Is Foley really the devil..?? (Previously: RetroBlast is a traitor..??)

[IntruderAlert]

Hey WAIT A SECOND!!!
That "Hammer Pro" says it has "an Oscar Controls style Spinner"
What exactly does that mean?

http://www.ultracade.com/accessories

[markrvp]

Am I the only one amused at the fact that after Foley's attack on the MAME community, he is now making products targeted to work with "today's leading consumer emulation" systems?

[monkeybomb]

Am I the only one amused at the fact that after Foley's attack on the MAME community, he is now making products targeted to work with "today's leading consumer emulation" systems?

I'm not amused by it, it's more amazed or funny in the non haha way.  The guy would have done all this and made a bundle.  We'd all love to see new products and get licenses for our favorite games, but now I'm pretty sure he'll never get a penny from a decent percentage of the market.  And this from a guy who buys everything for the hobby and asks questions later.  And yes mark I am very aware that we have that in common...I've seen your pile o stuff and it's acctually worse than mine

[RayB]

Hey WAIT A SECOND!!!
That "Hammer Pro" says it has "an Oscar Controls style Spinner"
What exactly does that mean?

http://www.ultracade.com/accessories

Kelsey should send a Cease and Desist to this jackass! (ie: "We own the trademark to Oscar Controls, blah blah blah, take your page down! Blah blah blah")

[monkeybomb]

That "Hammer Pro" says it has "an Oscar Controls style Spinner"

That's just unreal.

[markrvp]

Am I the only one amused at the fact that after Foley's attack on the MAME community, he is now making products targeted to work with "today's leading consumer emulation" systems?

I'm not amused by it, it's more amazed or funny in the non haha way.

[markrvp]

That "Hammer Pro" says it has "an Oscar Controls style Spinner"

That's just unreal.

If Foley didn't pay Kelsey for that, then I hope Kelsey bends him over and takes him for a nice long reaming.

[KevSteele]

Hey WAIT A SECOND!!!
That "Hammer Pro" says it has "an Oscar Controls style Spinner"
What exactly does that mean?

http://www.ultracade.com/accessories

Kelsey should send a Cease and Desist to this jackass! (ie: "We own the trademark to Oscar Controls, blah blah blah, take your page down! Blah blah blah")

I'm actually wondering if it has an actual Oscar Controls spinner in it.

[KevSteele]

Am I the only one amused at the fact that after Foley's attack on the MAME community, he is now making products targeted to work with "today's leading consumer emulation" systems?

I'm not amused by it, it's more amazed or funny in the non haha way.

[JoyMonkey]

One other thing everyone needs to remember: once iROMs is launched, Foley has promised a crackdown on pirate ROM sites. Don't know what that means for us all, exactly, but I predict more fireworks...

I didn't realize there were still rom sites out there. Don't people use bittorrent or newsgroups to find roms these days? I don't think he'll be able to do anything about that (or is he more powerfull than the RIAA?)

[MameMaster!]

I definitely feel he's permanently lost out on the MAME crowd, but I wonder if there's any market left beyond our community for arcade retrogaming?


Kevin....I think that's really the point here......beyond the "MAME TM" crowd (and who knows globally how big this group is really is ..... 100,000???....and I think that's optimistic)....NONE of us (or at best VERY FEW of us will participate in the "iROMS" program (by the way has anyone told Apple about this?).....

So who's left for this service?....the average joe paying $9.99 or $19.99 for JAKKS plug/play stuff?....the rich guy that buys expensive gifts at holiday time in the Shaper Image?....really what is the audience here?....where's the sustainable business model?

It's unfortunate that DF didn't marshall his resources to WOO THE MAME COMMUNITY NOT ALIENATE them.....too bad. Too late Dave.

I think a lot of us think you're a shrewd businessman...but you're really off target here....and I for one don't see how you can possibly make any real money off of this scheme.

But....time will tell. Who would have thought Michael Jackson would have walked?....maybe you'll be laughing at all of us in a couple of years.....but I doubt it.

[KevSteele]

One other thing everyone needs to remember: once iROMs is launched, Foley has promised a crackdown on pirate ROM sites. Don't know what that means for us all, exactly, but I predict more fireworks...

