WotC puts a stop to online sales of PDFs

[seankreynolds]

I'm not sure what you mean by "take over" TSR's copyrights, but TSR was a subentity within Wizards until about 1998 when they stopped using the TSR name and logo (IIRC an Alternity book was the first RPG book produced by the formerly-TSR staff that used the Wizards logo rather than the TSR logo).

 

[Treebore]

I'm not sure what you mean by "take over" TSR's copyrights, but TSR was a subentity within Wizards until about 1998 when they stopped using the TSR name and logo (IIRC an Alternity book was the first RPG book produced by the formerly-TSR staff that used the Wizards logo rather than the TSR logo).

I don't think he realizes WOTC bought TSR lock, stock, and barrel. IE, anything and everything TSR owned, WOTC now owns.

Plus copyright has lasted much, much longer than 50 years since 1978 in the USA. Trademarks are what have short periods of duration, in comparison.

 

[DaveMage]

I hear that.

"Problems with the printers" may be familiar to some people online circa January 1997....

Oh, yes.

 

[merelycompetent]

I hear that.

"Problems with the printers" may be familiar to some people online circa January 1997....

Ugh. Let's not go there just yet. You may remember my old moniker, Guardian, from that time period. Your point, however, is most emphatically understood.

On a related tangent, the more I look at 4E core (1st 3 rulebooks), Pathfinder, and my own houserules, the more I see how 4E *could* have easily been an evolutionary, backwards-compatible change in the game that wouldn't require trashing/major revamping of campaigns in progress. It may be my own bias coloring my opinions... No. I'll stop there. Back on topic.

I get the impression that all the public statements/information that are coming from WotC representatives are carefully vetted by legal and/or marketing. This is expected - they have to proceed carefully to protect the court case(s). WotC's next moves will be very telling - and I mean *moves* as in actions, not filtered text responses that can easily be misinterpreted.

 

[avin]

Can anybody explains what's this "problems with printers" about?

 

[Nyarlathotep]

Can anybody explains what's this "problems with printers" about?

http://www.enworld.org/forum/publis...tandards-d20-system-guide-17.html#post1115145

 

[Roman]

I hear that.

"Problems with the printers" may be familiar to some people online circa January 1997....

Can you explain for those of us not familiar with that? Thanks!

 

[Nagol]

Can anybody explains what's this "problems with printers" about?

In the late '90s TSR was being starved of cash to the point that announced prooduct couldn't be provided for sale.

TSR used "problems with the printers" as a common cover story for its financial troubles. Sometimes it really was trouble with the printers such as when the printer wouldn't release items until cash appeared.

 

[seankreynolds]

It's December 1997. TSR's just had another round of layoffs right before Christmas. The company owes the printing company some money, due to an earlier arrangement TSR's president made to get some books out the door. Printer says, "cough up some money." TSR says, "we don't have any cash right now, but the distributor just made another order of the Player's Handbook... if you print that, we can ship it to them, and they'll pay us for it, and we can pay you." Printer said, "no, we want to be paid before we print anything else for you."
So we waited.
And waited.
And people started to wonder why their subscription issues of Dragon and Dungeon hadn't appeared in their mail yet. The reason is that they hadn't been printed yet.
Then people started to wonder where all the January products were. The reason is that they hadn't been printed yet.
And here I am, TSR Online Coordinator, the online face of the company. Nobody gave me anything official to say about the situation, so I said nothing. And the emails kept rolling in. And the newsgroup posts asking the same questions. And still I was given nothing official to say.
And people were getting angry.

So I took the truth that I knew, and made a statement that was true, though it didn't give anything close to the whole story, because I wasn't authorized to say anything specific. What I said was, "Due to a problem with the printers, we have been unable to release any new products or magazines since December."

Which is true: the problem was that the printer wouldn't print anything for us until we paid them.

I wouldn't be surprised if the WotC customer service people were given a very limited amount of information (if that), told that they could only say X, Y, and Z, and yet are left holding the bag when people come asking for more information. It's a sucky position to be in, and they have my sympathies.

Edit: Note I am NOT comparing TSR's financial situation at that time to Wizards's situation now, I'm just talking about the tough position customer service-type people get put in when things are happening at the company that a part of the fan base is negatively vocal about.

 

[Nyarlathotep]

Can you explain for those of us not familiar with that? Thanks!

So the link in my post above is a little vaguely named....

I'll point you back to 1997 and a certain "problem with the printers that's delaying our products" statement posted by yours truly on the TSR site, when the actual problem was that TSR had no money to pay the printers. Everyone at TSR knew the truth, but nobody could say anything.

Edit: Beaten to the punch ... kinda.