Se deniega la descarga de algunos juegos en QLmaniacos

[radastan]

He recibido un cordial e-mail de RWAP invitando a retirar todos los contenidos que ellos están vendiendo en su web. Han amenazado con denunciar al hosting, y sabiendo que ellos primeron me bloquearían todas las cuentas y pasarían de todo por no tener marrones (es lo que tiene el efecto Megaupload) he tenido que acceder y retirar los contenidos.

Han pasado 25 años y todavía hay gente que cree que se puede hacer negocio con un ordenador que sólo tiene una docena de usuarios en activo y que las nuevas generaciones apenas conocen. Tendrán todo el derecho del mundo, no lo niego, pero es que esto ya pasa de lo que la lógica impone.

No son juegos nuevos, son juegos de hace 25 años, y ni siquiera se curran una versiones actualizadas con su estuche a color, su manual, y venir en disco de 3 1/2". Sería de los primeros en comprar las nuevas ediciones, pero parece que lo suyo es venderlos en formato "emulable" vía digital y cobrarte 10 libras. De risa.

Lo siento, pero es que siento vergüenza por este mundillo y en lo que se está convirtiendo por el asco del dinero.

[mcleod_ideafix]

¡Qué mal rollo! Precisamente hace unas horas estaba hablando con Rich Melchor porque por lo visto Adrian Ives se ha desvinculado de todo lo que tiene que ver con el QL y ha dejado sus proyectos para meter tarjetas SD en el QL y demás. Curiosamente, hasta entonces casi *nadie* de la escena QL británica conocía el QLSD. Han visto los videos que dejé y RWAP está interesado en comercializarlo (claro que tendrían que esperar a que terminara el driver y todo lo demás).

Ahora, visto lo visto, preferiría no tener ningún trato con ellos, grrrrrr....

[radastan]

Los ingleses están cogiendo la vena comercial (y no precisamente barata), no se lo que tienen que parece que todo lo que sea de QL tiene que ser "exclusivo". De verdad que no entiendo su postura con un ordenador que está más que muerto y enterrado, si quieren vender algo que sea nuevo software, pero tratar de vender los juegos de hace 25 años y acotar este ordenador a 4 frikis mal contados me parece una barbaridad.

Es que esto no es el Spectrum, aquí los juegos de máxima calidad se cuentan con las manos, y da la casualidad que RWAP (muy listos ellos) tienen la exclusiva de los más interesantes.

Estamos limitando el conocimiento de este ordenador a las nuevas generaciones, jodiendo a los que les gustaría probarlo... es ilógico. Hasta en emuladores hay un verdadero problema porque se quiere sacar tajada, pero al menos el autor de Q-Emulator da lo justo para poder probar juegos (aunque haya que grabarlos en disquettes).

No se, hay mucho mal rollo entorno a este ordenador y esto sólo lo pueden cambiar tres cosas:

- Software nuevo y gratuito
- Un clon del QL que elimine de una vez la dependencia de especuladores
- Un emulador de calidad gratuito

Para lo segundo no estoy capacitado, no veo por donde empezar para tratar de copiar la "ULA" del QL. La idea sería simplemente una placa con 512KB de RAM, controladora de disquetera, que no tuviera soporte de Microdrive (pero hiciera creer que los tiene), salida SCART de vídeo, y entrada de teclado PS/2. Un clon sencillo, no necesitaría ni SD ni nada, con eso bastaría.

Lo que si puedo meterle mano es a lo primero y a lo tercero, aunque implique abandonar mis proyectos de Spectrum de momento. El QL está en coma y hay muy poco margen para que vuelva otra vez al olvido por culpa de lo que está pasando. Me cabrea porque hasta Septiembre voy a estar con dos trabajos a la vez y no tengo nada de tiempo libre, trabajo hasta los fines de semana y festivos, pero iré preparando gráficos al menos que eso si puedo hacerlo a tiempos muertos.

Lo ideal sería que apareciera algún programador de ensamblador, le daba los gráficos encantado, y que empezaran a ver la luz juegos.

[RWAP]

Forgive me for posting in English, but I do not speak Spanish - Google Translate is good, but fails to sometimes get the right tone for posts!


I am dismayed by the upset which this has caused.

RWAP Software and the retro business remains my main source of income and copyright holders have every right to dictate what happens to the works which they produce.

