Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Mongrel]

Upper Deck busted for massive card counterfeiting operation.

Quote for clarification:

Yeah there was a Japanese version and an American version. UDE was only licensed to translate the cards for America and print them. They had to share the profits with Konami. The fake ones they printed were real in the sense they were the same as the others but UDE did not share in the profits and were selling them to people at a premium instead of in packs. They knew what would be valuable since they were just reprinting stuff from Japan. They would make extra of the really good stuff and give it to people to put on Ebay or something.

Was going to limit it to that article and a post in the news thread or something, but then I remembered how Decipher went belly-up and decided to make a thread. In Decipher's case, well, Warren Holland may be something of an idiot (I mean in general terms, not because he trusted a family member who wound up taking him to the cleaners - misplaced trust is human enough), but you can't help but feel sorry for the guy

To say nothing of the many many game companies who simply flamed out the old fashioned way. Or the Great Wizards-of-the-Coast Nerd Purge, which almost nobody recalls but led to the departure of almost all the founding staff and I must grudgingly concede almost certainly saved their business in the long run (if you ever asked yourself why WotC feels so damned corporate, this is why).

Anyway snappy thread titles aside, this really is a cautionary tale for those gamers out there who dream of founding a business.

[Mothra]

Or the Great Wizards-of-the-Coast Nerd Purge, which almost nobody recalls but led to the departure of almost all the founding staff and I must grudgingly concede almost certainly saved their business in the long run (if you ever asked yourself why WotC feels so damned corporate, this is why).

Huh, I never heard about this. Did the founding members go off to do anything else or are they just sitting on FAT STAX nowadays?

[MadMAxJr]

Peter Adkison got a lot of money out of stepping down at WOTC, owns and runs Gencon.

I met the guy on the floor at Gencon, after he was done talking to the guys who make Cthulhutech.  He dresses a bit like a tourist, is a friendly guy, and is apparently happy to greet folks coming to Gencon for the first time.

[Büge]

I read about that! WotC was a nerd mecca before the purge.

Actually, 'mecca' implies piety. The source I read painted the Adkison years as nonstop bacchanalia.

[Mongrel]

The source I read painted the Adkison years as nonstop bacchanalia.

That source is perhaps exaggerating a bit, but that assessment is broadly accurate.

Basically what happened was there was an event that could best be described "company cookout and bizarre sexual harassment weekend" and the corporate types leveraged the original owners' vices' against them, offering them cushy Stan-Lee-like buyouts to go away in exchange for complete control.

I always have mixed feeling about that. The game has lost much of it's early charm (and no 'charm' is not a codeword for 'broken mistakes and terrible cards'), has become very formulaic, and WotC is not above some rather blatant cashing in.

However, grumbling about this set or that set aside, the game is still fun to play and survives and prospers to this day because of very careful management and a sensible focus on the bottom line.

[Büge]

Funny you should mention counterfeiting. That weekend I saw Koipond and his daughter on the train, he showed me some pokemon cards they had thought were legit but found out were counterfeit. I think they'd just run afoul of a phony dispenser though.

[Miss Cat Ears]

Wow it's like everyone hangs out with koipond irl.

I love hearing about interesting frauds.  Especially ones that people have been getting away with for a considerable amount of time.  Of course management override is something that can't ever be prevented 100%... still interesting though.

If the original Japanese company making the cards did this, would it be considered a fraud?  Would the cards be counterfeit?  Or is it within their rights?

[Mongrel]

Well, they would be within their rights company-wise, but if some employee started printing extra cards for his own personal gain that might be considered internal theft (or it might be considered an incentive program LOL).

Basically, if it's the original rights-holder, using the original printing processes, there is no rights issue (though as mentioned above, there may be other issues).

[Miss Cat Ears]

If an employee did it unsupervised then it would most certainly be considered a fraud, even if not for personal gain.
I'm just imagining if it was a company's policy that when you did good work you got a free Charizard, I guess it wouldn't be that much different than restaurants that allow their employees a meal during their shifts, right?   I should stop thinking aloud in text.

[SCD]

Wow it's like everyone hangs out with koipond irl.

It's a fun thing to do.

He always brings the best boardgames:  His own!

[Mongrel]

If an employee did it unsupervised then it would most certainly be considered a fraud, even if not for personal gain.
I'm just imagining if it was a company's policy that when you did good work you got a free Charizard, I guess it wouldn't be that much different than restaurants that allow their employees a meal during their shifts, right?   I should stop thinking aloud in text.

Well, some card companies actually do have this, such as WotC's Judge Rewards program, where Tournament Judges are compensated with premium alternate-art cards that are actually worth fairly substantial amounts of money. But that's an official program set up as an employee incentive programs. I.E. the whole process is aboveboard.

Wow it's like everyone hangs out with koipond irl.

It's a fun thing to do.

He always brings the best boardgames:  His own!

 

[Shinra]

Wow it's like everyone hangs out with koipond irl.

I love hearing about interesting frauds.  Especially ones that people have been getting away with for a considerable amount of time.  Of course management override is something that can't ever be prevented 100%... still interesting though.

If the original Japanese company making the cards did this, would it be considered a fraud?  Would the cards be counterfeit?  Or is it within their rights?

I believe that intent is what makes the cards counterfeit. Specifically, the cards were printed for the sole purpose of evading paying royalties out to the copyright holder. If the rumors about UDE being in financial trouble are true, it's likely that some upper level executives were probably looking at termination without a good severance package, saw how much money they could make by running the presses an extra 20 minutes a day and tried to print as many cards as they could before the company folded.

I suspect UDE's partners are going to start looking at the other card properties they hold for similar fraud - Upper Deck is after all a sports card company first, and they also produce the WOW TCG among many others - if this fraud was going on with YuGiOh, it had to have been going on with the other brands.

[François]

I suspect UDE's partners are going to start looking at the other card properties they hold for similar fraud - Upper Deck is after all a sports card company first, and they also produce the WOW TCG among many others - if this fraud was going on with YuGiOh, it had to have been going on with the other brands.

Possibly, but not necessarily. They might have thought they had a better chance of getting away with it because Konami is a Japanese company; there's more barrier to surveillance and investigation than with Blizzard or the baseball people.

That said, idiots will be idiots...

[Dooly]

Basically what happened [at WOTC] was there was an event that could best be described "company cookout and bizarre sexual harassment weekend" and the corporate types leveraged the original owners' vices' against them, offering them cushy Stan-Lee-like buyouts to go away in exchange for complete control.

This one I'd like to know about.

[Mongrel]

Let's just say there were a lot of drunken 'spin the bottle' and 'truth or dare' type games.

At an official weekend-long company event.

[Classic]

Looking for this salon article? http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/2001/03/23/wizards/

[Brentai]

I like the part where he goes off on Pokemon.  Yeah it's a cutesy marketing tool but I have to squint to tell the difference between that and DUDE I AIRBRUSHED THIS WIZARD LET'S SELL IT FOR FOUR THOUSAND DOLLARS.

[Classic]

It occurs to me that Pokemon's success has similarly spiraled beyond the expectations of its creators. It would be cool if there were parallels for game freak as well.

...
...
Probably not though.

[Bongo Bill]

The current president of Pokemon, Hip Tanaka, is crazy. This is because he is a musician.

[Zaratustra]

The current president of Pokemon, Hip Tanaka, is crazy. This is because he is a musician.

You can't peg cause to effect so easily in a case like that