NoBrains

Today (28th of August 2003) I was very surprised to receive an email that actually did originate from bumastemra.nl (to which the BREIN foundation is connected - they seem to have an own internetconnection after all), in which they confirmed that the two previous emails were authentic. This time also with a full disclaimer, so I'd better not quote from that mail.

In this mail they again stated that SCEE was the legal owner of Lemmings because it said so in my own FAQ (I changed that in a later version when I found out that Take 2 Games was the legal owner). They also stated that they check the facts and rights carefully. There is however (even though I explicitly asked) no clue that they confirmed this with SCEE themselves, so they must be operating independently but in name of the NVPI of which SCEE is a member.

Of course I didn't leave it at that; they obviously don't check their facts, they also don't check if maybe I have already been in contact with SCEE, and they don't explicitly mention which copyrights are being violated (oh yes, the code). Then they use free emailaccounts (why? these guys probably make more money than I do) to summon people to take down their sites (I even found some of these summons from the same person in several guestbooks on certain sites) so authenticity cannot be verified. I've got one word for that: amateurs.

So what could I do more? First of all I asked this gentleman from BREIN for an explanation, then I mailed to NVPI to ask what their opinion is about the way the BREIN foundation acts, and finally I resent my email to Take 2 Games to ask about their opinion about my project, and if I could use this possibly copyrighted material in a non-commercial way in trade of free advertisement. I hope someone will mail me back this time...