I do take efforts to try and get software released into the public domain, but whilst some copyright owners agree to do this (and I provide copies of the software then both on my website for download and to the Sinclair QL Homepage)

However, in many cases, the copyright owners do not respond, or cannot give a definitive answer, in which case the software remains unobtainable.

In some cases, the copyright owners agree that the programs be made available again, but only on a commercial basis, subject to a royalty being paid to them.

I guess that in many cases, companies paid £1000s to get software written for the QL, and did not sell enough copies to cover their costs, and so take the decision that they don't want to just let that software go free.

In the longer term, I agree that the QL needs more freely available good software, but if people expressly forbid it being made available for free, then that is their choice and I respect that (and do what I can to ensure that their rights are protected).

Radastan's ideas of a new version of the software with better graphics is great and I commend him in his efforts - the graphics for the new Frogger look excellent - but writing the machine code from scratch is never too easy, unless you know of a good tool for creating and managing Sprites on screen.

As for emulators - there are quite a few for the QL, but QPC2 and Q-emuLator are (in my opinion) the best ones. QPC2 for running modern software and Q-emuLator for playing games. There is plenty of software available in the public domain, through the Sinclair QL Homepage

Q-emuLator is also free to use unless you need some of the more advanced features.

[radastan]

I am dismayed by the upset which this has caused.

RWAP Software and the retro business remains my main source of income and copyright holders have every right to dictate what happens to the works which they produce.

I guess that in many cases, companies paid £1000s to get software written for the QL, and did not sell enough copies to cover their costs, and so take the decision that they don't want to just let that software go free.

In the longer term, I agree that the QL needs more freely available good software, but if people expressly forbid it being made available for free, then that is their choice and I respect that (and do what I can to ensure that their rights are protected).

Radastan's ideas of a new version of the software with better graphics is great and I commend him in his efforts - the graphics for the new Frogger look excellent - but writing the machine code from scratch is never too easy, unless you know of a good tool for creating and managing Sprites on screen.

The problem is simple: offer a realy atractive new copy. Jewel colour case, instructions, disk with label in colour with graphics... it's easy, and people who wants original games would buy it wihout problem. No one who download a game and like it a lot don't buy it, if this user didn't buy the game he didn't buy the game if no download possible.

See this game for MSX:



Jewel colour case, instructions, disck with colour label... it sells a lot in events and at online shop. They sell it for less of 10 eur. ¡And it is freely downloadable! ¿Why they sell a lot if it is at freely download?

THIS is the way to sell the games.

[RWAP]

Possibly selling disks in a nice case would be an option as the QL is now finally beginning to appeal to a collectors market - however, the big issue is that it is hard for QLers to get hold of disk interfaces - hence why the QLSD interface is so important

[radastan]

Bueno señores, Talent se está dedicando a buscar páginas web con sus juegos, por error me ha solicitado 20 veces que borrara unos ficheros que yo ya había borrado y resultaba que eran de otra página web.

Lo útlimo que quedaba por ver: CAZA DE BRUJAS EN PÁGINAS WEB RETRO

For RWAP:

Sorry, but Talent actions bring to me to erase all reference to Talen and RWAP products on all my pages, articles, and more. It's your business, yes, but this is a hobby and I don't want headaches. I bought you a lot of hardware past years, computers and adapters (my Sinclair QL, my Thrumpcard, my PS/2 interface for ZX Spectrum...). Sell My Retro, RWAP, and Talen Software are not welcome in the future.

All Sinclair QL software, articles, and tutorials of my authoring are prohibited for distribution under RWAP, Shell My Retro, QLWiki, and other webpages with RWAP or Talen relationship.

Think about it.

[RWAP]

I am just amazed at the abuse and wide ranging discussion that this has raised.

There is also some misinformation here...

a) Vroom and Wanderer in 3D are the copyright of Pyramide software who have also contacted radastan to deny distribution
b) Tom Dolezal of Talent has denied distribution of his software
c) I understand that Jochen Merz has also been in touch to deny distribution of some of his games which were also listed.

All of these are the copyright holders and have the same rights to deny distribution as do Ultimate, Elite, Activision etc on the Spectrum. If you distribute games (either physically or by offering them as downloads) you are committing software piracy and the copyright owners have every right to pursue whatever avenues they see fit to protect their rights.

However, I am the bad guy for daring to raise this subject and actually making huge investments into the retro scene in order to bring products to the market and ensure continued support and running of your machines. Of course, if you all want to get together and spend £1000s on keyboard membranes, chips and second hand software to make them available for free or at cost, you are welcome to do so!

