Oh no you di'nt!

September 2, 2005 9:06 PM

BurgerTheft!Fuddruckers steals a flash based clone of BurgerTime from an indie developer without telling him. But rather than download it and host it themselves, they just point directly to his version of the game, which is spectacularly dumb. For a short time only, you can view the results if you click here. Wait till the annoying animation ends, go to the "Fuddrockers" tab, and try to play Burger Time.
posted by jonson (79 comments total)

Oh that is so sweet!
posted by MrMoonPie at 9:09 PM on September 2, 2005

ah!!! excellent!
posted by amberglow at 9:09 PM on September 2, 2005

Wow... first I'm going to say that is "udderly" (yuck yuck) hilarious.

Second, I'm going to say that it sucks that it totally takes over your browser.

Third, me likey anyways.
posted by AspectRatio at 9:10 PM on September 2, 2005

Damn, by the time I got to the game, I actually wanted to play it.
posted by fenriq at 9:11 PM on September 2, 2005

Wow... first I'm going to say that is "udderly" (yuck yuck) hilarious.

Second, I'm going to say that it sucks that it totally takes over your browser.

Third, me likey anyways.
posted by AspectRatio at 9:11 PM on September 2, 2005

fenriq, you can still play it directly on the main site - it only redirects the traffic if you're coming from fuddruckers.com
posted by jonson at 9:12 PM on September 2, 2005

Damn. Excellent. Wonder how long this will stay up. C"mon, let's start a pool. Who has a buck? I'm in.... 3am est
posted by umberto at 9:15 PM on September 2, 2005

And my next question: why did Firefox allow all those pop-ups? Hmmmm... Yep, it's turned on. Hmmmm....
posted by umberto at 9:18 PM on September 2, 2005

Farked.
posted by mr_crash_davis at 9:23 PM on September 2, 2005

That was so awesome it turned me on a little.
posted by johnj at 9:24 PM on September 2, 2005

m_c_d, what do you mean? links still work...
posted by jonson at 9:25 PM on September 2, 2005

umberto, you need to harness the power of flashblock.
posted by euphorb at 9:27 PM on September 2, 2005

"links still work"

Not here. Loading, loading, loading, in perpetuity.
posted by mr_crash_davis at 9:28 PM on September 2, 2005

That was great. For those that don't get to see what happens; when you click on the fudrockers game a new window pops up with this statement

Dear Fuddruckers,


If you paid someone to provide this game for you, you were RIPPED OFF. They didn't create the game, *I* did.

Not only are they unethical, but they are really, really stupid. By linking to someone else's website without the website owner's permission, all kinds of nasty things can happen to YOUR website.

I strongly suggest getting your money back. And sending the money to me, since it's my game they're passing off as their own.

Then the fuddruckers' site is redirected to a bunch of slaughter house pictures.
posted by 517 at 9:29 PM on September 2, 2005

That was great!
posted by Bugbread at 9:29 PM on September 2, 2005

that's maybe because it loads six separate windows (I need to look up that slashdot link which explains how to disable popups in firefox manually, since that ain't working).

One of those windows shows:
"If you paid someone to provide this game for you, you were RIPPED OFF. They didn't create the game, *I* did.
Not only are they unethical, but they are really, really stupid. By linking to someone else's website without the website owner's permission, all kinds of nasty things can happen to YOUR website.
I strongly suggest getting your money back. And sending the money to me, since it's my game they're passing off as their own."

the other windows are pictures of slaughterhouses in use.

I'm shocked that a chain allowed this to happen.
Even the smallest store I worked for had a lawyer look over ALL content and links on a webpage to verify no shenanigans like this were taking place.
Fuddruckers is a chain, right? That's the only way I could understand why the name's familiar.
posted by Busithoth at 9:33 PM on September 2, 2005

euphorb: thank you. Harnessing.
posted by umberto at 9:34 PM on September 2, 2005

on 'real' preview, what 517 said.

