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xraytango wrote:
Here's a little inside baseball for you as to why PgtM didn't receive any warning or even the courtesy of a C&D; Shapeways has been doing resin printing and production for Forge World.

This is false. Entirely not true.

 MeanGreenStompa wrote:

xraytango wrote:
Here's a little inside baseball for you as to why PgtM didn't receive any warning or even the courtesy of a C&D; Shapeways has been doing resin printing and production for Forge World.

This is false. Entirely not true.

As they say on the internet, xraytango, "*Citation needed."

I've been told previously by FW staff (during their convention appearances in the US) that all their production and design work is done entirely in-house, at Nottingham. If you want to claim differently, you need to post a link or provide evidence somehow. Otherwise, I must emphatically support MeanGreenStompa on this.

 Breotan wrote:

 MeanGreenStompa wrote:

xraytango wrote:
Here's a little inside baseball for you as to why PgtM didn't receive any warning or even the courtesy of a C&D; Shapeways has been doing resin printing and production for Forge World.

This is false. Entirely not true.

As they say on the internet, xraytango, "*Citation needed."

I've been told previously by FW staff (during their convention appearances in the US) that all their production and design work is done entirely in-house, at Nottingham. If you want to claim differently, you need to post a link or provide evidence somehow. Otherwise, I must emphatically support MeanGreenStompa on this.

I'll have to see if I can dig it up, but I found a while back the company that provided GW their 3D printers. Was browsing some commercial units and noticed GW's logo on the company's page of customers.

Plus given GW's issues with leaks, having the 3D files and models handled by a third party doesn't strike me as something they would do.

I think we'd notice it immediately if ForgeWorld outsourced production: there wouldn't be any more warping, release agent residue or bubbles in what they ship anymore.

To this day I still can't believe how a first world business can be so terrible at casting when there are countless examples of people who can cast with 0% warpage.

 silent25 wrote:

 Breotan wrote:

 MeanGreenStompa wrote:

xraytango wrote:
Here's a little inside baseball for you as to why PgtM didn't receive any warning or even the courtesy of a C&D; Shapeways has been doing resin printing and production for Forge World.

This is false. Entirely not true.

As they say on the internet, xraytango, "*Citation needed."

I've been told previously by FW staff (during their convention appearances in the US) that all their production and design work is done entirely in-house, at Nottingham. If you want to claim differently, you need to post a link or provide evidence somehow. Otherwise, I must emphatically support MeanGreenStompa on this.

I'll have to see if I can dig it up, but I found a while back the company that provided GW their 3D printers. Was browsing some commercial units and noticed GW's logo on the company's page of customers.

Plus given GW's issues with leaks, having the 3D files and models handled by a third party doesn't strike me as something they would do.

It's possible that GW's logo was used without their consent.

I think silent25's comment that a 3d printer manufacturer were listing GW as a customer is eveidence against them using Shapeways. It's not uncommon for companies to mention their high-profile customers on their website.

Same company also had a prominent case of painted Marines and Tyranids for expos and shows.

I have seen and chatted with Spartan, GW and other mini games staffers at shows such as TCT when I have attended.

 AndrewGPaul wrote:
I think silent25's comment that a 3d printer manufacturer were listing GW as a customer is eveidence against them using Shapeways. It's not uncommon for companies to mention their high-profile customers on their website.

That was the point I was trying to make. Unfortunately don't have the link anymore to show it, but is was just one of the pages you see on various manufacturing sites listing the big companies that have bought their product.

Has anyone thought that maybe GW has used Shapeways to print prototypes of models in progress to check how the model looks outside of a computer?

 Todosi wrote:
Has anyone thought that maybe GW has used Shapeways to print prototypes of models in progress to check how the model looks outside of a computer?

For such a big company i highly doubt it.

im pretty sure they would have their own rapid prototyping department.

 Desubot wrote:

 Todosi wrote:
Has anyone thought that maybe GW has used Shapeways to print prototypes of models in progress to check how the model looks outside of a computer?

For such a big company i highly doubt it.

im pretty sure they would have their own rapid prototyping department.

I know they have stated the preview models we see in WD/Codexs are 3D prints. They are given to the painters to work on so they have display models long before the first plastics come off the production line. There was a thread several years back berating the quality of some new dwarf model painting because it looked like there was a fingerprint on it. Turned out it was the 3D print layers.

 silent25 wrote:

 Desubot wrote:

 Todosi wrote:
Has anyone thought that maybe GW has used Shapeways to print prototypes of models in progress to check how the model looks outside of a computer?

For such a big company i highly doubt it.

im pretty sure they would have their own rapid prototyping department.

I know they have stated the preview models we see in WD/Codexs are 3D prints. They are given to the painters to work on so they have display models long before the first plastics come off the production line. There was a thread several years back berating the quality of some new dwarf model painting because it looked like there was a fingerprint on it. Turned out it was the 3D print layers.

I believe that was the case for the taurox as well.