I didn't realize there were still rom sites out there. Don't people use bittorrent or newsgroups to find roms these days? I don't think he'll be able to do anything about that (or is he more powerfull than the RIAA?)

Problem with bittorrent currently is the requirement for a tracker site, which is what would be targeted by Foley. Worse, other tracker sites have been forced to turn over their logs, which shows who downloaded what (a bunch of trackers were recently shut down by the MPAA over the distribution of Star Wars III)

I know the bittorrent community is working on decentralized trackers, however.

Kevin

[Lilwolf]

iRoms would have a market.  Sure hes !@#$ up that market... But I will try and buy any roms I can legally.  Even from someone like him.  Why?  I want to legitamize my machine.  So if the price is right, on my favorite games, I will probably purchase...  But it will take a while before I buy from Foley for sure...  But just because he is a ja!@ Ars@# doesn't mean that my morals have changed.

As for bittorrent + trackers...  Someone built up a BitTorrent + RSS feed system that works with some white box / tivo computers.  So you can select tv shows in the past, it will RSS a request for that show.  Anyone on the system who recorded it will automatically put up a torrent and broadcast it.  Then anyone who is interested will start downloading it.  Pretty cool system.   I hope they do something similar.

but a problem with bit torrent... you don't have to access the server to get the info.  People can find all the the main seeds.  Then find from them (by attaching) all of the leechers.  This is all standard through the protocol.  So don't think your safe.  just realize that its more of a hassle then its worth to find out...  IE don't download really sensitive movies / code.   Starwars III wasn't the first movie to go after torrents.

[Lilwolf]

btw, can whoever started this thread change the title?

It doesn't seem like anyone is talking about RetroBlast anymore.  And I think its kinda damning. 

[Edgedamage]

I think a few people should send Apple a few emails like this:"how do I sign up for your future Iroms service I keep hearing about?" Also will it work with my new Ipod photo?

[Lilwolf]

LOL - Apple would be over him like a... well... a hog on an apple...

[Witchboard]

Hey WAIT A SECOND!!!
That "Hammer Pro" says it has "an Oscar Controls style Spinner"
What exactly does that mean?

http://www.ultracade.com/accessories

I would think it's similar to the auctions you see on eBay selling, "WICO style leaf joysticks."  Everybody knows they aren't WICO's but the design is based on them.

[MameMaster!]

Hey WAIT A SECOND!!!
That "Hammer Pro" says it has "an Oscar Controls style Spinner"




WOW.....that's chutzpah!!!!....amazing......this guy has alienated the MAME (tm) crowd...and yet he makes references to products only "we" would know!...

[JoyMonkey]

Here's an interesting tidbit from the Ultracade forums,

9 time out of 10 if the game works on MAME we can make it work for UltraCade or Arcade Legends.

Hmmm.... could that be because the ultra-secret software that's running inside is Mame code? Surely not?

[IntruderAlert]

iRoms would have a market.  Sure hes !@#$ up that market... But I will try and buy any roms I can legally.  Even from someone like him.  Why?  I want to legitamize my machine.  So if the price is right, on my favorite games, I will probably purchase...  But it will take a while before I buy from Foley for sure...  But just because he is a ja!@ Ars@# doesn't mean that my morals have changed.

I know where you're coming from,
but due to the way he handled the NAMCO roms and the MAME trademark in the past..
What we have been wondering about it whether he will actually have the rights to issue the licence over the roms
and whether the iROMS licence will mean anything at all

and as far as the pricing goes
if you check the last page you'll see that he's already selling ROM packs f or the "Arcade Legends" "HOME USE ONLY" cab
If purchased after the sale of the machine a pack including 7 games:
Defender
Joust
KLAX
Robotron : 2084
Stargate
Tapper
Toobin

will cost you  $375 which = a little over $53 per game

[Goz]

Hey WAIT A SECOND!!!
That "Hammer Pro" says it has "an Oscar Controls style Spinner"




WOW.....that's chutzpah!!!!....amazing......this guy has alienated the MAME (tm) crowd...and yet he makes references to products only "we" would know!...   