I like how the game page does load, under all the gore pages.
posted by Busithoth at 9:35 PM on September 2, 2005

I love it.
posted by danb at 9:35 PM on September 2, 2005

They didn't create the game, *I* did.

Um, the game was created by someone at Data East in the early eighties, unless it's the same guy I don't think he can really say he created it.
posted by bobo123 at 9:37 PM on September 2, 2005

Busithoth, some lawyer or other legal type might very well have looked it over. The shenanigans didn't take place until after Rob noticed all the traffic being directed towards his website and he decided to extract his revenge.

It is just so deliciously evil. Great link.
posted by Qubit at 9:39 PM on September 2, 2005

Wow, talk about "just desserts"...

::snicker::
posted by Lectrick at 9:45 PM on September 2, 2005

Am I missing something here? It's hard to tell with all the pop-ups, but it looks like all Fuddrucker's did was link to some guy's page in a pop-up window. They didn't obscure the URL, they didn't link directly to the SWF file, they didn't frame it, they just provided a link to the guy's site, just like Metafilter does all the time.

I mean, hey, if the guy wants to redirect it to various slaughterhouse pages that's his perogative, but why is he the hero here?
posted by L. Fitzgerald Sjoberg at 9:46 PM on September 2, 2005

They didn’t even bother to download the game and host it themselves. They linked to my game, using my game and my bandwidth to promote their restaurant. Which is not only stealing from me, but it’s also really, really stupid. I mean, passing someone else’s content off as your own is nasty. But actually linking to it means that I can change it to whatever the hell I want. Which is dumb, dumb, dumb on their part.
posted by Serena at 9:56 PM on September 2, 2005

I bet this is gonna get ugly when the suits show up on Tuesday :)
posted by pjern at 9:58 PM on September 2, 2005

[esoteric]
WE ARE CLOSED NOW! *SLAM*
[/esoteric]
posted by WolfDaddy at 10:05 PM on September 2, 2005

Sjoberg, seriously? You look at their site and see nothing wrong with what they did? Nothing that looks to you like the content was created/hosted by them as a corporation?
posted by jonson at 10:06 PM on September 2, 2005

Yeah, I'm with L.FS. WTF? All they did was provide a link to his game in a popup window. His email address and url are in the screengrab he displays in the first link.

As a vegetarian I was thinking this was way cool at first but on reflection I think the guy fucked up.
posted by dobbs at 10:07 PM on September 2, 2005

Whatever. Their burgers are tasty.
posted by gyc at 10:11 PM on September 2, 2005

jonson, I can see an argument for that but I think it's pretty weak. I mean, the game exists in a popup with the "creator's" credit right underneath it. Sure, it would have been neat if they put, "Go check out such and such's great burger game." but I hardly think what they did is what he said they did.

In fact, it seems to me that if Fuddruckers is a well known place (I'm in Canada, never heard of it) then if anything, they're sending him free biz. Everyone who clicks the game sees who creates it.
posted by dobbs at 10:11 PM on September 2, 2005

Um, wait a minute. All they did was link to his game from their site? They didn't like, actualy make a deal with him and then renig?

And he put up this little 'protest'.

What a petulent douchebag.
posted by delmoi at 10:12 PM on September 2, 2005

Well, given that the site they linked to has a different domain name, the domain name and e-mail were prominently displayed, and the background colors and overall design were different, no, there's nothing that would lead me to believe that the game was created by Fuddrucker's.

I might, before clicking on the link, assume that the game was going to be hosted by Fuddrucker's, but that would be quickly cleared up by the site itself. If posting links that don't end up being what you expected was a crime, then Metafilter would be doing hard time.