In actual fact, if any of you bothered to explore the history of RWAP Software, the QL Wiki and supported the Quanta user group and QL Today magazine, you might have found out that my main cause for most of what I do is to expand the knowledge and userbase for the Sinclair computers

I have purchased lots of second hand software in order to preserve working copies and amended it to work from disk, and tried to track down the software authors / copyright holders to get it re-released. Where possible it has been re-released into the public domain (this includes Voyage of the Beano, Dreamlands, Speedfreaks, Assault & Battery, Spook and a lot more).

Where the copyright owners have said they will not release it as public domain, then I have re-released it commercially on payment of a royalty to them.

If you guys want to make remakes which are freely downloadable, then great - it all adds to the QL experience

As for the QL-SD Interface - I never once suggested that the interface was exclusively marketed by me (although radastan appears to have been told that this was my proposal) - it is just that with 26 years experience of the QL market, I have probably the largest database of people who would be interested in purchasing and supporting the interface, and that is why it would make sense for me to offer it for sale also.

Unfortunately, it now appears that mcleod_ideafix is no longer willing to work with me, because I defend the rights of software authors against piracy ! Unfortunately that is a great loss for the QL market, unless he can now learn and write the device drivers (something which many QL users would steer clear of).

I daresay he would feel different if someone took his designs and hardwork and used them to make and sell their own version of the QL-SD Interface ! Personally that is not something I would do - but look at the industry surrounding Linux (which is supposed to be a free operating system, but companies make huge profits from selling an operating system written by several 100 people for free) - oh yes, I forgot - they charge for 'support' afterwards!

[radastan]

I defend the rights of software authors against piracy!

A lot of games you sell are ilegal copies of original Konami games, without license. For example, Hopper is Frogger, ¿Konami licensed? no. But I am the pirate (Talen words, not yours).

You ask me to retire games, I retired all games... it is not piracy. 30 years before everyone think there is no copyright if the companies are closed.

All games are 30 years old, thre is a small catalogue of games in Sinclair QL... ¿Still wants to make money with them? ¿Really all closed companies still have the rights? I am still waiting LEGAL DOCUMENTS with clarify the copyright, because the old director says he has the copyright but no one have any document proved it.

At all I retired games, without waiting any legal document, I didn't see the problem.

You want to make money with our hobby, there is no problem, but not limit our actions. QL is a rare computer, with a short catalogue, limiting download you are collaborating to destroy our hobby. You, as seller, has the arguments to explain the situation and show that a free download can make games to sell better. You, as seller, have the oportunity to offer a better product, not a simple disk, but a jewel case in colour, intructions... we don't want a disk copied like in house.

It's simple.

In ZX Spectrum Ultimate and other companies deny ditribution, yes, but there is hundreds of similar games with permission grant. We have no choice in QL.

Think in a person never test a QL, he can`t play the best games of QL without paying for each game. ¿Do you think he want's to be a real QL user? no. The only manner to make new users, to expand QL World, is to make easy things. You can sell old games (with case), but you can offer free download. We thanks your effors to make public available a lot of games, but is not enought for us.

[mcleod_ideafix]

Por si sirviera de algo, según la página de QLAY
http://web.inter.nl.net/hcc/A.Jaw.Venema/

La distribución del software de Psion se permite, siempre y cuando no se haga con fines comerciales:

4. QL Programs
Do you remember?
QUILL, EASEL, ABACUS and ARCHIVE (270k)
In QLAY compatible MDV format (19970807).
The 'PSION' programs are copyright Amstrad plc. Distribution, use on a non-commercial basis is allowed.

Creo que esa es la vía por la que hay que ir. Lo que están haciendo todos estos programadores y casas de software que, según RWAP, han denegado la distribución de su software, incluso aquel que se escribió hace 30 años, sólamente puede ir contra ellos a medio/largo plazo.

[RWAP]

If they were copies of the original Konami games then you may have a point (presuming they did not give consent at the time). But copyright for programs is based on both look and feel and code implementation.

However, the graphics, feel and code behind the Konami games and QL games based on popular arcade games is very different - I doubt that anyone playing the game on the QL would ever think it was the arcade game (or maybe half of the catalogue on World of Spectrum is also in breach of their copyright?)

I have no idea if Konami ever wrote any games for the 68000 processor (most definitely none for the QL that were ever published), but you could always raise the issue with them if you wanted - if they were successful in a law suit to prevent the QL games, then presumably they would also want to bring action against all of the other similar games produced for the Spectrum, Amiga, Amstrad, Atari etc....

