Comments on: Why Facebook left 'Scrabulous' alone

Though it could've faced legal troubles for not pulling a developer-created game with obvious trademark infringements, leaving Scrabulous alive as long as possible was in Facebook's best interest for a number of reasons.

[SactoGuy018]

I still think that Facebook did not realize that Hasbro has a history of strongly protecting their copyrights, as noted by how they protect the "Monopoly" franchise (Hasbro bought Parker Brothers back in 1991). As such, the Facebook people should have vetted out Scrabulous for possible copyright violations before the game came out, especially considering potential legal trouble involved.

[pol;0987]

i think Jeremiah Owyang said it best, when speaking on Facebook homebrew devs that are"...trying to find ways to be successful, and that means copying games". This whole scrabulous issue is simple really, the little boys took something that someone else owned, slapped a silly name on it and published it. Its akin to saying, "imagine tic tac toe, but instead of x's and 0's, we're gonna use +'s and -'s. We are gonna be so rich!" At the end of the day, they is theft is theft is theft, and dont pass that crap about imitation being the sincerest form of anything, because if you personally owned any IP, that you have paid for to be protected and take an interest in its commercial viability, you'd be a little more like Hasbro, than you'd want to admit.

[TomMariner]

Insightful post on the Facebook reasons behind the Scrabulous event. The actions of the Facebook legal team ring true in that they seemed to act responsibly while the Hasbro legal eagles made a mess of it.

As with most large entertainment media concerns, Hasbro is fighting the future with the past technologies. They had a perfect opportunity to understand that someone outside the firm had come up with a better way of marketing and distributing their intellectual property. Instead, Hasbro ingored any advice from their tech team in the basement and consulted only the law department on mahogany row.

The way it could have gone down is that the chief technical officer could have walked next door to Brian Goldner's office (Hasbro CEO) and said, "Brian, a pair of smart techies in India have come up with a way to make hay with our 50 year old brand Scrabble. Since they are making maybe $25k per month why don't we pay them $50k, put them on the payroll of our subsidiary in India, and get the stupid name Scrabulous changed to Scrabble? We could get the legal folks in the basement to work up a threatening letter if it was necessary. It could be a whole new way of marketing a lot of our tired old IP."

But that didn't happen and Facebook and the developers kept making money and just did a two day sidestep. And Hasbro lost a golden opportunity not only to make ginormous money, but win the hearts and minds of a gazillion smart developers that they didn't have to pay. In a technical world, if you don't listen to your techies, you're toast.

[sanenazok]

I don't think Facebook's actions in regards to Scrabble rip off are surprising. The other examples of "activism" by Facebook you came up with were all obvious security issues that if they went ignored would seriously decrease the value of the Facebook platform. Sure Facebook has banned spammers, adware, and software with security holes. That's what they *must* do to maintain the value of their system. When it comes to rights of others, like Hasbro, Facebook doesn't act unless a lawsuit is imminent or has been filed...or an obviously correct c&d letter has been sent. Given the number of apps running on Facebook, you can't expect them to review each program for third party rights. When it comes to their own value Facebook will (and must) act, but third party rights are not important.

[Saboonsong]

What amazes me is the amount of cognitive surplus people seemed to be prepared to expend on discussion about the existence or otherwise, and the pros and cons, of a game - for goodness' sake - on a moronic social networking site. Maybe this is an opportune time to say, "Get a life"?

[TV James]

The longer Facebook left it up, the more articles containing the word "Facebook" appeared in the news. And still continue to appear in the news (dot com).

[fredtheviking]

Well, Facebook not be 'neutral' in the sense it will let developers create apps that might negatively affect user experience. Other than that though Facebook can't be held responsilble for rogue developers that tramp on copyrights. How can Facebook proactive in blocking copyright software? I don't think it is an easy problem. Perhaps they could have been more aggresive in getting the app of the site once Hasbro contact them. But they didn't want to get into a legal entanglement, which would be bad. So, Facebook behavior is understandable. I can't imagine I would have handled it differently if I was Facebook.

[singularitydesign]

Actually, the issue of the timing of everyone's actions (or inaction) is worth some analysis and debate. Hasbro could have taken much stronger actions much sooner, but it seems that they were waiting for their own version to launch on Facebook first. There's a discussion about the impact of Hasbro's approach on its own brand image that I've started at:

http://onlinebrandexperts.blogspot.com/2008/07/scrabble-vs-scrabulous-w-r.html

Comments are welcome and encouraged.

[Harrison912]

Scrabulous or Wordscraper makes no difference to me. I'm on FaceBook for the personal connection I can make to raise awareness for the need for personal security.

Social marketing my safety products is not just a business but a personal passion. Helping people stay safe is more important to me than using FaceBook for games.

There are much better places to focus on games than this great social venue.

[roizen]

Scrabble and its clones are just like Scrabble because the game play and word base remain the same. You get better at the games by memorizing stupid short words.

If you want to see a game which totally changes the word base and game play, take a look at

http://www.wildwords.us

This game will be coming to Facebook and other social networks soon.

[roizen]

Scrabble and its clones are just like Scrabble because the game play and word base remain the same. You get better at the games by memorizing stupid short words.

If you want to see a game which totally changes the word base and game play, take a look at

http://www.wildwords.us

This game will be coming to Facebook and other social networks soon.

[treet007]

I still like to know how people can find time to play a well-involved game like this AND be on Facebook. Do they do laundry, take their kids to soccer practice, cook dinners, and the like? Are people around them being neglected while these folks stay online for a long time? Sounds like too many introverts and not enough living...