We did not encourage Goko to use that model; why would you think we did? I couldn't have controlled it, other than by threatening them with cutting off my contract with RGG in a few years in order to get rid of them.
Perhaps it was comments like this: "Goko is the official implementation of Dominion. I support it." that made me think that you supported Goko. How silly of me to so carelessly misinterpret those ambiguous words.
Jay said, I'm going with these guys I'm talking to at this con (Funsockets, they changed their name to Goko later). It was his call. They talked big. I had zero information about them other than that they agreed to not make Farmville.
Later, I did not say "These no doubt awful people do not have my support in any way." I said, "they're the guys, I'm on their side." Would you have behaved differently? Until they had demonstrated incompetence, anyone, even someone so poor at customer relations as me, would know to say, yes, they're the guys.
Me saying "I support it" was not me saying "we encouraged them to use that model" or "this was under my control." I never had any control; at best I could threaten, which I never did, to get RGG to not renew his contract with them (or if that failed, to cut off my contract with RGG in order for their contract to mean nothing). In all cases Funsockets/Goko and MF were interested in my opinion, but that doesn't mean they always did what I wanted.
I have always preferred a system where once you buy something it's yours. As a multiplayer game you need a server or direct connections but could just have your offline version (again ShuffleIT did not think direct connections would work for most people). I imagine it as just like buying Heroes of Might and Magic II or whatever; it's a disc with some software, when you buy a new computer you can hope it still runs on that operating system.
This system wasn't that and I don't know how early I knew that. I have all my old emails with Funsockets and it's clear from the start that they'll be selling expansions (with a free base game, and we approved of that, we wanted a free base game and to sell expansions), but it wasn't clear for a while that that didn't mean, you download a program and it's in your computer and yours even if the company dies.
Or perhaps it was comments like this: "Jay turned down the people who wanted to do everything in micropayments. We went for, you can just buy expansions and play them" that made me think that you and Jay ("We") explicitly chose ("went for") the "buy expansions" model. You are on record that you explicitly chose this model, Donald. It wasn't that Goko were a fait accompli and poor little you had no control over what they did. You and Jay chose them and their model.
Poor little me! The poor little me part is having these conversations.
We ruled out micropayments. Most people wanted to make Farmville. When I say "we" I mean Jay and I didn't want that and it was Jay's call but he's friendly.
Jay and I have always preferred people to buy things and then have them. That is not what the Goko model actually is. All Jay knew day one was that they agreed to not do Farmville (then they tried to anyway with Zaps), and that they thought they could handle every platform at once, with one system that played a zillion games.
Again "buy expansions" does not automatically tell you "but they'll stop working when the company stops existing or stops having the project."
Maybe it was when you said "If you want to pay a monthly fee, just buy one large expansion per month. That's $12 a month, and hey then it's free once you have them all." that I thought you were promoting the "buy expansions" model as better than the subscriptions model. Perhaps I somehow thought you were telling me it'd be free once I had them all. Man oh man, however did I misinterpret your statements so badly? What a dumb-dumb I must be.
That's what the system was. There you have me describing the system as it existed. I was not trying to mislead people by not working out situations in which the service would go down.
I certainly had no reason to believe that Goko would die, that Dominion would be sub-licensed to a new company that we didn't pick, and that (though we hadn't been happy with Goko) we would not be happy with the new company. In that eventuality that I didn't consider, I didn't further consider that the new company would want a different payment model, that we would initially propose just paying for all existing customers not realizing we didn't have their money to hand over, and would thus be in a bad bargaining position.
However it was clear when we negotiated for "offline sets, or a year online" that some people would be unhappy. We did not see how to do better. To date my best approach is, we could have said, "sorry ShuffleIT, we started bargaining from a bad position since we thought just paying back the money we'd made would cover everyone on the new system; since it won't, I don't see how we can get everyone onto your system, so we will just find some other company, where we can start bargaining from a more informed position."
Another helpful trick is: to everything I ever say, please automatically append, "to the best of my knowledge at this time." To the best of my knowledge at the time, the system was going to keep going. If I had stopped to consider, what if we switch companies, I would have thought, people will just get the system on the new service.
Perhaps it was comments like this: "You seem to be under the impression that you are paying to play Dominion on a per-game basis. That's not what's going on. You can play the main set endlessly for free. If you buy Intrigue then you can play the main set and Intrigue endlessly after paying for Intrigue once ever." that made me think I was going to play the main set and the expansions I bought endlessly for free. "ENDLESSLY FOR FREE". Those were YOUR words, Donald, made when it was convenient for you to make us believe that that was what we were getting. Now that it is convenient for you to make us believe otherwise, you're claiming that that was never your promise, but you wrote those exact words. ENDLESSLY FOR FREE. Those were your words. All of the quotes above were your words, words that you used to cajole us into giving you money, words that now maybe were or were not true.
Again that was to the best of my knowledge at that time. I was responding to whatever thing that was someone misunderstanding whatever it was; I'm not checking. I wasn't saying "now everyone be quiet I want to sell them online Dominion with this pitch."
I do not wish to cajole anyone into anything. I don't try to sell tickets to myself. When I post a Secret History, it's not a designer diary on the front page of BGG; I figure the people who care will find it. I don't go to cons to promote my games (though I also don't like to travel). If you don't want my stuff I do not want you to buy it.
You did not find - and you would have been pretty pleased too - where I said on BGG, yes, when Making Fun loses the contract and new guys take over, of course everyone who had the old system will have the new system for free. I honestly thought that was what would happen and did not know to never be sure about the future.
The fact is Donald that what you claimed when Goko was released is not what you are claiming now. The things you claimed back then and the things you claim now cannot both be true. There's a word for that, one which you seem quite happy to bandy about (see below) but which I will not use.
I haven't lied about anything. I am ridiculously honest. I feel like I have a great track record there too. I don't say true statements that intentionally mislead people either; I consider that lying.
I don't remember all of my posts from years ago, but for sure I stood by Goko, longer than was reasonable, then stood by Making Fun (who Jay hadn't even picked), longer than was reasonable. I don't see what else to do in that situation.
So if RGG did read the contracts then they did know why they weren't getting any money. It's not complicated: either they knew how much money they were getting or they didn't read the contracts. This was not their first rodeo.
Jay (RGG is one person) misunderstood the contract. He read it; he misunderstood it.
This is probably not something worth pursuing; maybe you want to say, it's semantics, if he misunderstood it he didn't really read it. Man whatever. It's not that he signs random pieces of paper without looking at them. It was a mistake and so much for that.
The ShuffleIT contract is also just between Jay and them, but I proofread this one.
And as for "you feel like a company promised you Dominion forever", no, I feel like a person promised me Dominion "endlessly for free" once I had bought it. Wherever did I get that idea?
I have labored to be good to my fans; sorry you don't feel like I'm there for you. You're so mad at not having Dominion for forever that you won't even enjoy the year we got you.
Or, the offline version; if you prefer to play offline then you can take that instead of the year and then you've still got Dominion, just like I never let you down, assuming you like the new version and well here's hoping.