If there's going to be an argument about this, I have a request: if people feel that Fuddrucker's was doing something unethical, please supply a simple rule of ethics that they didn't follow, something like "You should never link to an external URL without explicitly stating that you didn't create the content in the external link."
posted by L. Fitzgerald Sjoberg at 10:17 PM on September 2, 2005

How 'bout: don't hotlink content. They chromed his game in a pop up window with no address bar to reveal the url, and none of the surrounding content he had created about himself, etc. Fuddrucker's is not a link aggregating blog, Lore, it's a corporate burger chain, and this part of their site was dedicated to diversions they ostensibly were providing to amuse kids. In fact, they just hotlinked someone else's content without his permission. I'm frankly a little stunned that you, dobbs & delmoi don't see anything wrong in it. But maybe it's just me...
posted by jonson at 10:24 PM on September 2, 2005

jonson, the dude's url and email address are on the screengrab. How could there be any mistake that he created it?

In the past, I've had content hotlinked and it's not done the way this was. It's piped into the page you're on with no indication that it didn't live on the same server. It's annoying as hell, yes. Bugs the shit out of me. But I don't think that's what was done here.

All they did was link to the guy's own page in a pop up window. And on viewing that page, I see that not only are the URL and the email address visible, they're links!
posted by dobbs at 10:32 PM on September 2, 2005

"By linking to someone else's website without the website owner's permission, all kinds of nasty things can happen to YOUR website."

So, jonson, I certainly hoped you obtained Fuddrucker's permission before linking them in this post.
posted by notmydesk at 10:35 PM on September 2, 2005

Yeah, the fact that the guy put his personal information in the game seems irrelevant. If he hadn't, would Fuddruckers be in the wrong then?
posted by 23skidoo at 10:36 PM on September 2, 2005

Ugh, it's sickening how people will defend corporations. Isn't it obvious what they did? They took his work and put it on their website, making it look like it was their own creation, or that it was created for fuddruckers. If you were a painter, would you want fuddruckers using your painting as their website background, even if the painting had your name on it? Not without permission you wouldn't.

God, I hate corporations.
posted by Citizen Premier at 10:38 PM on September 2, 2005

That's a simple rule: don't hotlink content. It uses resources that don't belong to you and exposes your site to (deserved, in my opinion) malicious acts.
posted by letitrain at 10:42 PM on September 2, 2005

They took his work and put it on their website

They did? I missed that part. Please point it out. (unless you're talking about the tiny screengrab).

Yeah, the fact that the guy put his personal information in the game seems irrelevant. If he hadn't, would Fuddruckers be in the wrong then?

But that's not what the situation is, is it? What they might of done is hardly relevant.

That's a simple rule: don't hotlink content.

Where did they hotlink content?
posted by dobbs at 10:45 PM on September 2, 2005

Are we all using the same definition of the word "hotlink" here? A direct link to a game file, image file, music file, or something of that sort is a hotlink. A link to a Web page is just a link. This wasn't a hotlink by that definition.
posted by L. Fitzgerald Sjoberg at 10:45 PM on September 2, 2005

Citizen: Who cares, linking is linking. Imagine how difficult things would be if whe had to ask every single person before we could link to them?

If we're going to have a general rule about the acceptability of linking, then we're going to have to accept edge cases like this.

If he didn't want people linking to his 'work' he shouldn't have put it on the WEB.
posted by delmoi at 10:47 PM on September 2, 2005

In my opinion, this is a hotlink:



And this isn't.

With the exception of my latter link not being in a popup, it's what FR did.
posted by dobbs at 10:57 PM on September 2, 2005

But that's not what the situation is, is it? What they might of done is hardly relevant.

I'm not talking about what they might have done. I'm saying that him putting his name in his game has no bearing on what Fuddruckers actually did. If you think what they did is right, or if you think what they did is wrong, it shouldn't depend on whether he put his personal information on the game he made.
posted by 23skidoo at 11:01 PM on September 2, 2005

23skidoo, I'm not gonna answer that as it's a can of worms.

However, the points this guy brings up re: hotlinking... none of them are true in this instance:

- they aren't stealing his bandwidth, they're merely linking to his site.
- his changing his content doesn't affect their site in anyway. (whereas if I change the dog photo on my server, I alter MeFi as well).
- there is no confusion about who made the game.

You know what... go back to his page. Look at his referral chart again.

