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Yslaire4 days agoThere is indeed no evidence of non-payment of suppliers - only of Chaosium that one could qualify as entitled. Now the final troubles of Ludik took place during the KS (summer-autumn 2018) and not 10 years ago: https://www.black-book-editions.fr/forums.php?a=last&topic_id=10111.I really invite you to read this to better understand the links that exist between these distinct societies but whose managers (and addresses) are very related: http://necrophiludique.blogspot.com/2018/12/confrontation-sans-detour -The return-de.html? m = 1Again this does not indicate any wrongdoing but it is time to look at facts that are essentially verifiable. Yes it remains Adventures, yes it remains Confrontation, but Cthhulhu alone had to easily weigh 50% of the turnover of Sans Détour. Few companies could absorb such a loss. We wish them the announcement of Chaosium is only a warning shot or they are very strong legally / financially.
SD sera de retour de vacances en janvier 2019. / SD will be back from vacation in January 2019.
We are taking this unilateral step to at least enable Éditions Sans-Détour to fulfil obligations to their Masks of Nyarlathotep/Day of the Beast Ulule.com backers:Chaosium will unilaterally grant a license to Éditions Sans-Détour to fulfill the 2017 Ulule.com crowdfunding campaign. We do that despite our concerns that we will never see a cent of the not insubstantial royalties owed by ESD, by ESD’s repeated acts of bad faith, for their serious breach of contract, and copyright and trademark violations. We do that because we don’t want the fans to get punished for someone else’s deeds.This license DOES NOT permit Éditions Sans-Détour to sell Masks of Nyarlathotep/Day of the Beast to game stores, distributors, or online. It ONLY allows ESD to fulfill the Ulule crowdfunding campaign to existing backers and nothing more. Nor does it waive ESD of its obligation to pay Chaosium the royalties owed. Chaosium reserves all rights to seek legal relief against ESD as specified under its (now-lapsed) contract with ESD.We’ve tried to work with ESD to move past what is obviously a difficult period in their company’s finances, but not only have we not received any royalty payments for books sold since the end of 2016 - we haven’t even received sales data upon which royalties could be estimated. Our requests for this information have been ignored.
I have read the latest press release from the publisher SANS-DÉTOUR, which does not hesitate to charge me with the project's" freeze ", to report information that could be covered by the confidentiality of the exchanges, and clearly defamatory, so I intend to assert my right of reply here, which will be brief and very clear: without payment of royalties since the fundraiser and after months to question my editor on this subject, I was forced to bring in my legal adviser, without any more success.In addition, in the face of persistent silence, and in the absence of factual information on the fundraising, I could only take note of the suspension of the contract. SANS-DETOUR has been duly informed beforehand and repeatedly, as it should, by official means. To my great regret, the discussion is interrupted today. The expected answer to these questions belongs to SANS-DETOUR. As for the allegations of SANS-DETOUR with regard to my rights as author, I leave it to the "legal" to take care of it. The termination of the project does not in any way result in the production of any license agreement.This situation is a real heartbreak for me, the AVENTURES project being one of the most motivating and exciting of my career. If out of respect for the community invested in this project, informing is essential, this information must respect certain principles. " Source: http : //urlz.fr/8rRb
That’s a nice little trick that Chaosium pulled; by giving SD a license extension to fulfill their Ulele campaign, They keep their good name intact while keeping SD from making any profit by selling more copies after (if) they fulfill the ulele orders. The Call of Cthulhu translations were their main revenue stream, wasn’t it? Why would they let the license lapse?
They didn't let the licence lapse, Chaosium never renewed it because SD haven't paid them royalties in 2 years, how did you miss that part of the story? They also didn't pay any royalties due to the Aventures guy hence the termination of that project. It seems they're not good at paying their dues in general...
The half-bothered disinformation campaign appears to be working... Sans Detour should've focused on the Cadwe army in metal, since they're compatible with almost every other faction IIRC, and possibly a styrene multi-part Cadwallon militia box, as based on the metal versions, these are compatible with a variety of other games and shorn of symbols, 14th/15th Century HYW infantry. Based on sales, subsequent campaigns could cover one or two other factions at a time. Maybe I'm being unreasonable, but PVC doesn't have the same appeal for me...
