Now it gets even better. Not only does John find a company stupid enough to reprint Age of Steam but he also convinces them that he paid for the original artwork. Please note that the title boilerplate is from the original version. The copyright for this artwork lies with Warfrog, since they paid for the artist to do the work. FRED were told last October by another person that the artwork was copyright Warfrog but they ignored the warning. They did not even bother to email me to ask who the rights belonged to. Winsome has never paid for artwork - notice the use of covers that are in the public domain. I will be taking this matter further as copyright law is much more straightforward than trademark law.

I regard the new edition of Age of Steam as stolen property. There was never a 'real' license from Winsome to Warfrog. The 'licensed from... ' was favour to John to help big up Winsome, in the same way that John published Prairie Rails with my name on even though I never designed it. The game was never submitted to Winsome for publication, it was always designed to be a Warfrog game. John was paid to develop it, that is all.

Even if Winsome did own the license then there should also be a contract between Winsome and the designer. There is no such contract. Even if there was one the fact that Winsome have paid me no royalties for the design would mean they were in breach of contract. I'm sure John is never tired of telling people in private about the money I owe him but that's all in his head. After AoS was released Warfrog and John made an agreement to share the profits on Winsome designed maps. John later reneged on this deal and demanded 1 Euro per map printed, as well as more money for the second printing of AoS. As a third of each of the maps are still unsold that meant Warfrog losing money on them. However, we agreed a sum and I paid him all monies owed. He then came back the following year demanding more money - hence why we have fallen out. Please note that the original deal was witnessed. For some reason John cannot remember it.

Winsome has never had to risk money publising AoS yet wishes to claim it as its own design. Warfrog took the risk to publish it and yet is not regarded as the legitimate owner.

Now it gets even better. Not only does John find a company stupid enough to reprint Age of Steam but he also convinces them that he paid for the original artwork. Please note that the title boilerplate is from the original version. The copyright for this artwork lies with Warfrog, since they paid for the artist to do the work. FRED were told last October by another person that the artwork was copyright Warfrog but they ignored the warning. They did not even bother to email me to ask who the rights belonged to. Winsome has never paid for artwork - notice the use of covers that are in the public domain. I will be taking this matter further as copyright law is much more straightforward than trademark law.

As far as the trademark issue goes that's simply as case of not having enough money to see justice done. As John receives free legal advice he is always going to win on the grounds that the opponent does not have enough money to fight him. That does not mean he is the legal owner of the trade mark.

FRED are in receipt of stolen property. There has been enough discussion of the ownership of the game to warn them of the issues surrounding it. Instead of contacting me about this they chose to publish it without my knowledge, even though we have been in regular contact about other matters. You'd think a simple, 'hey, we're printing AoS' would not have been too difficult.

As far as I am concerned I want nothing more to do with FRED or Funagain, they being the same company, and am doing my best to terminate the existing contracts I have with them.

Sorry for ranting but I'm a bit brassed off about the situation. It used to be that companies did not behave in this manner, as the public reaction would bankrupt them, (see Hexagames as an example). Today it seems that some companies believe that it's OK to rip designers off.

Martin Wallace

Where did he write this?

I thought trade marks covered names such as the title, and copyright covered text and artwork?

I thought trade marks covered names such as the title, and copyright covered text and artwork? By no means am I taking sides, just observing and asking.

The following question is based purely on an observation and nothing else. Doesn't the back of the box say in addition to licensed to Warfrog "Age of Steam is copyright Winsome Games, 2001"

I thought trade marks covered names such as the title, and copyright covered text and artwork? By no means am I taking sides, just observing and asking.

Is that correct? Why would the rules copyright not be retained by the person/company commissioning the work, and not the developer?

I spoke to Martin a few hours ago.

The problem with trademark actions in America is that there's no money after winning. You merely get the rights. The discovery period is very long and lawyers must be paid throughout this time, and clearly there are additional costs thereafter. Even though documentary evidence exists that proves that Bohrer doesn't own AoS, as mentioned above by James Hamilton, providing it to an American court is not worth the cost involved.

The logo issue counts as copyright infringement, now that FRED has published and sold it without permission. There's no question that Martin bought the copyright in the artwork from the creator [and that no one else has been involved since]. Here there is money, and hopefully also an American judge will acknowledge the financial situation and compensate Martin fully.

The logo issue counts as copyright infringement, now that FRED has published and sold it without permission. There's no question that Martin bought the copyright in the artwork from the creator [and that no one else has been involved since]. Here there is money, and hopefully also an American judge will acknowledge the financial situation and compensate Martin fully.

They do,however having searched US and UK patent offices records (yes , i know too much time on my hands) there appears to be no record of a Winsome copyright.

... now that FRED has published and sold it without permission.

I have to think that punitive damages could be huge.