Psion allowed software distribution of Quill, Easel, Abacus and Archive only on a non-commercial basis - unfortunately, their permission did not extend to their games for the QL (Chess and Match Point). That was their decision at the time, and everyone should respect that decision!

You claim that I (and copyright holders) are stopping you from doing what they want - NO WE AREN'T. We have nothing against you doing something legally - but software piracy (distribution of software in breach of the license / copyright holders wishes) IS ILLEGAL.

How much more proof do you need of copyright status - if I write a program today I have copyright to it.
The programs all contain a copyright statement saying they are (c) Talent Software either in the game itself or in the boot file - the advertising from the magazines in 1984 onwards all state Talent Software (or Microdeal) - how much more proof do you need?

Whatever reasons a copyright holder has for denying distribution is personal to them - users should respect that personal decision.

There are hundreds of public domain games available for the QL - including machine code games - some excellent quality ones by Damon Chaplin and Alan Pemberton, which you should have a look at - in my opinion Damon's games are at least as good as the ones by Talent (except maybe Alien Hijack)

[mcleod_ideafix]

There are hundreds of public domain games available for the QL - including machine code games - some excellent quality ones by Damon Chaplin and Alan Pemberton, which you should have a look at - in my opinion Damon's games are at least as good as the ones by Talent (except maybe Alien Hijack)

Hey! That's a good thing to know

[RWAP]

The other good quality games to look out for are ones by Janko Mrsic Flogel (or JMF) (this includes the M-Crunch, M-Treasure, M-Metropolis games which are all public domain) - though don't worry about the fourth one in the series M-Cosmic that really was a poor show for him). M-Treasure is VERY similar to QL Cavern which he wrote (published by Eidersoft and appears to be their copyright), and M-Metropolis (which is VERY similar to Citadel, another Eidersoft program)

[radastan]

Whatever reasons a copyright holder has for denying distribution is personal to them - users should respect that personal decision.

I respect his decision, I erase all games.

I won't continue this discussion, you have a opinion and I have other, the most important thing is to respect each other.

My only petitions are:

- Please, make better copies of the games: colour jewel case, instructions, colour label for disk. If you want I can help with design for free.

- Please, explain to the copyright holders the advantages of free download model over the sales. If a guy test a game for free, like it, and find he can buy a new copy with a good presentation on your shop... it would be easy to increase sales. If nobody know your game (only trough RWAP and only one screenshot) it would be more dificult to sell anything.

Sales & Free are very popular today (see new games in ZX Spectrum, see new MMORPG like Aion for PC), and prove the success of this two concepts: play free, pay if you like it.

[afx]

Todo este lío me ha dejado bastante desconcertado, me parece incluso un tanto surrealista todo este follón. Para cuatro "gatos" que somos y encima mal-avenidos .

Me apena bastante estas discusiones porque he tenido muy buenas relaciones con todos ustedes.
- Radastan es un "colega" del QL con el que he compartido muchas ciber-tertulias, incluso hemos colaborado en algún desarrollo.
- Mcleod es un genio de la electrónica, también hemos intercambiado algún cacharro, y su disposición a ayudar a cualquiera es excelente.
- Con Rich Mellor siempre he tenido buenas experiencias en todos los componentes que le he comprado, gracias a él he podido darle vida a mis QL's.

Pero bueno, la parte positiva es que ya están todas las cartas sobre la mesa y estáis exponiendo libremente vuestras ideas. Posiblemente todos tengáis parte de razón.

Yo como usuario del QL me gustaría:

1) Que todo el software del QL fuera de libre descarga, al menos para pruebas. Ojalá los creadores o propietarios del software comercial del QL autoricen esto algún día.
2) Que haya vendedores que re-editen el software que consideren, pero preferiblemente (como plante Radastan) con la calidad extra que merece una re-edición (carátulas, manuales, entrevistas a sus creadores, ...). Yo soy el primero que adquiriría esas re-ediciones.
3) Que algún día llegue esa dichosa tarjeta de expansión SD, preferiblemente por el puerto ROM al estilo del diseño de Mcleod_ideafix. Que RWAP esté interesado en comercializar el desarrollo de Mcleod_ideafix son buenas noticias (al menos para mi), me parece un impulso importante al proyecto QLSD (que es distinto al proyecto QL-SD).

En fin, esas son mis opiniones. Ojalá todo este lío sea para bien.



Saludos.