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RSSIn that week, more than 30,000 Facebook members have rallied to the game's defense, joining Save Scrabulous Facebook group.
The game, developed by two brothers in India, is similar enough in look and feel to the board game that Scrabble is griping its intellectual property is being infringed. But, while that may be the case, it's not clear that Hasbro or Mattel (which owns the rights to the game abroad) is being hurt here.
Consider, quite a few people are saying that Scrabulous spurred them to purchase copies of the board game. "A few friends and I, all Scrabulous players, recently bought three Scrabble games ... I think you are shooting yourself in the foot, if you try to squash the best free marketing campaign Scrabble has ever seen," wrote one.
Others chimed in with their own reasons why Scrabulous is a boon to Hasbro. "I think Scrabble should be thankful for Scrabulous. Now there is an entire generation addicted to it," one argued.
"Yeah, the infringement is obvious, but so is the concept of not annoying your fans!" wrote another.
Facebook isn't talking, but, as of Friday morning, neither has the company removed the application. That indicates to some observers that Facebook is in talks with Hasbro and Mattel (which owns the rights to the game abroad). Some sort of settlement is the only resolution that makes sense here.
As with music or video, free exposure can be invaluable in building fans. In 2006, shortly after CBS made clips of TV shows available on YouTube, the network said that ratings increased. "The Late Show with David Letterman" drew 200,000 new viewers, a 5% increase, after CBS placed clips of the show on YouTube, while "The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson" increased its viewership by 100,000, or 7%.
It's not surprising that people who've played Scrabulous would then go out and buy Scrabble. And it also won't be surprising if removing it from Facebook results in a loss of interest when users are forced to find other online games to play.
RSS FEEDS
Just this past weekend I went to Borders in Marin County to purchase 2 Big Print"Official" Scrabble Dictionaries and I was not the only one ... 2 other people were doing the same all because of Scrabulous! One of the ladies said that her son lives in London and this is a great way to stay in touch.
I play with 6 different friends and every time we see each other out poops the Scrabble game.
In case you are inspired:
Alan Hassenfeld/Chairman Alfred Verrecchia/President CEO Director Brian Goldner/COO HASBRO 1027 Newport Ave Pawtucket, RI 02862
SHAME ON THEM
My suggestion for the best solution here is for Mattel/Hasbro to settle with the 2 developer. By settle I would suggest buy the application for a REASONABLE price and use it as a marketing/branding tool. I agree all 30,000+ people who signed up for the ScrabbleWars on Facebook have not purchased the board game, BUT WHAT IF Scrabble put a $5 coupon & a link to buy the game from Amazon for $13.95 rather than $18.95?
Even if that didn't draw a large number of buys (which I imagine it actually generate a decent number of), you would have free branding to a mass population; that in the world of traditional advertising would cost you thousands and millions of dollars to reach your direct target audience.
Honestly, has anyone really counted the number of Facebook users who have actually gone out and PURCHASED Scrabble? No, because such purchases are laregly an urban myth. What young person would buy a board game when a free version is already online in a place where they're more likely to play??!! The number is really small, as in fewer than 20, unless they're morons.
If these 2 guys from India would have approached Hasbro/Mattel they would have been laughed at and thought their idea was ridiculous, OR it would have taken them months to get to the right decision maker within the company.
What most older guys dont KNOW is they are the real reason P2P and piracy has jumped so high. The older guys invented Digital Rights Management (DRM) and that has single handedly has made P2P huge! Look at Sony now... dropping DRM, but adding a Watermark (branding). Very smart! That right there is the old guys working with the new guys.
The next few years we will see a huge change in attitudes because my generation is moving into the drivers seat of companies. There will be more media & content available and the best part it will be FREE & INTERACTIVE. Those 2 words are the driving force of my generation.
I understand intellectual properties and all of that business because I have already worked for 2 large companies, and currently am starting my own. My thoughts when I'm developing software is to create software with the least amount of limitation as possible by rewarding customers for proper use, rather than beat them over the head with a lawsuit or make unusable software with DRM.
This upcoming generation HATES restrictions. No one is going to be able to change that mentality. So my suggestion to other companies is to consider changed their approach. Companies that don't change their methods will kick the bucket eventually, but Companies who change their approach will be the profitable ones of the next several years.
If you could just type a few keystrokes on your computer and kill someone anywhere in the world, would that make it OK because you did it online?
Reality is companies need to push the envelope online - and there are ways for the new guys and old guys to work together.
But if they don't want to commit their intellectual property, so be it.
The new guy should take their pitch to the next old guy and you will get traction somewhere.
My generation (im 23) has a much different mindset than previous generation. WE LOVE FREE!!! We are the "Google" generation. What the older generation see as "infringement" we see as "fun, entertaining, & free."
Other examples... we like watching our TV shows online for FREE and we dont mind the advertising that comes with the FREE, especially if it is a product that is targeted at us. Not only to we love FREE, but we want to be ENTERTAINED. We are an interactive generation. The companies that are really doing well hitting our generation with advertising is companies like Facebook, Myspace, and I would even say Apple. Has anyone taken notice to who Apple's Target Audience is??? Anyone? Highschoolers & college kids... ME! They really don't care about marketing to the 43 year old CEO. They know the CEO is more than like set in his ways & too insecure to change. Here is the brilliance of Apple's marketing plan.. who is going to replace that CEO in the next 5-10 years? ME! My generation! We love our Apple computers! They are trendy, easy to use, stable, run Windows faster than a PC, and let's not forget sexy! Especially that MacBook Air! Walk around your local colleges and count how many people have iPods, Apple Computers, or iPhones and then try to count the numbers that have PCs.
APPLE FUTURE PREDICTION: In the next 5-10 years Apple will start to invade the business/corporate world at a very fast pace because the Decision Maker will be people like me who Apple has successfully branded& marketed an high quality product to.
Word to Hasbro... you really need to change some of your old school thinking. If you are going to reach my generation you need to update you ways of thinking.