The bulk of that bandwidth comes from http://saionji.net/hiro6.htm. Go ahead and click that link. It's to another site entirely that hotlinks his content and meets all the requirements that the Fuddrucker's action does not.
posted by dobbs at 11:11 PM on September 2, 2005

oh yeah? then what do you call this?


posted by ernie at 11:12 PM on September 2, 2005

I call it "Wendy's is in for another lawsuit."
posted by L. Fitzgerald Sjoberg at 11:15 PM on September 2, 2005

lol.
posted by dobbs at 11:16 PM on September 2, 2005

huh...fuddruckers site is down right now.
posted by schmedeman at 11:22 PM on September 2, 2005

The bulk of that bandwidth comes from http://saionji.net/hiro6.htm. Go ahead and click that link.

His switcheroo-page is up at this site as well now, except now the salutation is less of a formal greeting, and more of a co-opted insult, like:

"Hey assholes, you can all kiss my ass."

"Hey fuddruckers, stop hotlinking my game."
posted by 23skidoo at 11:27 PM on September 2, 2005

Oh, I don't know, it all seems pretty clear-cut to me.

Step one: Person makes flash version of existing, copyrighted game for fun (and not for profit of any kind);

Step two: Corporation puts link to popup containing the game on their corporate website, without asking permission, notifying the person, or providing any contextual information (other than the contextual information provided by the person who made the flash game), which does two things:

1) makes the person who made the game think "hey, in MY opinion, it looks like they're trying to pass this game off as having been made for their web site";

2) makes it possible that the persons who own the copyright on the original game might see this, think "hey, in OUR opinion, it looks like this person made a flash version of our game and sold it to Fuddrucker's for a profit, which is a big copyright no-no".

Step three: the person who created the flash game exercises his right to change his own content to whatever he wants for whatever reason.

So the only person you can really say did anything wrong is the person who decided to link a corporate site to another site without providing the fairly standard context of "this is content from another site, that Fuddrucker's does not control, and that we are not responsible for" -- thus exposing themselves to exactly the type of shenannigans that this guy executed.

So I say bully for him, and think he was exactly right in calling out Fuddrucker's on this.

Oh, and I'm a professional corporate web developer for a living, so from that angle I can also call the Fuddrucker's folks out as being naive and foolish.

Also a quickie from the whole "the internet is all about linking without permission" side of things: yes, yes it is. However, if you are trying to make MONEY on the internet (which is NOT what the internet is all about), and you are a corporation with an image of some kind to uphold, you best be aware that (a) if you link to content outside of your control, this kind of thing might happen, and (b) if you don't want people to deep-link to you, you'd better find a technical way to stop it, because your "acceptable use" policies on deep-linking will generally be ignored.

End of line.
posted by davejay at 11:35 PM on September 2, 2005

Well, for what it's worth, the saionji.net site is also showing the nasty message. Looks like it shows up for all external referrers.

Also, this thread has made me hungry for Fuddruckers, but they are not open this late. I want an ostrich burger... :(
posted by Potsy at 11:36 PM on September 2, 2005

Hm. Funny. The exact same issue reframed with the corporation as the plaintiff and Metafilter public opinion goes in the other direction.

Hey, I hate corporate culture as much as the next guy, but you have to be consistent with your arguments. Moreover, you can't really bitch about this guy's content being stolen when he seems to have stolen Data East's content to begin with. Under current copyright law, for better or worse, (FWIW, I think worse) I'm thinking this guy is breaking the law a heck of a lot more than Fuddruckers is.