What makes everyone so sure he's not one of us. There are near 6400 registered users here.

Maybe all of the dick-heads of the past, present, and future have been / are / or will be DF... 

Things that make ya go hmmmm


-Goz

[IntruderAlert]

so.. he's like 100 Agent Smiths or something

[IntruderAlert]

Not sure if anyone's ever actually read all of this but just to be fair here is David's side of the story:

Like most things that are spread by rumor, the facts about me, UltraCade Technologies, and the M.A.M.E. emulation system are quite distorted. I will try and educate anyone who cares to listen about the reality of our marketplace and what we are doing and what we are not. Simply put, we are making an effort to stamp out the commercial sales of M.A.M.E. based systems that advertise the ability to play thousands of games while relying on the customer to obtain the ROMs which can not legally be obtained. What we are not doing is trying to claim ownership of the M.A.M.E. open source emulator or sue its authors. We are concerned about the commercial marketplace, and not the readers of the many M.A.M.E. user groups and forums.

I have been working on emulation technology since the mid 80's when I did work on an emulation project in college. In 1994, while working on games for companies like Sega and Williams, we developed an emulation of the arcade games Joust, Defender and Robotron that ran on a Sega Genesis. In 1996, we started the Lucky 8 project which turned into the UltraCade project. In 1998 we were one of the first companies to acquire the rights to classic arcade games from various publishers. We have licensed games from several manufacturers including Capcom, Jaleco, Taito, Stern, Incredible Technologies, Midway, Atari and more. We have started several projects and built prototypes for companies like Sega, based on technology that was licensed from authors from the emulation community. We have licensed technology from many of the communities programmers, paying them to use their code in our products and demonstrations. We have been the leader of the retro arcade movement, and have invested millions of dollars creating a market for retro games. UltraCade was the first successful multi-game arcade machine combining many of the old classics. We further enhanced the market by creating Arcade Legends, our consumer version of the UltraCade product. We have also paid hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees to have the right to sell our games.

In the past couple of years, there has been a huge wave of resellers competing with our UltraCade and Arcade Legends products. They build a similar style cabinet, install a PC in the machine, load M.A.M.E., and sell it for a very low price. Lower than we could ever offer our machines for sale. How? Quite Simple. They profit by stealing others work. If you look at the web sites, and read the eBay ads they offer machines that "Play over 4,000 Classic Arcade Games" They then try and skirt the law by pretending that they are not promoting piracy of these same 4,000 games with statements like "we don't load the ROMs" but of course, almost all of them do. The others that don't, they provide you with an instruction sheet with a link to several web sites where you can illegally download the ROMs, or provide you with the contact information for a CD/DVD duplication house that will sell you a set of ROMs for all 4,000 games for less than $200. Would anyone really buy this arcade machine if they knew that there was no legal way for them to run over 99% of the games that they were promised, I don't think so, and if you really look at this without emotion, I'm sure you would agree. These companies are simply selling the promise of thousands of games on a machine that can not possibly run them legally. I sometimes hear the argument, "well, I could go on eBay and buy up all of these games and then run it", and while plausible, it certainly would not be anywhere near cost effective, and again, if the customer knew that to legally operate these games, they have to spend thousands of dollars buying legal ROMs I seriously doubt that they would consider purchasing a M.A.M.E. machine. Anyone reading this email thread is an intelligent person, and if they put emotions aside, they will realize that what we are saying about selling M.A.M.E. machines and the promise of getting 4,000 games for the average consumer can't possibly happen. Unlike most of you reading this, the average consumer looking to buy a machine for their game room has no idea how emulation works, or what is legal and illegal to do. To them, they read an advertisement on a website or on eBay and compare our product with 50 games or an ad for a machine that promises thousands of games, with the promise of instructions about how to obtain those games. Of course, in this skewed environment the average consumer would gravitate towards the thousands of games machine, not realizing that the software and the games are unlicensed and illegal to play. Most consumers who are pointed at a web site selling a 7 DVD set of ROMs have no idea that this is an act of piracy, they were simply instructed to do this by the person selling them their arcade cabinet, and told this is how you get the games.

