GW's Behavior Already Backfiring

[okenobi]

I have been playing GW products for about 20 years now. I have not bought a WD for about five years now. I just joined BoLS about a year ago. I think their magazine sucks for what you pay for. And I didnt sign up to this web site to see future releases or white dwarf content. I signed up because to know your enemy in the gaming world, you read his diary on his tactics and how he thinks. This web site has mad me a better gamer. Not a copy of WD.

[Power Klawz]

I will admit that I kept buying white dwarf long after it's glory days, likely out of a sense of nostalgia to some extent (also being a financially irresponsible single guy in his early twenties.)

But there was a certain point where I just didn't like it anymore, and I figured if anything its a waste of my time if not money. It's been a few years since I've purchased an issue and I don't see that trend changing anytime soon. Of course I don't purchase print magazines in general much these days. Its a dying medium and for good reason.

Sadly corporate interests will always seek to control information to whatever extent is possible. They will push the legal limits and sometimes they'll go beyond them until some government watchdog reels them back in (hopefully.) Instead of embracing the new information paradigm they choose to cling tightly to the older methods as long as possible for fear of losing revenue. Ironically it is the small footprint of GW that allows it to cling so long. I am pretty certain that the majority of major corporations would have loved to have continued doing business the same way they've done things since the 50s. They didn't want the internet or instant media publishing, they didn't want a 24 hour news cycle or an involved and educated consumer. The problem is that those things happened despite their wishes, and they simply had to adapt to remain in business. GW is affected at a much slower rate due to its small size and entirely niche market segment. They can go on living in a world without transparency for a very long time because, honestly, nothing they do is that important.

I mean hell, if the music industry can still pull half the shenanigans it still pulls I doubt we will ever see GW embrace the information age with anything more earnest than embittered resignation after many long battles.

[canadainbeaver]

The speculation is that GW told google to shutdown the website, because posting pictures of the white dwarf before it's been release causes a reduction in sales of the white dwarf. The admin pulled all the GW content related info in the forum, before they shut form down too.

I said "If it is about white dwarf sales".

[Defenestratus]

gw have illegally ordered a website to stop publishing legal excerpts of their public material.

fify

[DrLove42]

As has been pointed out people are letting their "personal" vindictions against GW get in the way

BoLS is down for technical reasons and have recieved no C&D from GW. Maybe its because Natfka was writter for BoLS weekly....BOLS is NOT down because of GW

Faeit is down because they published pictures and scan from un released documents. Its basically piracy. Don't get me wrong, I like Faeit and what they post but there was a line crossed

Def above me ^^^. WRONG. How is it illegally ordered? They issued a proper C&D through the correct channels. And how are the excerpts legal? It material taken from a thus far unreleased document belonging to a company. It'd be no different to putting up chunks of the new Star Trek movie on Youtube

[canadainbeaver]

Jesus, people need to stop over reacting.

GW have ordered a website to stop publishing illegal copies of their public material.

Thats like Empire Magazine refusing to cover movies from Paramount because Paramount tried to get a Torrent website to stop.....

It's more like Paramount apply an injunction, without the court, on Empire Magazine for publishing a behind the scenes photo of a movie about to be released.

But then Empire would have permission to do so first

[Defenestratus]

Faeit is down because they published pictures and scan from un released documents. Its basically piracy. Don't get me wrong, I like Faeit and what they post but there was a line crossed

You should REALLY go educate yourself about the limitations and uses of the DMCA before you say such things.

[DrLove42]

You're right I'm not an expert on online legality. But everything I've seen and heard has said Faeit has ignored multiple requests to not or withdraw illegal/leak scan and images and GW took the final action one stop higher with google, and that google over reacted and pulled the entire blog, not just the offending articles, in a similar way that Amazon Knee Jerked and pulled that Space Marine book

[NockerGeek]

You should REALLY go educate yourself about the limitations and uses of the DMCA before you say such things.

Here's the actual DMCA infringement takedown request: [URL="http://www.chillingeffects.org/dmca512c/notice.cgi?NoticeID=928410"]http://www.chillingeffects.org/dmca512c/notice.cgi?NoticeID=928410[/URL]

Magazine has a street date of April 27th. Takedown request was issued on April 22nd, on the grounds that the material was from a as-yet-unreleased product. GW, as copyright holder, was within their rights to issue a takedown request to Google, and Google, as an Online Service Provider, was obligated under Title II of the DMCA to honor that request. Now, Google could have just taken the offending post down/put it in "draft" status/etc., but instead took down the entire site (probably due to past requests aimed at the same blog for posting leaked info).

This is basically a lose/lose situation for Games Workshop - issue a legally proper takedown request and look like bullies to the wargaming community, or do nothing and risk losing their IP's protections by not defending it. As a company that depends on its IP to make money, they really can't do the latter, but they're drawing a ton of heat by doing the former. And of course, the Faeit212 blog isn't really the originating source of the infringement - it's wherever the leak in the distribution chain is, so that someone could snap pics of the magazine early and send them along to Natfka. When it comes down to it, the core cause of all of it is the tiny preview window that GW allows these days, making sites like Faeit212 that much more popular for the news-and-previews-hungry market that is the gaming corner of the internet. This is just the fallout from the legal repercussions of following through with that plan.

GW loses fans' respect (and inadvertently creates more ammo for the war between GW fans and GW haters), the fans lose a popular rumors site (and a popular news site through collateral damage), and everyone ends up just being that much more tense - all because of perfectly legal, valid action that, honestly, had to be taken.

[DarkLink]

Jesus, people need to stop over reacting.

GW have ordered a website to stop publishing illegal copies of their public material.

Thats like Empire Magazine refusing to cover movies from Paramount because Paramount tried to get a Torrent website to stop.....

No. It's like if Paramount shut down Youtube so no one could watch the trailers for upcoming movies. Trailers that, for some stupid reason, Paramount only ever releases the day before opening.