Gryph Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 He's using unethical means to try to curb emulation piracy and remove competition. EDIT: I'm suprised MAME wasn't already trademarked by the MAME dev team... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sultan Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 He's using unethical means to try to curb emulation piracy and remove competition.<{POST_SNAPBACK}> What I want to know is why he just doesn't get Ebay to ban sales referencing mame. Any sale involving mame would be illegal per the mame license, so why is there a need to trademark it for added leverage? I know ebay outlaws sales of lots of illegal things. Wouldn't it be possible to get them to add mame to the list? Seems that would eliminate most of his pirated competition in the US. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sultan Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 I'm suprised MAME wasn't already trademarked by the MAME dev team...<{POST_SNAPBACK}>Probably a mix of factors. 1) the logo is probably fan art not created by the mamedevs, 2) most of them are not from the US and might not see the point in registering mame with the US PTO.However, I wouldn't be suprised if the trademark was registered in Italy. That would be much more likely. And it would be another nail in the coffin of this silly application. But I guess Nicola or someone would be quick to say if that was the case. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gryph Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 So far I've only seen R. Belmot reply in that thread in the MAME forum. He basically said that they never expected anything like this so trademarking it wasn't really something they thought about. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dooz Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 What I find rediculous about this guy is that he threatened people with legal action claiming that he owns the trademark already, and then demanded royaltys. This guy is pure slime. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Agozer Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 So far I've only seen R. Belmot reply in that thread in the MAME forum. He basically said that they never expected anything like this so trademarking it wasn't really something they thought about.Well they sure think about it now. There should be some kind of legislative or something that would prevent these kinds of "incidents". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Madi Posted February 22, 2005 Share Posted February 22, 2005 can he actually make money if he's sucessful?sorry new to this whole bussinness ordeal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
James Posted February 22, 2005 Share Posted February 22, 2005 http://www.aarongiles.com/index.html MAMESuffice to say, everyone who works on MAME is well aware of the attempted theft of our name and logo. Appropriate, measured steps are being taken to solve this issue. This is not something that is going to be helped by a lot of public hand-wringing by those involved with MAME, so don't expect a lot of public comments on the matter. Just trust that it's being taken care of, and if help is needed, it will be asked. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Robert Posted February 22, 2005 Share Posted February 22, 2005 Here is a rather lengthy dialog between a mamedev and mr foley (from Aaron's site) I received contact in a pleed for help from the MAME Team in this matter... I threw a few messages back and forth, tried to post on the main site but I've never been able to use that forum, so hope its well received here this information on the matter of Ultracade. I now turn this over to Aaron and bow out of it. To: support@ultracade.comSubject: MAME Hello. I have been keeping something of an eye on the recent events between MAME and Ultracade. My personal take on emulation is that it is a tool to preserve electronic entertainment equipment and gaming aside be damned. I have spent several decades repairing mainly home electronics but do occasionally work on uprights. I also have worked with the MAME community since it began and what I saw Ultracade do was very inappropriate. I wholly understand your position to protect your company from those lying, thieving, bastards such as E-Bay... forgive my language, but last year I had a large amount of property stolen that ended up auctioned on E-Bay, even though they were informed before hand to be on the lookout; and then once they allowed the sales of known stolen property, attempted to withhold information about those involved. So, you ask for suggestions... how's this? Rather then hurting yourself by bringing down a publicity wrath of all those involved in MAME, rather then trying to outright steal the MAME name (even though the intent was good), rather then trying to reinvent the wheel of law that already exists to protect both MAME and your own business, ENFORCE those laws and file suit against E-Bay for the sales of such equipment containing software and "roms" that can not be legally marketed? MAME Team itself is mainly hobby based and has very little financial support to go after the multitudes who treat MAME as a game platform to be profited by... this does not mean those actions are endorsed or legal (in many cases). While your recent actions no doubt earned you some enemies in the MAME community, I'm sure if you took proper legal actions, keep your target focused, stop burning your bridges with those who likely support you, that this entire PR incident could be turned around. