4 ms·

How far along to completion would you say the game was? Even 50%?

by gt2 8y ago

DonHopkins 8y ago
On one hand it was culmination of widely known ideas and "intellectual property" that Will had been openly thinking about, talking publicly about, experimenting with prototypes and proofs of concepts about, shipping products about, and even producing reality TV spots [1] [2] and a cable TV show [3] about for decades. And on the other hand it was also a lot of handwaving and vaporware and trendy ideas and creepy social networking and online privacy surrendering and crowd sourcing and user content creating clichés. The "Serial Hacktreprenuer" had absolutely nothing useful to bring to the table other than the self professed ability to raise money (which he failed at) and a complete lack of shame and honesty (which is very useful in the games industry, and a skill that Will lacked), but no original creative ideas or track record whatsoever. But he strongly believed he deserved all the rights to all the ideas that Will had been talking about his whole lifetime, and that if Will didn't go through with his deal (which was just misleading talk that he exaggerated), Will might turn around and sell the "Serial Hacktreprenuer's" intellectual property that he presumed he now exclusively "owned" to some other company if Will didn't go through with the deal that the "Serial Hacktreprenuer" (pretended to) make. You know: "genocide". For example, he was in secret talks to sell the company to Zynga, who actually only wanted to acquihire the company to get Will himself just because he was Will, not because of any ideas or execution plan the "Serial Hacktreprenuer" came up with. But he didn't consult with Will, who didn't want to drop everything he was doing (including his other companies) to work on the next Cow Clicker [4], and he wasn't honest with Zynga or anyone else. And EA (an investor in Will's other company) was not particularly pleased with the idea of losing Will and their investment to Zynga, either. It was totally untenable along many dimensions. So many people just want to be the "idea guy" because it's easy and glamorous and means they won't have to do any hard work, since they think their own untested unoriginal ideas are brilliant and unique, and they will be able to simply tell other people what to do all day, then criticize and blame them for not living up to their own brilliant vision if and when they fail. Will is the opposite of that, but when the "Serial Hacktreprenuer" had a real honest to god "idea guy" in his lap with ideas and experience and a plan of how to execute, but his job was just to raise money around that fact (not auction the idea guy's meat off to the highest bidder like a golden goose), he wanted to throw away all of Will's ideas and experience and substitute his own behind his back without consulting him, instead of trying to sell what he already had. (That's also why SimCity 3000 was delayed for so long, and EA ended up buying Maxis.) The Venturebeat article [5] and the PDFs of the lawsuits [6] [7] explained and revealed some parts of it pretty well: >In papers disclosed by Ansari, Ansari said that Hive Mind was in talks to be acquired by or receive an investment from Zynga, the largest social gaming company. That deal reportedly valued Hive Mind at $75 million. The talks took place in November, but nothing ever panned out. By December, Parekh and Wright resigned. >It was unclear whether Zynga was really serious about buying Hive Mind at a high valuation, or if it simply wanted to hire Wright. Ansari alleges that Wright is trying to sell the Hive Mind ideas again, only through the Stupid Fun Club, as if that entity owned them. He also says Wright is trying to implement the ideas through yet another company, Friendly Gravity. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXrbqXPnHvE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXrbqXPnHvE [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXsUetUzXlg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXsUetUzXlg [3] https://www.engadget.com/2010/03/31/will-wright-to-produce-reality-show-with-user-created-storylines/ https://www.engadget.com/2010/03/31/will-wright-to-produce-r... [4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cow_Clicker https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cow_Clicker [5] https://venturebeat.com/2012/06/03/game-pioneer-will-wrights-personal-gaming-startup-falls-apart-in-litigation-exclusive/ https://venturebeat.com/2012/06/03/game-pioneer-will-wrights... [6] https://www.scribd.com/document/95620882/CA-HiveMind-Complaint-20120208#download&from_embed https://www.scribd.com/document/95620882/CA-HiveMind-Complai... [7] https://www.scribd.com/document/95675531/Verified-Complaint#download&from_embed https://www.scribd.com/document/95675531/Verified-Complaint#...
- gt2 8y ago
  So any code? Great collection of info you posted about it (and a shame about legal happenings that can hamstring capable people) but I'm even more curious now as to whether there was any code at all written!
  - DonHopkins 8y ago
    The "Serial Hacktreprenuer" never wrote a line of code -- he just destroyed companies and tried to take credit for other people's ideas. But here are some earlier demos and prototypes I developed for Will at the Stupid Fun Club, exploring his ideas about storytelling, social networking, mobile and geolocated gaming, a community scripted TV program, geographical music organization and navigation, and a reality TV show with robots, which got tangled up with the HiveMind boondoggle and was never released (so I can't release the sources, unfortunately). You can read the articles and his lawsuit complaining how Will was committing an "atrocity" and "genocide" by taking all the ideas he presumed he owned and doing them without him, but take it with a grain of salt because we had been working on that stuff for many years before he came along, and they were pretty obvious widely known ideas: Stupid Fun Club StoryMaker Demo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2yEHs_WLzQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2yEHs_WLzQ >Demo of the Urban Safari StoryMaker technology, developed for Will Wright's Stupid Fun Club, by Don Hopkins. Originally developed for CurrentTV's Bar Karma TV show, the first online community-developed network television series. Branching collaborative storytelling and voting. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bar_Karma https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bar_Karma >MediaWiki front end server. Python back end server. Flash Storymaker client. Geolocated storytelling. Google map overlays. Administrative back-end content management system. MediaWiki integration and embedding. iPad Storymaker application. MapKit integration. Facebook StoryMaker app. Voice synthesizer reading stories. Facebook album import and export. 3D branching story visualization with Unity3D. MediaGraph Music Navigation with Pie Menus Prototype developed for Will Wright's Stupid Fun Club: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2KfeHNIXYUc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2KfeHNIXYUc >This is a demo of a user interface research prototype that I developed for Will Wright at the Stupid Fun Club. It includes pie menus, an editable map of music interconnected with roads, and cellular automata. >It uses one kind of nested hierarchical pie menu to build and edit another kind of geographic networked pie menu. Servitude: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXsUetUzXlg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXsUetUzXlg >Stupid Fun Club's "Servitude" One Minute Movie about Robot Servitude, written by Will Wright. Robot brain and personality simulation programmed by Don Hopkins. Empathy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXrbqXPnHvE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXrbqXPnHvE >Stupid Fun Club's "Empathy" One Minute Movie about Robot Empathy, written by Will Wright. Robot brain and personality simulation programmed by Don Hopkins.

