I offered my version of coldstone for sale to someone asking for it here on this forum and mods closed the topic and erased my post.

After the moderators killd every effort to mobilise people - for instance by asking people wether or not they were willing to pay extra for an upgrade - they even have the nerve to still keep on controling this forum, even now the software is dead.

Every change we have had to try and have a positive influence on this is gone out the window, thanks to the moderators.

Well, I did the professional thing: I payed my fees for Flash and am trying to create coldstone-like stuff there.

Anyway, this message will be deleted in 360 seconds anyhow, countdown starting now: 360, 359, ...

It doesn't matter which moderator deleted your post and locked the thread, we are all in agreement here. As one of the other moderators said, "This is not EBay."

Who's to say you wouldn't try to sell your copy 16 times and reap a hefty profit? You know we can't condone that.

I'm not going to lock or delete this (yet) because I believe that the message here is important for all to understand. We have all, moderators included, experienced frustration.

Humm, I didn't think about "This isn't ebay." but I agree with it. Had you pm-ed people or used email, I wouldn't care. But anything that can potentially lead to illegal activities won't last on this board.

I don't see how stating that Coldstone is dead and offering to sell it has anything to do with making a positive influence.

Complaining, bribing, pleading, petitioning, flaming, or whining will not make Coldstone appear any faster. It's in someone else's hands, and it's an incredibly difficult task. If it's officially dead, we'd let you know immediately. But it's not.

YuriGoul, a knowlegable member of this community has confirmed what I suspected. What you proposed to do is, indeed, illegal. You do not own the software, you only own the right to use it. Therefore you cannot legally sell your copy to anyone else.

If I'm not mistaken, both the seller and the buyer would be breaking the law and subject to legal action should ASW see fit to pursue this. Buyer beware, you will not be on record as owning a registered copy of Coldstone.

(edited for typo)

Rubber Ducky, on Jan 5 2006, 05:48 AM, said:

What you proposed to do is, indeed, illegal. You do not own the software, you only own the right to use it. Therefore you cannot legally sell your copy to anyone else.

If I'm not mistaken, both the seller and the buyer would be breaking the law and subject to legal action should ASW see fit to pursue this. Buyer beware, you will not be on record as owning a registered copy of Coldstone.

I read through a lot of the documentation and read the online FAQs. I did not find anything that said you can not sell your registered copy (or registration license if you prefer to call it that) to someone else. Perhaps it's there somewhere, but I didn't see it. Obviously you would only be able to sell it once because if you sell it, you can't still own it. Most software has some language about how you can sell the license/software as long as you delete all of your copies.

In any case, if Ambrosia is no longer selling it, then I can see that as a reason not to want sales to happen on Ambrosias forums. I think that would have been a better answer rather than trying to make the person out to be some software pirate without knowing any details.

That brings me to my next point which I will have to put here since the other thread was locked.
Ambrosia has various titles that don't run in OS X and they are still for sale, so I don't buy the "It doesn't run properly in OS X so that's why we stopped selling it" answer. That would only be believable if they stopped selling all of the games that don't run properly in OS X.

If you were planning an update to some software, wouldn't you want to keep selling it to keep people interested in it? Once nobody is using it, an update will not get much attention. Most people will already have moved on to something else and not want to start over on a game they gave up on long ago because they couldn't upgrade their demo version.

There are only 4 other possibilties I can see.

1. Keep selling it and put out an update. They didn't do this one.

2. Keep selling it and work on an update, but fail to be able to for some reason (for example maybe Benox owns some code and isn't sharing with Ambrosia). If an update never comes out you get a lot of angry buyers/users. They didn't do this one.

3. Stop selling it and tell everyone who has been working on a game for a year that it's dead and get a lot of angry buyers/users. They didn't do this one.

4. Stop selling it and continue hinting that an update will be worked on after such and such gets completed. Keep waiting long enough until most people have slowly moved on to other things and even the ones who haven't no longer really expect an update and then announce that it's officially dead. Not enough people using it at that point to have many angry users.

I think they stopped selling it to force Beenox to give them the code (or whatever you call it). Not sure if they ever did, though.

I suppose you may be right, but I like to believe otherwise. :mellow:

Edit: misspelt
Edit2: Bah...