I seem to recall that it was the printer manufacturing company displaying logos of people who had the same model printers, as it's common practice to highlight big name customers using your tech. I know I've seen GW listed as a client/buyer at some of the 3d tradeshows. GW may have bought one of the objet printers (like what shapeways uses) but that would have been 8-9 years ago, and a while back they upgraded to an envisiontec printer which is lightyears ahead of what shapeways offers as I've seen some of the GW stuff printed by an envisiontec machine. They've had their own printers for years and both GW & FW print their prototype designs in house. Each printer model has it's own advantages, differing speed, or other qualities so it's highly possible they may have additional printers beyond the envisiontec, but given that it prints at such high quality it's doubtful they'd need anything beyond that.


(I have my prototypes done on an envisiontec printer, but I have to outsource my prints to a commercial printer as I can't afford 60K+ for one of the machines & software)

The fallen giant template was 3d printed, wasn't it?

 Zach wrote:
Boy I hope they dont come take my 3D printer to stop my Space Warrior pad production.

I think you've inadvertently hit the nail on the head here, regardless of the legality of the IP in question here, Shapeways is under no real obligation to list/make anyone's objects on their site. like nuking the site from orbit, printing stuff yourself is the only way to be sure.

Well this sucks, I had some Mk3 Shoulders I wanted from him and now they're gone, knew I should've ordered them last month.

Atleast I was able to get the Iron warriors combat a and breacher shields :(

 Desubot wrote:

 Todosi wrote:
Has anyone thought that maybe GW has used Shapeways to print prototypes of models in progress to check how the model looks outside of a computer?

For such a big company i highly doubt it.

im pretty sure they would have their own rapid prototyping department.

Games Workshop has$40 million USD in revenue. I'm pretty confident they could afford a Form 2 of their own. The idea they contract product development out to Shapeways is pants on head, I think.

The studio absolutely 100% has its own 3D printer, and has done for a few years now.

morgoth wrote:

Also, about IP in general: the law isn't fair to copyright holders.

Think about GW: they came at a time when there was nothing comparable to WH or WH40K, they built stores to educate the market, they sold their products there, a market was created, people started buying GW specialist games, then non-GW games, and all of a sudden, most of the people benefiting from GW's initial effort, were not GW.

No matter how you slice it, if someone so much as makes a model for 40K, following the same design guidelines as GW's models, they should in all fairness pay something to GW, who created their target market (people interested in 40k-esque miniatures).

I know, rite? How about all those fething leeches like Ford and Toyota? They should pay Daimler-Benz royalities.

Or to put it another way, your ignorance is showing. Hugely.

xraytango wrote:
Here's a little inside baseball for you as to why PgtM didn't receive any warning or even the courtesy of a C&D; Shapeways has been doing resin printing and production for Forge World.

No doubt they received "a word in their ear" and "friendly encouragement" to do things quietly lest they be caught in another CH-style quagmire.

As long as his work was his own and all his designs were of non-trademarked or copywriter and registered origins (no matter how loudly or often GW says it, they do not and never will own any sort of heraldic device, arrow, numeral, tribal design, et. al.) GW really wouldn't have standing.

The only way to beat the CH case was to keep the defendant from being able to make his appeal. GW had an affirmative defense but lost on 75% of their initial claims, something which would make them gun shy about openly pursuing another similar case.

If this is true, then another Shapeways seller's experiences make a lot more sense. Obviously, I don't have reason to doubt, other than this is the internet. However, another Shapeways seller who frequents a couple of the chapter groups I'm in for Space Sharks, and he's reported much the same: of the 150+ items that he offered on the site, something like, 90 of them have been removed. None of his stuff was based on founding legions, and the bulk of the chapter specific stuff was for chapters which featured in the Badab War books (including the chapter I play)

 Azazelx wrote:

morgoth wrote:

Also, about IP in general: the law isn't fair to copyright holders.

Think about GW: they came at a time when there was nothing comparable to WH or WH40K, they built stores to educate the market, they sold their products there, a market was created, people started buying GW specialist games, then non-GW games, and all of a sudden, most of the people benefiting from GW's initial effort, were not GW.

No matter how you slice it, if someone so much as makes a model for 40K, following the same design guidelines as GW's models, they should in all fairness pay something to GW, who created their target market (people interested in 40k-esque miniatures).

I know, rite? How about all those fething leeches like Ford and Toyota? They should pay Daimler-Benz royalities.

If all past IP was treated like recent (<25 years) IP, that's exactly what you would see.

You would also see Daimler-Benz pay royalties to other people of course.

morgoth wrote:
If all past IP was treated like recent (<25 years) IP, that's exactly what you would see.

You would also see Daimler-Benz pay royalties to other people of course.

And you would see GW pay royalties to all the companies they ripped off.

 Peregrine wrote:

morgoth wrote:
If all past IP was treated like recent (<25 years) IP, that's exactly what you would see.

You would also see Daimler-Benz pay royalties to other people of course.

And you would see GW pay royalties to all the companies they ripped off.

Of course.