How far along to completion would you say the game was? Even 50%?

by gt2 8y ago

How far along to completion would you say the game was? Even 50%?

On one hand it was culmination of widely known ideas and "intellectual property" that Will had been openly thinking about, talking publicly about, experimenting with prototypes and proofs of concepts about, shipping products about, and even producing reality TV spots [1] [2] and a cable TV show [3] about for decades. And on the other hand it was also a lot of handwaving and vaporware and trendy ideas and creepy social networking and online privacy surrendering and crowd sourcing and user content creating clichés. The "Serial Hacktreprenuer" had absolutely nothing useful to bring to the table other than the self professed ability to raise money (which he failed at) and a complete lack of shame and honesty (which is very useful in the games industry, and a skill that Will lacked), but no original creative ideas or track record whatsoever. But he strongly believed he deserved all the rights to all the ideas that Will had been talking about his whole lifetime, and that if Will didn't go through with his deal (which was just misleading talk that he exaggerated), Will might turn around and sell the "Serial Hacktreprenuer's" intellectual property that he presumed he now exclusively "owned" to some other company if Will didn't go through with the deal that the "Serial Hacktreprenuer" (pretended to) make. You know: "genocide". For example, he was in secret talks to sell the company to Zynga, who actually only wanted to acquihire the company to get Will himself just because he was Will, not because of any ideas or execution plan the "Serial Hacktreprenuer" came up with. But he didn't consult with Will, who didn't want to drop everything he was doing (including his other companies) to work on the next Cow Clicker [4], and he wasn't honest with Zynga or anyone else. And EA (an investor in Will's other company) was not particularly pleased with the idea of losing Will and their investment to Zynga, either. It was totally untenable along many dimensions. So many people just want to be the "idea guy" because it's easy and glamorous and means they won't have to do any hard work, since they think their own untested unoriginal ideas are brilliant and unique, and they will be able to simply tell other people what to do all day, then criticize and blame them for not living up to their own brilliant vision if and when they fail. Will is the opposite of that, but when the "Serial Hacktreprenuer" had a real honest to god "idea guy" in his lap with ideas and experience and a plan of how to execute, but his job was just to raise money around that fact (not auction the idea guy's meat off to the highest bidder like a golden goose), he wanted to throw away all of Will's ideas and experience and substitute his own behind his back without consulting him, instead of trying to sell what he already had. (That's also why SimCity 3000 was delayed for so long, and EA ended up buying Maxis.) The Venturebeat article [5] and the PDFs of the lawsuits [6] [7] explained and revealed some parts of it pretty well: >In papers disclosed by Ansari, Ansari said that Hive Mind was in talks to be acquired by or receive an investment from Zynga, the largest social gaming company. That deal reportedly valued Hive Mind at $75 million. The talks took place in November, but nothing ever panned out. By December, Parekh and Wright resigned. >It was unclear whether Zynga was really serious about buying Hive Mind at a high valuation, or if it simply wanted to hire Wright. Ansari alleges that Wright is trying to sell the Hive Mind ideas again, only through the Stupid Fun Club, as if that entity owned them. He also says Wright is trying to implement the ideas through yet another company, Friendly Gravity. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXrbqXPnHvE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXrbqXPnHvE [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXsUetUzXlg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXsUetUzXlg [3] https://www.engadget.com/2010/03/31/will-wright-to-produce-reality-show-with-user-created-storylines/ https://www.engadget.com/2010/03/31/will-wright-to-produce-r... [4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cow_Clicker https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cow_Clicker [5] https://venturebeat.com/2012/06/03/game-pioneer-will-wrights-personal-gaming-startup-falls-apart-in-litigation-exclusive/ https://venturebeat.com/2012/06/03/game-pioneer-will-wrights... [6] https://www.scribd.com/document/95620882/CA-HiveMind-Complaint-20120208#download&from_embed https://www.scribd.com/document/95620882/CA-HiveMind-Complai... [7] https://www.scribd.com/document/95675531/Verified-Complaint#download&from_embed https://www.scribd.com/document/95675531/Verified-Complaint#...