What Fuddruckers did is stupid and petty, no doubt, and this guy is pretty clever, but that's all there is to it. I believe information wants to be free, so I say deep linking is fair game. One might make an argument regarding Fuddrucker's for-profit intent, but the momentum of the law right now seems to be ignoring that (e.g. RIAA suing grandmas and whatnot for pirating.) Oh well, let them have it. The Fuddruckers we used to go to always seemed like an ecoli hive to me. Tasted good, though.
posted by Skwirl at 11:42 PM on September 2, 2005

His switcheroo-page is up at this site as well now,

and

Well, for what it's worth, the saionji.net site is also showing the nasty message

Yes, that's my point. His changing the burger game content on his own site has affected saionji.net's page because they hotlinked his content but Fuddrucker's page hasn't changed at all because they didn't hotlink his content. Yes, the link on FR's goes to different content, but this guy's actions have not done what he claims ("all kinds of nasty things can happen to YOUR website.") Nothing has happened to the FR site.

providing the fairly standard context of "this is content from another site, that Fuddrucker's does not control, and that we are not responsible for"

Huh? Where would they have put this "fairly standard" copy (which I cannot recall a single instance of ever reading on the web)? Are you suggesting every link on every site have a disclaimer on it? That's absurd.

Oh, and I'm a professional corporate web developer for a living,

I'm a freelance one and have been for 10 years. As I said above, I've had content hotlinked and it sucks. Hasn't happened here.

If this hadn't been a Corporation, no one would agree with him because all FR did was link to his page!
posted by dobbs at 11:46 PM on September 2, 2005

I'm thinking this guy is breaking the law a heck of a lot more than Fuddruckers is.

Fascinating. So there's a law that says once a business decides you're working for them, you have to work for them? That sounds suspiciously like slavery.
posted by Citizen Premier at 11:50 PM on September 2, 2005

If this hadn't been a Corporation, no one would agree with him because all FR did was link to his page!

They're also polluting his work with their own corporate dogma. It's akin to the way Woody Guthrie's song "This Land is Your Land" was corrupted into a patriotic song.

I don't really think what they did should necessarily be illegal, anymore than I think corporations should be illegal (which I might), but I think they deserve to suffer for it.
posted by Citizen Premier at 11:55 PM on September 2, 2005

Is the name 'Fuddrucker's' supposed to be some kind of play on the word 'fucker'? I don't get it.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 12:00 AM on September 3, 2005

Whoa, fuddruckers.com is redirecting to google. Good contingency plan guys!
posted by phatboy at 12:12 AM on September 3, 2005

dobbs, you're working from a principle, and I can appreciate it, but you're not looking at some things, mostly related to context and presentation on the web on different kinds of sites:

- On corporate identity pages, like Fuddrucker's, how often do you see links to outside sites available on the front page? Usually it's shunted off to a page of "outside resources" if it exists at all. These corporate identity pages are ubiquitous enough that most of us have internalized the "rules" here.

- The popup window. Usually on the web that implies some sort of ownership or at the very least consensual relationship with the content because it subordinates the one to the other. It is not clear from the Fuddrucker's site that the game is unaffiliated content even with the byline.

As for turnabout is fair play, it again depends on the context. We know very well the individual with the blog links to outside resources all the time and they don't subsume other people's work and especially other businesses under their own banner when they link to it. But suppose the individual were running a portfolio site. If I hotlinked to this game – or the Fuddrucker's home page – in a popup window from my portfolio site, there'd be the same thing going on, because even with the byline I'd be implying I had some relationship with the work, if I did it the way Fuddrucker's did.

(The standard disclaimer does appear on some sites, usually kid-oriented, I think.)
posted by furiousthought at 12:21 AM on September 3, 2005

I think it may not be a redirect to google, but rather a literal copy that's being served from the Fuddrucker servers.

Might be someone is sweating about his/her job. :-)
posted by Malor at 12:25 AM on September 3, 2005

Yep, after looking a little further, it looks like someone at Fuddruckers just copied the Google pages and put them up in place of their regular ones. Click on the Groups link, for instance, and you'll get an error that 'groups.fuddrucker.com' doesn't exist. Talk about compounding the problem... they went from a bad link to fullscale copyright infringement.

Bizarre decision, I must say. It feels like fear to me, thinking poorly because it's a total crisis. If that's an accurate read (and this is all purely a hunch, obviously), I bet Fuddruckers' IT department is a very unpleasant place to work.
posted by Malor at 12:32 AM on September 3, 2005

Inspired by this post I've been playing Burger Time on MAME for the past 20 minutes or so.