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- FROM: David R. Foley UltraCade You may pass this along to the MAME community and team members. If the trademark is granted, we would gladly assign it to the original team members so long as we prevent others from using it commercially. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- " TRADEMARK - a word, phrase or slogan used to identify and distinguish thesource of the goods or services " As M.A.M.E. is a conglomeration of work by hundreds of people and can not besold, it also can not be classified as a "goods" or as a "service".Further, as many variants of MAME exist by several developers and for manysystems, even if the core MAME file could be trademarked, it would not serveto fulfill your desires as those abusing MAME would simply turn to anynumber of alternatives available. This information will be passed to Aaron Giles for review.However, keep in mind, that MAME was designed this way to ensure no oneperson or entity could ever gain legal control over the project. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- FROM: David R. Foley UltraCade I'd love to communicate with Nickola or Aaron directly, or their attorneys,and assign them the trademark, or help them get it registered and prevent itfrom commercial use. David R. FoleyUltraCade TechnologiesCEO1281 Wayne Avenue, San Jose, CA 95131, USAwww.ultracade.com408.436.8885 415.723.7225 FAX ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- As before, I will pass your message along. Please understand I am just a small cog in the MAME system and I am not directly a part of MAME Team. I only do this as a company owner myself whom understands your position and as someone who within MAME that has not been so angered as to open this dialog. Expect to hear from Aaron or one of his legal representatives... but know this, as one of the foremost persons leading the flow of MAME development, your actions in this matter have seriously injured any rapport you could have had with the singularly most influential person in the MAME community at this time. And before you ask... Smitty, Haze and Salmoria are the next probable bigwigs of the project... who presently are following with Giles' rage of this incident Just on a personal note, I think you really should have contacted someone within the MAME community first as most of them tend to agree and do not like to see MAME sold or threatened... while you fall into the first part in agreement, your ill planned method to resolve the issue placed you the later part, a threat. I truly hope something can be resolved. I also feel, given MAME is protected from being legally sold or ROMs (most) distributed, you will not be able to get much legal support from the MAME angle and that it is the criminals who need to be targeted. I would personally love to see E-Bay get all they deserve... even though I know they are just a selling place for illegal goods and its those selling (the MAME cabinets, MAME software, and "selling" the ROMs). I personally helped in the effort to bring down the Tombstone site that sold MAME ROMs.. oh, I'm sorry, that is, they sold the DVD's, which just happened to contain the MAME ROMs... right. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- FROM: David R. Foley UltraCade No one from the MAME team has ever responded to my several emails over the past year. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I am preparing a direct post to A.G. now.Can you supply me with the email address you used? If it is true that you expressed this concern and your messages were ignored or "lost", it could help to sway your case. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- FROM: David R. Foley UltraCade I used the authors email addresses as listed in the MAME.TXT file. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: David R. Foley [mailto:david.foley@ultracade.com] To: 'MC6489@mclink.it'; 'mab22@po.cwru.edu'; 'agiles@mame.net'; 'chris.moore@writeme.com'; 'bradman@pobox.com'; 'ascott@utkux.utcc.utk.edu'; 'vaszs01@banet.net'; 'l.elia@tin.it'Subject: Please contact me so that we can properly assign the TM to you As you know, we have been in the process of preventing several commercial enterprises from selling machines and promoting the sale through the offering of illegal ROMs. Like it or not, the way US trademark law works is the first to file, will almost always get the mark, unless someone else files and shows commercial use of the mark prior. We filed for the mark in order to prevent any of our competition from filing. We would ultimately like to see Nicola and/or the original team file and own the mark, and follow the spirit laid out in the MAME.TXT document. We will gladly pay for the filing and assignment to you and your group, and/or remove our filing upon confirmation that you have filed, preventing anyone else from filing. Please contact me at your earliest opportunity to discuss. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------David R. Foley UltraCade Technologies CEO 1281 Wayne Avenue, San Jose, CA 95131 www.ultracade.com 408.436.8885 415.723.7225 FAX This email was sent several times throughout the year of 2004 and at least 3 times since during 2005. Posted by: SomeOneTryingToHelp at February 21, 2005 07:11 PM Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
montpics Posted February 22, 2005 Share Posted February 22, 2005 What an evil scheme..... I don't like it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gryph Posted February 22, 2005 Share Posted February 22, 2005 Well it's nice to know that they are working on it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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