Now that we have attempted to take legal recourse to prevent illegal competition, the same people, who steal the work of the M.A.M.E. authors, and then profit by selling machines that have no value without the pirated games being made available, turn around and cry foul when we call them on their ways. They run to the M.A.M.E. discussion forums and spread rumors about UltraCade suing the authors of M.A.M.E. or stealing the M.A.M.E. engine. I'm amazed at the response of the community, a community that is being whipped into action by the same people who are stealing and profiting from them and they're efforts. Many people have reacted with hate mail without even considering to look at the facts of the situation, or to realize who is spreading the rumors. They are being spread by those who wish to profit by selling unlicensed games.

The simple fact is that we are attempting to stop the tide of illegal arcade machines, and the promotion of unlicensed games. The M.A.M.E. platform, while a technical marvel, consists of many violations of copyrights and trademarks. The authors have always stated in the documentation that it was not put into the public domain to steal from the game authors or publishers, and they have always been hands off about how to obtain the ROMs. They have also clearly stated that it is not to be used for commercial gains. A majority of the publishers who own the copyrighted material have not paid much attention to this marketplace, as until recently it has not had a huge commercial impact. But now, there are websites and eBay sellers selling machines that directly compete with legitimate publishers like us who publish games from Capcom, Taito, Midway, Atari and others, or publishers like Namco that publish Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga or the Donkey Kong/Mario Bros. machines.

Of the many thousands of games that M.A.M.E. supports, only a minute fraction of them can legally be played on a M.A.M.E. equipped machine, and many can not. There are many fallacies about the legality of owning ROMs and how you can play the game. Many people claim that they have a board set and therefore they can download as many ROMs as they like. The law is very strict. You can transfer the image from the actual original ROM chips, which you legally own, to another piece of hardware, provided that you actually transfer the code from the chips. Just having a board sitting around, and saying I have the right to play it is not the case. Many people point to StarROMs and say that they can then sell the games with the ROMs installed. This is not the case either. StarROMs license prohibits the resale of the game licenses, and only the end user can purchase these ROM images, resellers can not. Our market is further plagued by the rash of 4 in 1, 9 in 1, 24 in 1 39 in 1 and the new 300 in 1 "multicade" boards. These boards come from Taiwan and Hong Kong and contain illegal copies of the ROMs of several games.

This is a complex case amongst companies that are trying to make it about UltraCade stealing something from the M.A.M.E. team. That is not what this is about. This is simply UltraCade Technologies and other publishers doing whatever it takes to protect our commercial interests and prevent other companies from stealing our market by capitalizing on unlicensed games and selling products that only have value when coupled with illegally obtained games. Our application towards a trademark is to simply prevent anyone from commercially marketing an illegal product, nothing more. There have been no lawsuits filed against any of the M.A.M.E. authors, and there have been no claims towards the open source engine, nor will there be We are simply protecting our commercial market, and nothing more. We have no interest in the hobby community. We have no interest in the open source project. Our goal is to simply stop the rampant piracy in our marketplace, and we will use every means at our disposal to do so.

I welcome open discussions about this situation, and will respond to legitimate communications or questions.

-David R. Foley

http://www.ultracade.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=135&highlight=mame#135

[Edgedamage]

He's still a ---meecrob---.

[Shape D.]

I welcome open discussions about this situation, and will respond to legitimate communications or questions.

He lied, he never responded back to me whan I asked him why he's such a tool.

[Goz]

I've read Foley's stance a number of times and unfortunately still think he's a deuche-bag. While I would be willing to pay for legal ROM usage Dave has not proven that he is capable of being that source.

-Goz

[Goz]

He's still a ---meecrob---.

Great minds think a like.

[Edgedamage]

let's start a pool buy a ultracade reverse engineer it and post our findings on every bit torrent and P2P site out there. Bet there is some kind of Mame code in there that that ---meecrob--- has stolen.

[Edgedamage]

That DF guy is so thick he's probaly reading this thread think "Duh why are they calling me the french word for shower?"

