Imitation is the Greatest form of Stealing
As you all know, a few weeks after I posted my Budget Buddy software idea, a software developer named Phil announced the release of his own web-based BudgetSimple product. Clearly, Phil’s software was developed as a direct response to my publicly-posted idea, and he managed to sneak his product onto the market before I could develop my own version of it.
(Just kidding, Phil :)
Now, I’ve discovered that the same thing has happened again.
On July 4th, I wrote about an idea for a role-playing game called Assassinate! Then, over the course of the next seven days, someone in Scotland obviously read my blog, started a company (called Outer Light) and developed The Ship, which was publicly released on July 12.
According to a July 27 article in the New York Times, this “ingenious” game is “essentially a virtual version of real-life games like Assassin”. Here’s how Times writer Charles Herold describes the opening scenes of The Ship:
I receive a message with my quarry’s name and most recent location. She’s one deck below me in the bar, so I hurry down the stairs, carefully looking at each passer-by. A woman in a ball gown pulls out a flare gun and is about to fire it at a man in a top hat when a ship security officer grabs her. The top-hatted man, realizing the woman knows his face and will be back, takes off his hat and puts on a new suit and an eye patch.
My quarry has left the bar, but a new message says she’s out on deck. I hurry outside. Is that her? I move closer. It is her. I walk forward, trying to give the impression that I’m looking elsewhere so she doesn’t run, but as I’m about to pull out my ax, a man pulls out a steak knife and, before I can even react, stabs me to death.
Good grief. That sounds startlingly familiar.
Compare it with my own description of the Assassinate! game:
At this point, you start wandering around downtown Chicago, searching through the streets, the hotels, the cafes, and the bowling alleys for a guy named Edward Epstein. You talk to bums, drug dealers, waitresses, cops, newspaper reporters, and whoever else you meet on the streets. When you find Edward Epstein, you put a knife in him.
As compensation for your services, you’re paid $5000 and given a new assignment: Nancy Reynolds.
Of course, Edward Epstein and Nancy Reynolds are two other players in the game. They’re also wandering around downtown Chicago. Both of them have been given a weapon and an envelope full of cash. Maybe one of those envelopes has your name on it.
Obviously, the people at Outer Light studios completely copied my idea. And understandably, I’m a bit shaken by the whole thing.
But I’ve got to give those guys credit for developing and marketing an entire game: the characters, the storyline, the graphics, the client-server software and everything, all within a single week. I’m so impressed, in fact, that I’m willing to forgive the blatantly obvious fact that they stole my idea.
Seriously though…
It’s actually very validating to see that these ideas are being simultaneously developed by other authors. It gives me the feeling that my intuitions about the software market are correct. Or at least, that my intuitions are congruent with the intuitions of other software developers throughout the world. If I’m hopelessly misguided, at least I’m in good company.
August 1st, 2006 at 3:13 pm
Thats completely crazy. I always believed that ideas aren’t worth anything and the people who don’t post their ideas publically are stupid, because no one would be interested in stealing their ideas. Guess thats not always the case!
What do you have in mind about the winner idea? Are you reveal what it is publically?
August 1st, 2006 at 3:41 pm
“What do you have in mind about the winner idea? Are you reveal what it is publically?”
I’ll be posting more on that subject later tonight. Stay tuned.
August 1st, 2006 at 3:42 pm
I think people will have a hard time picking up your brand of humor:
“But I’ve got to give those guys credit for developing and marketing an entire game: the characters, the storyline, the graphics, the client-server software and everything, all within a single week.”
Validation, hell….I get frustrated when every GREAT and UNIQUE idea I come up with seems to have somebody that beat me to the punch. I was CONVINCED that i invented a truly original idea with break-lights on the FRONT of cars (one amber light in the center of the grill)….until I saw this
(http://www.halfbakery.com/idea/Car_20Front_20Brake_20Light#1153725340)
*sigh*
“”everything that can be invented has been invented.”
1899 Patent Commissioner, Charles H. Duell
August 1st, 2006 at 3:58 pm
Perhaps your next business idea should be creating business ideas? Better hurry up and announce your winning idea before I launch GovSimple! ;)
August 1st, 2006 at 5:31 pm
Man, I can’t win. I was just about to register “5-great-ideas.com” and then Phil opens his big mouth.
*sigh*
:)
August 1st, 2006 at 7:48 pm
I’m amazed at how much artwork they were turn out in a week.
For what it’s worth Benji, your 30 day exercise inspired me to do something similar. Only 20 ideas, and over the course of a weekend, but eye opening nonetheless. Now I’ve got my own winning idea, and it’s full steam ahead.
August 1st, 2006 at 10:12 pm
Bill Keller says:
“Only 20 ideas, and over the course of a weekend”
Holy hell, Bill. I hope you consumed an appropriate amount of coffee.
August 2nd, 2006 at 7:51 am
What makes you think they copied you? What if you were about to copy them?
August 2nd, 2006 at 9:27 am
It wasn’t that bad. I wasn’t brainstorming for an audience, so I didn’t need the same kind of depth that you’ve had. And most of them were things that had already been floating around in my head, so what I did was more of a pros and cons list. I had less detail than your regular posts, and a little more than your “Nine more ideas” post.
The biggest time sink was googling to see what has already been done. And even there I didn’t spend a huge amount of time. I figure that if I can’t find a piece of software in a few tries, then neither can a potential customer.
August 2nd, 2006 at 9:55 am
ouback says:
“What makes you think they copied you? What if you were about to copy them? ”
I was just joking. :-)
Of course they thought of the idea first.
But last Thursday evening, I was aboard a plane, taking a hastily planned weekend vacation. I had picked up a copy of the New York Times at the airport newsstand, and I was idly leafing through the pages when I ran across Charles Herold’s review of The Ship.
When I read the first few paragraphs of the review, I was absolutely incredulous that this game could be so similar to my own idea, and that it was released to the public just a week after I had written about my own idea.
That’s when I decided to write this tongue-in-cheek post.
My actual feelings are expressed in the final paragraph, where I said:
It’s actually kinda cool to see this software on the marketplace. It vindicates my marketing instincts. And, besides, I had already decided not to develop this particular game, so the existence of The Ship is no skin off my back.
August 2nd, 2006 at 10:42 am
I know, I know.. I was kidding too. Forgot to put the smiley face :)
I have a different approach to ideas in general. To me, they are more like radiowaves that you can “tune into” rather than something you “create”. If you have a bunch of receivers tuned similarly, they’ll pick up the same stations. I am sure you’ve also seen that simultaneous scientific discoveries are plentiful in history. Thus, in my opinion, people aren’t creating anything, but rather the people with the right tuning are picking them up. Tuning possibly has to do with genes, background, environmental influences, etc..
I don’t think you can ever work around the fact that there will always be someone doing what you thought of. At best, you might have had a simultaneous pick-up and start at relatively the same time as the other person(s).
Hence, I would focus on the “experience” as I wrote to your other post.