This post has been edited by Ledorax : 17 January 2006 - 12:28 PM

Well I dont think anyone will get any hope for an update unless an admin keeps giveing word of it or a progress log is released, but if they are just waiting for us (the few) members who post here to die down and forget I would rather them just release the full version say that it will ONLY work on OS9.

Edit: spelling.

This post has been edited by Two Jacks : 17 January 2006 - 06:45 PM

This thread is dangerously close to being locked. Debra's words bear repeating in bold type.

Debra, on Jan 4 2006, 10:09 AM, said:

Complaining, bribing, pleading, petitioning, flaming, or whining will not make Coldstone appear any faster. It's in someone else's hands, and it's an incredibly difficult task. If it's officially dead, we'd let you know immediately. But it's not.
View Post

This forum is devoted to helping those who are using Coldstone solve problems they are experiencing. The ASW staff undoubtedly seldom checks in here. If you have something you want said to the administration, the correct forum is probably Ambrosia Banter.

Al is Great, on Jan 17 2006, 04:49 PM, said:

I read through a lot of the documentation and read the online FAQs. I did not find anything that said you can not sell your registered copy (or registration license if you prefer to call it that) to someone else. Perhaps it's there somewhere, but I didn't see it. Obviously you would only be able to sell it once because if you sell it, you can't still own it. Most software has some language about how you can sell the license/software as long as you delete all of your copies.

In regards to Coldstone, if you have paid for the software, then you have received a CD and a license code to use with the CGE. As such, you have a piece of physical media, being your CD, and a piece of digital authentication, being your license code. This is where we have the problem - I can't really see much of a barrier to you selling your CD. The software on the CD isn't registered, the only real advantage of the CD over a download of Coldstone is the complete graphic libraries contained on the disk.

The problem is with your license code. When you buy the license code, you are requesting the right for you to utilise the software in registered mode on one (or more, depending on licenses) computer that you own. This code is based on your personal identification and email. This code can be renewed, but it is issued on a personal basis to you as an individual.

Ambrosia's official policy on licensing says that if you lose your code you can request a renewal, and that's fine - you can update your copy to work again. But they don't say that you can transfer your code to another person - probably for good reason. For a start, their codes are based specifically on your name as supplied when you registered, in order to change that, they'd need to generate a new code - which is effectively a 'free copy.' There's also no way at all to ensure that you aren't still using your code - if you keep email records, as I and I'm sure many people do, it's quite easy to simply punch in the code and hit 'renew.' I very much doubt Ambrosia would just disallow an IP address - many of us still use dynamic IPs, and what happens if you changed ISP and needed to renew a code?

I'm going to get in touch with the relevant persons and post a specific response if I can - but my current feeling is that due to problems with authentication, with mode of sale and quite possibly privacy concerns, Ambrosia wouldn't be fond of the idea of you reselling your code. It is after all something they generated for you to use, not to resell. Ambrosia has never authorised resellling of their goods - so that's perhaps another issue.

I initially left this thread open, partially due to the original poster's assumption that I or another moderator would automatically close it, partially because I felt the matter wasn't that untenable at the point. As RD has said, we are close to the line, so everyone please calm down, and I'll see about official word for you. Don't make me need to lock or delete this thread too.

-Andiyar

In addition to the 4 options listed above, cracks are available everywhere on the web which would allow us to play the ganes and use the software that Ambrosia has waited over 2 years to correct or otherwize distribute. Rather than unbraid those of us who complain about this delay, we should be thanked for not taking the easy option, one that the president of Ambrosia has written can destroy the shareware practice -- namely, cracking. Those of us who complain support shareware, and want a company like Ambrosia to meet us half way. It seems like little to ask, just more than this company is willing to do.

@billiam, on Sep 18 2006, 06:38 PM, said in This is the limit:

It seems like little to ask, just more than this company is willing to do.

Your last sentence brings to mind a song from the Gilbert and Sullivan operetta, H.M.S. Pinafore:
"Things are seldom what they seem.
Skim milk masquerades as cream ......" etc.

You don't know what the complexities of this situation are. You don't know what ASW, as a company, is willing to do. You are new to our community here, so tred lightly in our vinyards lest you break open the grapes of wrath to make your wine (or is that - whine?) Do you have a registered copy of Coldstone, billiam, or is this all just "sour grapes?"

