Dragon32Universe.info

A place to discuss everything Dragon related that doesn't fall into the other categories.
admin
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Dragon32Universe.info

Post by admin »

I know the author of the Dragon32Universe.info site is a member here, but I cannot find or recall his details or find any contact details on his site.

I need to contact him regarding a few things:

1. The errors in the screenshots he has generated from XROAR. A number of games feature screenshots that use black, white, orange and blue which for Dragon 32 or Dragon 64 is technically impossible for them to produce as they output video in PAL format. The additional colours (blue & orange) are only visible on NTSC output and thus would only have been seen or used by machines outputting NTSC such as the US only Tandy Coco or the US Only Dragon by TANO. These screens would not have been seen by the vast majority of Dragon 32, 64 or 200 owners who mainly lived in Europe. They would instead have seen a pure black & white (or green) screen. Is it just me that sees this as an error for a Dragon website?

2. The same errors are present in the youtube videos.

3. Selling a DVD that contains content that I suspect may come from this site and has been collected and contributed by members of this site for at least the past 10 years without asking for any sort or permission. I have carefully obtained permission from several of the copyright holders to provide this archive, but that permission does not extent to other sites or collections and certainly not to charging for it. Is this a valid point of view?
Simon Hardy
zephyr
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Re: Dragon32Universe.info

Post by zephyr »

admin wrote:
I need to contact him regarding a few things:

1. The errors in the screenshots he has generated from XROAR. A number of games feature screenshots that use black, white, orange and blue which for Dragon 32 or Dragon 64 is technically impossible for them to produce as they output video in PAL format. The additional colours (blue & orange) are only visible on NTSC output and thus would only have been seen or used by machines outputting NTSC such as the US only Tandy Coco or the US Only Dragon by TANO. These screens would not have been seen by the vast majority of Dragon 32, 64 or 200 owners who mainly lived in Europe. They would instead have seen a pure black & white (or green) screen. Is it just me that sees this as an error for a Dragon website?
No; I agree with you.
admin wrote: 3. Selling a DVD that contains content that I suspect may come from this site and has been collected and contributed by members of this site for at least the past 10 years without asking for any sort or permission. I have carefully obtained permission from several of the copyright holders to provide this archive, but that permission does not extent to other sites or collections and certainly not to charging for it. Is this a valid point of view?
I agree on this point as well.
Alastair
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Re: Dragon32Universe.info

Post by Alastair »

admin wrote:I know the author of the Dragon32Universe.info site is a member here, but I cannot find or recall his details or find any contact details on his site.
It's daelectron's site.
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robcfg
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Re: Dragon32Universe.info

Post by robcfg »

I've taken a look at the site, and I can confirm that it contains material that I've scanned and dumped for the archive.

What pisses me off is the fact that we're not credited for our work, and he says he watermarked the images for his own site as if he did all the work.

On top of that, he's selling a DVD with our work, which was never intended to be sold, and I hope we don't get trouble for that.

But the thing that makes me utterly mad, is the fact that he's taking a lot ftom this site but it's not contributing back anything. I've seen that he has some tape covers and such that we miss, but he doesn't seem keen to share them with us.

I'd put a license for the material in the archive, and ask for our material to be removed from his site, even if I have to search tape by tape to show which material belongs to us.
Sarah
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Re: Dragon32Universe.info

Post by Sarah »

I haven't seen that site before but likewise have issues with material he's erroneously publishing and selling.
zephyr
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Re: Dragon32Universe.info

Post by zephyr »

There is an email address at http://www.acornelectron.co.uk if anyone wants to try contacting him directly.
munkeyboy
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Re: Dragon32Universe.info

Post by munkeyboy »

