What’s so difficult to understand that these guys from India have ripped the trademarked Scrabble game (using only a slightly different name) and that it’s against the law? People seem to have a sense of entitlement, whether it’s breaking trademark laws or not.

oh, for sure- in no way do I suggest that these Indian cats should get away with it. But they built up a fanbase, and instead of forcing a far inferior, new Scrabble app on the Facebook masses, they should've totally have taken over Scrabulous, turned it into a Hasbro product, and benefitted from the installed user base instead of alienating them. As of now, Hasbro comes out as the big bad corporation, and no amount of self-righteousness is going to reverse that bitter taste

Why should they buy the rights to a rip-off of their own product? That doesn't make sense.

The self-righteous big bad corporation: They are only looked at in this way because people feel they have a sense of entitlement to rip them off. Maybe instead we should look at the Indian developers as a couple of small time hoods.

Christ, Donna, you are TOTALLY missing the point here. (your last name isn't Hasbro™, is it?)

I'm not saying that these dudes were right in porting a copyrighted game, nowhere have I asserted that argument. I'm not saying they should profit. I'm not even saying we're right in feeling entitled to our communal gameplay.

What I'm talking about here is reality of the online psyche, something that is absent from this rationality. Fine, I'll concede the point that these dudes broke a law. Go to them, say: "You stole our game. We're not going to sue you, IF you give us control of your company." Give them an out, like the government does when they recruit hackers instead of jailing them. Make them go away.

And then Hasbro™ gets what they need more than some academic moral victory: They get a pre-fab user base who sees them as a benevolence instead of a despot.

Is it right that corporations get shit on for protecting their assets? No, well, not always. But in shutting the game down and pissing off all of these fans and likely customers, they're cutting off their nose to spite their face.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got a game of Scramble to get back to.

Ryan, I think you missed some of the news here.

First, most people seem to be reporting that the brothers were asking north of $30MM for Scrabulous. This would negate any sort of logical deal. That's just madness. Okay, let's all play nice, here's 5-10 mil for what you did so far? But $30 mil? Madness. I wouldn't pay them either. We're only talking.... what? 100,000 users? It's not like it's Facebook. ;)

Every indication seems to be that Hasbro/Mattel attempted to do exactly what you're suggesting, just with no luck.

Ah, well then, if *that* is true, than I have no sympathy. Too bad Hasbro® had to release such a poor version of Scrabble™ on Facebook®, it's really hurt their chances of salvaging this mess.