Did you know it's possible to make it to level three without using any pepper?
--so...who do I pay for that? And how much?

Is the name 'Fuddrucker's' supposed to be some kind of play on the word 'fucker'? I don't get it.

Well, duh. It's a Spoonerism. A phonetic play off of the common street lingo known as "Rud Fucker's."
And we all know what that means. Geez.
Catch up, already.
posted by sourwookie at 12:38 AM on September 3, 2005

dobbs wrote: If this hadn't been a Corporation, no one would agree with him because all FR did was link to his page!

I disagree that "all FR did was link to his page." I went and looked at the screenshots (as the domain is presently pushing traffic, somewhat inexplicably, to Google), and the design and content of the page seem (to my eye) to fairly strongly imply that they are offering a "Kids Section" full of games, not linking to games on other sites; the design implies it very strongly to me, though I acknowledge that this is quite subjective.

More incriminatingly, however, they have linked to his game in a chromeless pop-up: not a reasonable way to link to another site's content because it gives the user the implicit impression that they are viewing a page which is a sub-page of the parent (in my experience). Even with his contact information at the bottom, I would still think that I was viewing a game hosted, and presented, by Fuddruckers.
posted by lx at 12:43 AM on September 3, 2005

Yep, after looking a little further, it looks like someone at Fuddruckers just copied the Google pages and put them up in place of their regular ones.

Actually, it's worse. They updated their DNS to point to Google's IP (!).

Check it:

Non-authoritative answer:
Name: www.fuddruckers.com
Address: 66.102.7.99

Non-authoritative answer:
www.google.com canonical name = www.l.google.com.
Name: www.l.google.com
Address: 66.102.7.147
Name: www.l.google.com
Address: 66.102.7.99
posted by lx at 12:45 AM on September 3, 2005

And we all know what that means. Geez.

Indeed. *lays finger significantly aside his nose*
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 2:04 AM on September 3, 2005

I find it disturbing that some people can't see that Fuddruckers is passing off another's content as their own. The pop up is a dead giveaway. How about at least stating, "Check out this cool game so and so designed."

I bet the reason they did not copy the game to their server is because some genius thought, they were being clever: Hey, by not copying the files to Fuddruckers' server, we aren't actually stealing. Haha, we so clever. Well, I let the PR nightmare begin. Kudos to game boy for waiting for the Labor Day weekend to get his revenge. It's sooo fitting.

I still don't understand why Fuddruckers is redirecting to google. What's genius logic behind that?
posted by a_day_late at 4:53 AM on September 3, 2005

Why are they pointing to google? Probably their webmaster got an email from an exec...and needed to put it offline. Three days of your corporate website redirecting to google is easier than dealing with the rest of the fallout of slaughterhouses and implied theft.
posted by filmgeek at 5:20 AM on September 3, 2005

The corporation this, the corporation that. Yadda yadda. More likely one get-ahead middle manager who doesn't understand the web (or possibly a clueless web 'designer', or the former in cahoots with the latter) within the company, or possibly contracting for the company, who will be fired/sued when they return to work.
posted by Hogshead at 5:51 AM on September 3, 2005

Fuddruckers is lucky he didn't replace the game with something like Goatse and a message saying "Kiss my flaming bung hole.
posted by Eekacat at 5:59 AM on September 3, 2005

What? Who, upon getting an e-mail from the higher-ups to take the site offline, would go to the trouble of remapping their domain name to google.com's IP, rather than just shutting down the server? Like fuddruckers.com gets enough traffic that anyone's going to notice?
posted by aaronetc at 6:48 AM on September 3, 2005

Maybe more than one site is hosted by that (web)server, so shutting everyoen down is not an option.
posted by dabitch at 6:56 AM on September 3, 2005

Dobbs and Lore: I just went and looked at the screen captures, and while I don't think there was a significant "stealing," there was a pretty clear misrepresentation. The thumbnail icon leading to a pop up is both poor webdesign and deceiving. That he had his URL and email there isn't as important as you argue: for 99.99% of surfers, that's going to be as well-read as the text in the middle of a Microsoft EULA. People will assume that he made that content for Fuddruckers, when he clearly didn't. Because of that, he's well within his rights to fuck with their content right back.