I agree with you Simon on all three points.
Thank's for the link to the email Zephyr, I haven't used it but I will post a message to "Daelectron" here.
I don't own the rights to any of the material that I have uploaded to this site, but have done so in the knowledge that I am trying to preserve it and not for it to be used to make money!
All of this material remains the property of the writers or publishing companies who hold the copyright. Simon the administrator of this site has sought out permission to publish this material from the various owners and with the aid of many other forum members has made an excellent Dragon computer repository. As has already been stated elsewhere in this forum, it would be easier to upload and help with this existing non-profit making site than to start another one (if preservation is your reason for making a website), that of course is your choice, but don't use material from this archive (or material that hasn't even been released on the Dragon) that many people have given their time freely to create and maintain and then sell it on a DVD for £14!
If Dragon32Universe was clear of all the Tandy CoCo material and the DVD for sale then you would have a great Dragon site, but would your site even exist without the DVD sales option?
daelectron
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Re: Dragon32Universe.info

Post by daelectron »

This is the same almost entirely the same argument that people have made in relation to my other retro software sites. I am very surprised to see how furious people are about someone creating a new site about their favourite machine. I personally don't mind that the screenshots are in colour and not black and white; there are some BBC games on my Acorn Electron world site and the same argument runs that they are not Electron games and shouldn't be there.

Yes, there are some cover scans downloaded from this site on there. Every tape/disk I have managed to collect I have scanned and uploaded myself but some games exist where I haven't found them yet so if there is an image on the net that's copyright-free (and whom I have no idea who it was who scanned it) then I think it's unreasonable to suggest there is no-one to "go to" to ask permission.

If you don't want the information on DVD then don't buy it. All the information is there on the site so you can just amble through and enjoy a different presentation from this site? Have you explored all the html instructions, Personal Computer News reviews, Dragon User reviews, etc, etc? This site doesn't have these and also I don't like the way forums divide content from the Wiki here - it makes it difficult for people to click a link and see them; they have to amble around for a long time, or maybe find the information in PDF or scanned format. People just don't want that, they want to click a link and see it instantly.

I have uploaded some WAVs and some cover scans to your forum but the process of uploading them to the Wiki or to the forum is difficult, whereas on my own site that I control, a new piece of software arrives at my apartment, I scan it, I run the scripts that add it and it takes just a few minutes.

If you want the stuff that's missing that's on my site on this site as well then just go to my site and download them then do the work yourself to upload them here. I could make exactly the same argument about my site - "Oh you should all just upload stuff to my site rather than here". Why? Who cares? I believe just share and share alike, which is what I imagine people who do software archiving want most of all. Just to have people still use the stuff. It strikes me as disingenuous to say I should upload all the stuff I get here as well because I'm actually not preserving stuff but rather trying to sell DVDs. Some people *do* want stuff on a DVD, simply because sites do suddenly disappear. It's happened in the BBC Micro world countless times - whole loads of stuff suddenly lost.

My site offers a lot more than some hawker just stealing the archives from your site, slapping 'em on a DVD and attempting to get rich quick. I'm actually really proud of it. I think it's a bit sad if people don't embrace these type of hobbyist projects in the spirit that they are intended. Just enjoy it the way that it is.
Sarah
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Re: Dragon32Universe.info

Post by Sarah »

I think it's pretty simple - you appear to be profiting from the work of others, without asking for permission even when that would have been easy to do; it's not recognisable to me as the 'spirit' of this community.

There is misinformation on your site, associating software with the wrong authors and items of software taken or originating from my site, as well as some that were given to personal friends but never intended to be made publicly available. I don't appreciate what you are doing and kindly request that you remove the offending section from your website and/or your DVD please.
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robcfg
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Re: Dragon32Universe.info

Post by robcfg »

I agree with Sarah on the permissions issue.

You could have just made a post asking for it, stating your purpose, and besides the DVD, I think there would have been no problem.

The problem with the DVD is the possibility to get us all in legal trouble. I know you've put a lot of effort building your site (so do we), and I wouldn't like neither to be shut down, or its people in trouble.

Please don't take it too personal, your site looks great and I appreciate that you give your permission for us to use material from your site to complete ours, but it feels kind of awkward that you say that your site is better than other sites because it has more information, when there's a lot of that information that has been taken from these sites you deem as inferior.
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