bad precedent?" How could having millions of new fans of your game and treating them right, rather than depriving them of what they want be considered a "bad precedent?" Some may answer that the "bad precedent" would be that it would encourage others to create similar knockoffs of other Mattel games, but, again, if they drove as much interest in the originals as Scrabulous did, isn't that a good thing? Some may claim that it would deprive Mattel the opportunity to license the games for lots of money, but again looking at Scrabble as an example, the bigger fear for Mattel should have been the fact that many people didn't care about the game at all. By letting random people create the games for it, it can quickly determine which games work well online and then work with the creators of those games to put an official stamp on it. The Agarwalla brothers created this game at no cost to Mattel, who otherwise would have spent a ton of money to create it after which it might not have caught on in the same way Scrabulous did. This way the game has been created, tested and even built up an audience at no cost to Mattel. Shouldn't they consider that to be a good thing?

Legal Issues

by Dennis Yang

Fri, Jan 11th 2008 7:13pm

Filed Under:
facebook, scrabble, scrabulous

Companies:
facebook, hasbro