The only WTF now is the google thing. I mean, why not simply strip the link?
posted by klangklangston at 7:08 AM on September 3, 2005

does anyone have their real Ip number, like in cache?
posted by MrLint at 7:16 AM on September 3, 2005

Like fuddruckers.com gets enough traffic that anyone's going to notice?

Well, they do now. Come to think of it, maybe this whole thing was a publicity stunt... probably not.
posted by Citizen Premier at 7:17 AM on September 3, 2005

I hope the Flash guy credits Data East, the creator of the original Burgertime.
posted by meehawl at 7:57 AM on September 3, 2005

I saw the Google re-direct, and assumed it was done by an outside hacker, not by Fuddrucker's, themselves. Does what lx cited prove that it was done by the corporation?
posted by MrMoonPie at 8:14 AM on September 3, 2005

fÛÐÐRúÇKëR§ gÖt pwn3d, d00dz...

That's pretty funny... and, I guess, what can happen if you link to content on other people's sites. (Cheap bastards!)

Another good example is when slashdot linked to something awful and sa was all like "talk to the hand, biotch" and redirected all the visitors to goatse. The old school slashdotters still grumble about it.

While I've got no problem with general pranks 'n' mayhem and whatnot, It does seem a little self-righteous of the burgertime d00d. I mean, he put the game up for people to play on the internet, a game he didn't even invent.

Had metafilter linked to his game, he would've been happy. The Fudd linked to him and he got sad.
posted by ph00dz at 9:21 AM on September 3, 2005

Those of you who disagree with me, I'll concede that Fuddruckers could have done it better. No question. However, my problem with the "creator" of this game is that he claims they did something they didn't.

As I said, I'm both a vegetarian and a freelance web designer. I should be all over this thing with joy. However, it looks more to me like someone who hates corporations or maybe Fuddruckers in particularly, saw something and flew off the handle and over reacted.

he's well within his rights to fuck with their content right back.

But that's the point, KK: he CAN'T fuck with their content. His changing his own content didn't alter any content on fuddruckers.com. Sure, the company probably doesn't want any links on their site to go to slaughterhouse pictures. However, I believe that whoever put the link there in the first place was aware that the content was out of their control and that it could go down or change at any time.

how often do you see links to outside sites available on the front page?

Without attribution? Hardly ever. However, and I hate to nitpick... they haven't linked him from the front page. It's from a sub page. But whatever, I understand what you're saying.

In my opinion, FR linked to the guy in a somewhat dubious way. However, that is neither bandwidth theft or hotlinking or, imo, saying that they created the game. Had they hotlinked it, it would be all those things.

I find it disturbing that some people can't see that Fuddruckers is passing off another's content as their own.

The flash designer is passing the game off as his creation for crissakes. Pot, meet kettle. If anyone linked to in this thread is a thief it's the guy yelling "Thief!"
posted by dobbs at 9:30 AM on September 3, 2005

dobbs wrote: The flash designer is passing the game off as his creation for crissakes. Pot, meet kettle. If anyone linked to in this thread is a thief it's the guy yelling "Thief!"

I disagree that they are comparable. At worst, this fellow has created his own implementation of a concept under copyright. The code and implementation are his -- at most he has violated the original holder's IP rights. I don't see this as being at all analogous to Fuddrucker's implication of his work with their business operations.

"Burger Time", while perhaps not as iconic as "Pac Man" or "Frogger", is pretty widely known (in the way retro-games generally can be "well known"). I think he just takes for granted that people are going to know that he didn't come up with the idea the same way anyone playing a flash implementation of Frogger or Pac Man or Tetris would.
posted by lx at 11:37 PM on September 3, 2005

And now fuddruckers.com is back up, and the link to his content has been removed. No idea at all why they redirected to Google.com for two days...
posted by jonson at 9:25 AM on September 4, 2005