I thought about putting this in the official Adamant Entertainment livejournal, but no…..that wouldn’t be professional, I suppose.
The latest installment in the saga of Louis Porter, the no-talent, ethically-challenged rip-off motherfucker…..
But first, some backstory for those who came in late (links to earlier LJ posts from the past 6 months or so):
First: Porter announces that he’s going to “Take me on” by doing pulp-genre products.
Then: He starts to release his crap, and plays the race card.
Then: He implies that I am racist, for producing pulp-genre material.
Then: He gets booted from the largest PDF sales site, for being a scumbag.
Since then, I’ve pretty much ignored him. The loss of income from RPGNow probably puts him making somewhere around 15-20% of what he used to, so he literally became too insignificant to worry about. He still regularly buys my products, and I know it’s because he plans on ripping them off, but he’s so damned small now, it’s not worth getting bent about.
Recently, however, he’s started getting mouthy again.
He announced a pulp-genre release featuring King Kong and Skull Island….based on the fact that the Universal vs Nintendo lawsuit resulted in the ruling that it was in the public domain. Fair enough, right? Kudos to him.
Except….a little digging reveals that whereas the STORY is in the public domain, the character and name KING KONG is trademarked out the ass by Universal. Hence, just as is the case with public-domain stories like Burrough’s Barsoom novels, the trademarks prevent any derivative products from being legally developed. The story is public domain, the character is a branded trademark. This is the sort of thing that got him kicked from RPGNow….rip-offs and skirting the legal line.
Doesn’t have a thing to do with me, apart from yet another amateur wanker making all PDF publishers look ghetto.
However, in recent press releases, he’s taken swipes at my company (“Why would anyone want 32 pages of pulp product for 5 bucks?” for example — citing my usual adventure length and pricing)….and then today, I see the following banner ad at ENWorld:
A direct insult to my company (our Skull-island-inspired product is called “Dragon Island”).
Plus, and this is the cherry on top of the whole thing: Check out the image on the right-hand side of the banner. Then take a look at this official Universal promo image. Check out the right eye.
Rip-off. Again.
I really hope that this time, the other sites he sells at will wake up and bounce his ass. Unfortunately, ENWorld’s GameStore has, in the past, said that they don’t “police” the products they sell. As long as that sort of look-the-other-way policy continues, it will allow cunts like Porter to continue to make things worse for the entire industry, by giving us all the associated image of somehow being less than Real Publishers.
interesting that you mention Burroughs
My husband is currently in a production of a play based on “Princess of Mars.” The small theatre company has been dealing w/ Hollywood attorneys (from the upcoming movie) trying to shake them down. Legally, it’s been a real eye-opener.
Re: interesting that you mention Burroughs
Oh, I’m familiar with the trademark issues.
This week, I’m releasing a new RPG called MARS. With all of the legal crap surrounding Burroughs, I decided to cast the net wider, and do an original setting, inspired by Burroughs, yes…..but also by Welles, Moorcock and others.
Free preview is available here.
I know it’s unprofessional for me to say but… man, what a tool.
I suspect that a well placed email to Universal might stop him in his tracks.
I wonder what would happen if Universal Studios Licensing, LLLP attorneys were aware of Mr. Porter’s creative use of their copyrighted material.
UNIVERSAL STUDIOS, INC.
100 Universal City Plaza
Universal City, CA, 91608, USA
Or these people.
I think, when The Encyclopedia of Pulp Heroes finally comes out, ~15 months from now, people who think that “the pulps were racist” are going to be a little surprised (if they read it, which I doubt) to find that they weren’t any more racist than the rest of popular culture of the time.
Is there a pool on how long it will take until he gets a C&D in his in box? It’s one thing to rip off the IP but it takes a lot of stones to flat out steal an image from that IP and use it in your ads promoting said stolen trademarked properties.
I suppose, hypothetically, one could inform Universal of a licensing infraction here if one was so inclined.
looks slick…
if far beyond my ‘puter skills. Nice muscles on those folks. ;-)
May Heavy, Heavy Lawyers fall upon the balls of Louis Porter.
I’m really looking forward to that, Jess.
In theory he can produce works that are derivative of the King Kong setting & story (if those are in the PD) — there was a recent similar court case over a play based on a Sherlock Holmes story — but you’re absolutely right that by using the trademarked character name in his advertising he’s opening himself up to a whole world of legal pain (the Holmes play didn’t mention Sherlock Holmes (TM) in its title or blurb).
sounds like the guy has issues.
with all due respect, if it thinks you’re a threat, he must be real small-fry.
Ditto. On an unrelated note, I have cited Fantastic Victoriana in the bibliography of my upcoming rpg, Passages. Thank you for that great book.
As for LPJ, I have mixed emotions. He’s local to me, and he helped me quite a bit when I was starting out a few years ago. Personally, I like the man. OTOH, I just don’t get where he’s coming from on the business side of things. I think it just comes down to the fact that his principal goal is simply to make money and he expects that he’s a small enough fish that no one will notice any copyright or trademark transgressions. Obviously, I can’t condone that.
Wow. Classy.
You know, I don’t have anything personal against LPJ, but business-wise, this is just too far. This HAS to be stopped.
obviously he has got your goat.
but surely if a potential gamer overlooks your material in favour of his – then he (the purchaser) is a prick to do so! Take that anyway you want.
thats the deal with Open Gaming Content – the answer is to write your own system with no OGL!
Despite what personal conflict I’ve had with Gareth in the past, he does put out good work and you get your money’s worth (enough for me to use d20 elements for my Voodoo Island book). :)
On the other hand, Porter severely dropped the ball on many things, including work that pretty much just needed to be uploaded (as in the layout was pretty much ready and done).
As Gareth would say, much of what LPJ is doing is ‘actionable’…