[IntruderAlert]

We have no interest in the hobby community. We have no interest in the open source project. Our goal is to simply stop the rampant piracy in our marketplace, and we will use every means at our disposal to do so.

I welcome open discussions about this situation, and will respond to legitimate communications or questions.

-David R. Foley

With these new control panels http://www.ultracade.com/accessories and the whole whoop-T-do over the iROMS service and working with the MAME devs to include his .LIC licence in the MAME code ..
he sure is going to a lot of trouble to work with an open source project and to please a community in which they have no interest in either of

[IntruderAlert]

DOES THIS SOUND LIKE THEY HAVE THE RIGHTS TO LICENCE iROMS?


http://www.ultracade.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=50&highlight=#50


http://www.ultracade.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=53&highlight=#53



http://www.ultracade.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=55&highlight=#55

DOES THIS SOUND LIKE THEY HAVE THE RIGHTS TO LICENCE iROMS?

[DarkKobold]

This is simply UltraCade Technologies and other publishers doing whatever it takes to protect our commercial interests

From the horse's mouth.

I don't care what you think of illegal roms, of piracy, of crappy mame cabinets.

He was willing to steal from other people in his crusade.

Two wrongs don't make a right.

[Crazy Cooter]

This shows exactly what my point is...

Not sure if anyone's ever actually read all of this but just to be fair here is David's side of the story:

Like most things that are spread by rumor, the facts about me, UltraCade Technologies, and the M.A.M.E. emulation system are quite distorted. I will try and educate anyone who cares to listen about the reality of our marketplace and what we are doing and what we are not. Simply put, we are making an effort to stamp out the commercial sales of M.A.M.E. based systems that advertise the ability to play thousands of games while relying on the customer to obtain the ROMs which can not legally be obtained. What we are not doing is trying to claim ownership of the M.A.M.E. open source emulator or sue its authors. We are concerned about the commercial marketplace, and not the readers of the many M.A.M.E. user groups and forums.


-David R. Foley

1) He doesn't care about the end user, only money:
"We are concerned about the commercial marketplace, and not the readers of the many M.A.M.E. user groups and forums."

2) He's a liar, trademarking something claims ownership.

[RayB]

So they supposedly invested time and money to develope SNK emulation BEFORE they have the rights negotiated? I think that proves right there that they're just ripping off existing emulators... No one in their right mind would spend time/money developing software they don't even know if they can sell!

[MameMaster!]

So they supposedly invested time and money to develope SNK emulation BEFORE they have the rights negotiated? I think that proves right there that they're just ripping off existing emulators... No one in their right mind would spend time/money developing software they don't even know if they can sell!

I agree...that makes no business sense.

[romperwomb]

This has gone past surreal.  I would have assumed the iROMs service would only make ROMs available for the emulator used by Foley's Arcade Legends and Ultracade...the one running Joshua OS that they've ?developed?  Is he planning on offering technical support to get his ROMS running under MAME?

[Crazy Cooter]

These are exactly the questions someone that actually owned the rights to a game title would ask.

[JoyMonkey]

From what I can tell, JoshuaOS is some sort of Unix derivative. If a bunch of us were to put a little cash together and get the $1000 conversion kit (and then perhaps return it after we realize it's crap) - what chances do you think we'd have of someone here deciphering the emulator code from the OS?

[romperwomb]

What about those poor saps that bought his Arcade Legends home market system...unless he charges the same prices for the iROMS as he does for his Arcade Legends game packs.   What is to stop them from MAME'ing their machines, purchasing the ROMs for cheap on iROMS and running an Ultrastyle Frontend?

Would he have to send himself a Cease and Desist order for unfair competition for his own service?

-one hand clapping...

[Witchboard]

From what I can tell, JoshuaOS is some sort of Unix derivative. If a bunch of us were to put a little cash together and get the $1000 conversion kit (and then perhaps return it after we realize it's crap) - what chances do you think we'd have of someone here deciphering the emulator code from the OS?

I'm sure by buying one of these machines you're required to subject yourself to an EULA.  I would presume this EULA would include a clause where you would have to agree not to reverse engineer his product.