gt2 8y ago
So any code? Great collection of info you posted about it (and a shame about legal happenings that can hamstring capable people) but I'm even more curious now as to whether there was any code at all written!
- DonHopkins 8y ago
  The "Serial Hacktreprenuer" never wrote a line of code -- he just destroyed companies and tried to take credit for other people's ideas. But here are some earlier demos and prototypes I developed for Will at the Stupid Fun Club, exploring his ideas about storytelling, social networking, mobile and geolocated gaming, a community scripted TV program, geographical music organization and navigation, and a reality TV show with robots, which got tangled up with the HiveMind boondoggle and was never released (so I can't release the sources, unfortunately). You can read the articles and his lawsuit complaining how Will was committing an "atrocity" and "genocide" by taking all the ideas he presumed he owned and doing them without him, but take it with a grain of salt because we had been working on that stuff for many years before he came along, and they were pretty obvious widely known ideas: Stupid Fun Club StoryMaker Demo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2yEHs_WLzQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2yEHs_WLzQ >Demo of the Urban Safari StoryMaker technology, developed for Will Wright's Stupid Fun Club, by Don Hopkins. Originally developed for CurrentTV's Bar Karma TV show, the first online community-developed network television series. Branching collaborative storytelling and voting. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bar_Karma https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bar_Karma >MediaWiki front end server. Python back end server. Flash Storymaker client. Geolocated storytelling. Google map overlays. Administrative back-end content management system. MediaWiki integration and embedding. iPad Storymaker application. MapKit integration. Facebook StoryMaker app. Voice synthesizer reading stories. Facebook album import and export. 3D branching story visualization with Unity3D. MediaGraph Music Navigation with Pie Menus Prototype developed for Will Wright's Stupid Fun Club: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2KfeHNIXYUc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2KfeHNIXYUc >This is a demo of a user interface research prototype that I developed for Will Wright at the Stupid Fun Club. It includes pie menus, an editable map of music interconnected with roads, and cellular automata. >It uses one kind of nested hierarchical pie menu to build and edit another kind of geographic networked pie menu. Servitude: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXsUetUzXlg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXsUetUzXlg >Stupid Fun Club's "Servitude" One Minute Movie about Robot Servitude, written by Will Wright. Robot brain and personality simulation programmed by Don Hopkins. Empathy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXrbqXPnHvE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXrbqXPnHvE >Stupid Fun Club's "Empathy" One Minute Movie about Robot Empathy, written by Will Wright. Robot brain and personality simulation programmed by Don Hopkins.