For most companies it would make little to no difference, but at least revenues would trickle down to those who deserve them.

And, since this would be similar to FRAND clauses on current patents, it would be literally impossible for one company to hog a patent while forcing others to spend R&D money to uncover inferior alternatives.

morgoth wrote:

Also, about IP in general: the law isn't fair to copyright holders.

Think about GW: they came at a time when there was nothing comparable to WH or WH40K, they built stores to educate the market, they sold their products there, a market was created, people started buying GW specialist games, then non-GW games, and all of a sudden, most of the people benefiting from GW's initial effort, were not GW.

No matter how you slice it, if someone so much as makes a model for 40K, following the same design guidelines as GW's models, they should in all fairness pay something to GW, who created their target market (people interested in 40k-esque miniatures).

Just to hit this one again... Actually, GW wouldn't have had a chance to grow into what they are today if they'd been paying royalties to Moorcock, Tolkien, Heinlein, Herbert, George Miller, 2000AD & Giger/O'Bannon/Scott/Cameron/20th Century Fox from the point that they'd have been "owed". They'd never had a chance to get big enough to also owe money to Stallone, Disney, Aramaki, Cameron(again)/Orion, Hewlett & Martin, Lynch/Herbert/Universal, ....and so on and on it goes.

 Azazelx wrote:

morgoth wrote:

Also, about IP in general: the law isn't fair to copyright holders.

Think about GW: they came at a time when there was nothing comparable to WH or WH40K, they built stores to educate the market, they sold their products there, a market was created, people started buying GW specialist games, then non-GW games, and all of a sudden, most of the people benefiting from GW's initial effort, were not GW.

No matter how you slice it, if someone so much as makes a model for 40K, following the same design guidelines as GW's models, they should in all fairness pay something to GW, who created their target market (people interested in 40k-esque miniatures).

Just to hit this one again... Actually, GW wouldn't have had a chance to grow into what they are today if they'd been paying royalties to Moorcock, Tolkien, Heinlein, Herbert, George Miller, 2000AD & Giger/O'Bannon/Scott/Cameron/20th Century Fox from the point that they'd have been "owed". They'd never had a chance to get big enough to also owe money to Stallone, Disney, Aramaki, Cameron(again)/Orion, Hewlett & Martin, Lynch/Herbert/Universal, ....and so on and on it goes.

I think you misunderstand my idea: people should pay *some* royalties, which are actually proportional to how much they are benefiting of other people's IP.

Your list of people they should pay royalties to is probably accurate, but some of these are really minor contributors in the final product.

The Tolkien estate, which is by far and large the biggest impact on WHFB, might only get 1% of revenues for a large part of the WHFB range, and Mr. Stallone something like 1% of revenues for Sly Marbo only.

Royalties as they are implemented today are slowed, wherein the minimum amount is not affordable by small companies, and the rates are unfair to all but the biggest customers, effectively preventing most market actors from getting FRAND of most existing IP.

You may want to take a look at how much royalties actually take off, before throwing numbers....

The other thing to bear in mind is that the Tolkien estate, in particular, would not be taking royalties - they would just be saying 'No',

They are not fond of folks using their IP without permission - and that goes for TSR as much as for GW.

So, ah, no....

And honestly?

GW really does not have much, if anything, that is unique to their IP - their ideas are, for the most part, a syncretic accumulation - let's take lizard men and dress them up as Aztecs! Look! New IP!!!1!

Let's take a WWI tank, and strap laz cannon to it in place of the machine guns and cannon! Look! New IP!!1!

Let's take the figures we were originally making for the Eternal Champions RPGs, and file off Melnibonean, turning them into elves! Look! New IP!!!1!

Remember, they tried to claim Roman numerals.... and grenade launchers, and big shoulder pads, and skulls, skulls, skulls, and fur....

If allowed to claim all the IP that they deserve they would own... nothing.

The Auld Grump

Getting back on-topic, he's claiming on FB he's had more items removed and he's trying to rant about it - except people keep pointing out he's in the wrong (then those comments get deleted. For example:



but his is identical to the HH design:

Oh man that was a close call if i got those and saw this it would instantly set off my OCD

beast_gts wrote:
Getting back on-topic, he's claiming on FB he's had more items removed and he's trying to rant about it - except people keep pointing out he's in the wrong (then those comments get deleted. For example:

Spoiler:

but his is identical to the HH design:

Spoiler:

But the question isn't "how close are these to GW's design" so much as "is a geometric clenched fist design in a circle unique enough for GW to claim ownership?" Colour isn't relevant as the product isn't supplied pre coloured and wouldn't hugely support a claim anyways.

 Azreal13 wrote:

But the question isn't "how close are these to GW's design" so much as "is a geometric clenched fist design in a circle unique enough for GW to claim ownership?" Colour isn't relevant as the product isn't supplied pre coloured and wouldn't hugely support a claim anyways.

If things went to court, I don't think that would hold up, as most evidence shows he's advertising things in GW color schemes in a clear attempt to draw a certain market.