Christophe Ammirati: If someone holds the keys to the financial mystery, this is this guy. Unless there is a recent change; he is the financial director of Sans Détour. (his Linkedin profile does not mention this responsibility, but the site of Sans Détour yes). So it is this man who should have signed checks to Chaosium, who also could have provided a sales statement for Chaosium.But he is also a leader of Stellar Licensing and Consulting , the owner of Hong Kong-based Confrontation's intellectual property, and therefore, head of the company that needs to earn royalties for the Confrontation Classic's Kickstarter and the possible future Confrontation Resurrection. The "team" page of Stellar Licensing unfortunately returns to an error 404: impossible to confirm it there, but on Linkedin it is clear.Honestly, I would not want to be in the shoes of a man who may find himself in a position to choose between paying royalties to Chaosium and paying a return on investment for the Confrontation license (which must have been quite expensive). Here again do not necessarily see malice. I believe there are strong business and friendship ties between these two men and that they seek to get out of trouble in one way or another rather than voluntarily shutting down the world. Only when you play the tightrope, the slightest accident of course can be fatal. Another proof of this proximity, the company Way of Gamers / Smart Trading Limited, located at the same address as the warehouses of Sans Détour also belongs to Mr. Ammirati.Stock liquid that looks very much like that of Ludikbazar ...While formerly Way of Gamers was known only for a site of collaborative work and crowdfunding for creators geeks to the uncertain success ( 1 only unfunded project ). It is these appearances of conflicts of interest, combined with a certain amateurism, and the news of Chaosium leaving a doubt about the finances of Sans Détour that lend at this moment to all possible theories in the absence of answers to these questions : -What was the actual financial situation of Sans Detour when launching the kickstarter of Confrontation Classic? - If the little hands and the project manager were probably unaware of it: who knew about the dealings with Chaosium regarding the royalties?- Has Stellar Licensing received her royalties? - What exact role does Christophe Ammirati and his companies play in the partnership, what are the interests of each other? - Will the current finances of Sans Détour and its concerns of rights allow you to deliver The Masks, and, while having lost this cash cow, especially, in the long term, to deliver the KS Confrontation Classic? - Who will eventually take over the resin casts of Confrontation? Who is in charge of standard plastic production? - Where is the production planning of the big figurines?
Ludikbay declared bankruptcy; at this point I don't think ESD has though. But as Sandy says, it was not our desire to end the partnership with ESD, but we ended up having no choice. We had previously regarded ESD as a valued and trusted partner, but then they simply stopped paying us, or even answering our emails, or coming up with excuses when they did. ESD never finalised the rights to Masks of Nyarlathotep/Day of the Beast. The rights were contingent on ESD paying the standard license fee that was agreed to in the contract with Chaosium. This payment was supposed to made within 10 days of receiving the crowdsourcing funds from Ulule. But ESD never paid up*. Chaosium served notice on ESD to rectify this, but they persisted in ignoring us (nor pay any of the outstanding royalties owed for more than two years). Hence, the termination of ESD's permission to use our trademarks, logos and all related intellectual property, including Masks of Nyarlathotep/Day of the Beast. Because this put the Ulule backers in a unfortunate situation, having pledged funds to a project that the company producing it never properly secured the rights to, we came up with the unilateral solution posted here. This is despite Chaosium ourselves still not receiving a cent from ESD from the Ulule campaign (and ESD's total liabilities to Chaosium exceeding well in excess of €100K). We took this course of action because we don’t want French CoC fans to get punished for someone else’s deeds.We will be announcing the new French licensee shortly.*obviously, if at the time we were aware of that ESD were going to do this, we wouldn't have given them the green light to use our IP and trademarks in the Ulule crowdfunding campaign. But in early 2017 we still regarded ESD as a valued and trusted partner.
LaurendiAuthor Info3 weeks agogentlemen,Perhaps you should consult the previous balance sheets of the company?The latest figures available are not recent. On the data provided, we are very far from a company that rolls on gold: 46690 € Net Profit in 2014. This is not what is called a solid company.For the rest, concerning the ability of Chaosium to intervene to prevent a publication ... must be lucid: I do not see what they could do immediately. It is not a French entity. The rights are different. It is already difficult to recover an unpaid balance between French companies, then with an American company and the legal costs related to an action ... in short, I can not see Chaosium launched a lawsuit which will cost him a fortune and which guarantees him not to recover his bet. On the other hand, it is a good reason to break a contract with a partner who disavows it.Finally, in case of scam, know that it is the state that is considered as high priority by the financial agent. So if judicial liquidation there is, the first ones to be used are the agent and the State. Then the rights holders cheated. In other words, you will have nothing.
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Topic: KS for Confrontation 'Resurrection' April 17th (Read 58399 times)
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April 19, 2024, 10:36:09 PM