Welcome to the boards. ~RD

@billiam, on Sep 19 2006, 08:38 AM, said in This is the limit:

In addition to the 4 options listed above, cracks are available everywhere on the web which would allow us to play the ganes and use the software that Ambrosia has waited over 2 years to correct or otherwize distribute. Rather than unbraid those of us who complain about this delay, we should be thanked for not taking the easy option, one that the president of Ambrosia has written can destroy the shareware practice -- namely, cracking. Those of us who complain support shareware, and want a company like Ambrosia to meet us half way. It seems like little to ask, just more than this company is willing to do.

Let me get this straight. You want Ambrosia Software to thank you for restraining yourself from downloading a serial package or searching for a serial code, and using said code to register Coldstone? You want Ambrosia , the publisher of Coldstone, to thank you for not stealing it? Perhaps the government should also thank you for not murdering people? Or the highway patrol should pull you over to thank you for doing the speed limit?

I don't think it's going to happen, my friend. Oh, and I might as well mention that software piracy is a topic best labelled 'anathema' on these forums. Okay?

As to Ambrosia being unwilling to meet us halfway, perhaps we should look at their track record. The first game that they ever developed is currently open source and freely available. Several of their games that were published pre-1996 are still available and working today. Ambrosia are currently working to make their flagship products, Snapz & WireTap, compatible with the new OSx86 architechture. If you wander through the Help on the Way forum, or email help@ambrosiasw.com, they are still supporting games that are not at all useable under OSX - which has been the sole operating system Apple has sold since 2002. In fact, out of the dozens of games and utilities published, they have only once, ever, had to pull a product from the market. Care to guess what it is?

It isn't like Ambrosia has not put in an effort to get Coldstone 'fixed'. I can say with certainty that they went far beyond what almost any other publisher would do - they spent a great deal of time attempting to get Beenox to fix the product (remember, ASW didn't make Coldstone. Beenox did). They hired people to work, in house, on a product they did not even develop themselves. They were still negotiating with Beenox to get Coldstone working when the latter were acquired by Activision. Andrew has himself stated that the situation with Coldstone has been one of the most irritating processes he has ever had to go through in developing software - that he hates having had to pull the product due to flaws, and that trying to get it fixed, legally, became an incrediblle excercise in frustration.

What will happen from hereon in? Ambrosia is still trying to get Coldstone working. They have had problems with the source code they received from Beenox, they have had even bigger issues with currently profitable products requiring updating - business is, after all, business. That said, Ambrosia have said they are still committed to try to get Coldstone fixed. When? Well, as they always say with their products: when it's ready.

-Andiyar

There is not a software package on the market that you are allowed to re-sell. Period. Ambrosia (or is it Beenox?) owns the software. No one else does. We paid for a license to use it. We do not own it. I know software is re-sold on eBay all the time, but that is illegal. Only Ambrosia/Beenox and their distributors have any legal right to sell this software. The end.

This is the way it is with ALL commercial software.

Actually, you buy a licence, you have the right to sell that licence, but after you do you are no longer licenced to use the application. Therefore you can buy some software and then sell it to someone, completely legally, just as long as you no longer use that software

@thumbprint, on Oct 6 2006, 04:41 PM, said in This is the limit:

There is not a software package on the market that you are allowed to re-sell. Period. Ambrosia (or is it Beenox?) owns the software. No one else does. We paid for a license to use it. We do not own it. I know software is re-sold on eBay all the time, but that is illegal. Only Ambrosia/Beenox and their distributors have any legal right to sell this software. The end.

This is the way it is with ALL commercial software.

Read these two articles: Doctrine of First Sale, Softman v Adobe. Once you have read and understood them, it is my sincere hope that you will come to realize that you are mistaken on several points above.

Secondly, Ambrosia's shareware protection system is quite robust enough to handle transfering a copy from one person to another, although obviously there is little to prevent the original owner from continuing to use the software until he or she has to update his or her registration (and can no longer do so.) However, that would require ASW to do work for no compensation, over a product that will not run on modern platforms and was never all that wonderful to begin with. Honestly I have to agree with their ceasing sales of Coldstone - ASW has a reputation for quality, which was not earned by pushing buggy software. (Of course, I'd solve the problem by releasing it as Open Source, but (1) maybe there are some contractual obligations that prevent that, (2) maybe they retain hope that it can be made into a commercially viable product again.)

Thank you and have a nice day, &c.