waiting for resolution RAZBAM Situation Post Archive (will be deleted)

[NineLine]

2 hours ago, Mizzy said:

Bringing 'Reddit' nonsense here is a deliberate act of stirring it up and that's obvious.  

The timing of the latest post is not lost on anyone I am sure, it's the mindset of some people who just wish to make things worse than they already are. If there is any hope to move forward together after this, this sort of action will not make it any easier. My personal rant for today. Anyways... 

2 hours ago, JuiceIsLoose said:

Just because something comes from Reddit doesn't mean it is 100% false and untrue.... The reason the stuff posted on Reddit gets referenced is because it would be censored and deleted off of here immediately.

For good reason as well, if it is true (which no one can prove anyway), and it's a leaked conversation, that sort of material is not welcome here. I am not sure why I have to state that, but here we are. It adds nothing to any of this other than there were issues, and things fell apart, we are well beyond that now, mending things, if that is the intent, is not done by picking apart the past. 

[JuiceIsLoose]

9 minutes ago, NineLine said:

The timing of the latest post is not lost on anyone I am sure, it's the mindset of some people who just wish to make things worse than they already are. If there is any hope to move forward together after this, this sort of action will not make it any easier. My personal rant for today. Anyways... 

For good reason as well, if it is true (which no one can prove anyway), and it's a leaked conversation, that sort of material is not welcome here. I am not sure why I have to state that, but here we are. It adds nothing to any of this other than there were issues, and things fell apart, we are well beyond that now, mending things, if that is the intent, is not done by picking apart the past. 

This comes across as if ED is trying to mend things and users are bringing up issues to further divide. Not sure, if that is your intent.
 

But if ED really was trying to mend things, a good place to start would be by paying the developers for the module that ED sold and continues to sell. When people ask why modules cost so much you and Bignewy state it’s because the developers should be compensated for all of their efforts, a sentiment I think we all share. Where is that concern and support now for third party companies?

If there was harm to ED please show us where. Because all the users can see is a third party not receive revenue from a product they created through years of development. Years of development and now they watch their module sold and receive nothing from it. How does that seem right?
 

Seriously, people are upset about the way ED management is treating a third party, and yet we are censored and told to just be quiet and wait. How does that come across as mending things?

[NineLine]

10 minutes ago, JuiceIsLoose said:

This comes across as if ED is trying to mend things and users are bringing up issues to further divide. Not sure, if that is your intent.
 

But if ED really was trying to mend things, a good place to start would be by paying the developers for the module that ED sold and continues to sell. When people ask why modules cost so much you and Bignewy state it’s because the developers should be compensated for all of their efforts, a sentiment I think we all share. Where is that concern and support now for third party companies?

If there was harm to ED please show us where. Because all the users can see is a third party not receive revenue from a product they created through years of development. Years of development and now they watch their module sold and receive nothing from it. How does that seem right?
 

Seriously, people are upset about the way ED management is treating a third party, and yet we are censored and told to just be quiet and wait. How does that come across as mending things?

If the issue was that simple I am sure we could do just that. Sadly it's much deeper than that. You are only showing one side of a very large story. Just stick with the official announcements and filter out the other noise. Nothing good comes from some of this chatter other than people trying to steer a certain narrative. As I already stated, it will only make things harder, if not impossible to go back to any sore of normal life after all this is said and done. 

This is a good example of what I mean. It fuels confusion and anger. I know that the two sides are discussing, it's a legal matter and that's all we have right now. Snipping a comment here, or theorizing there will not do anything but keep anxiety levels higher than they already are. 

[JuiceIsLoose]

3 minutes ago, NineLine said:

If the issue was that simple I am sure we could do just that. Sadly it's much deeper than that. You are only showing one side to a very large story. Just stick with the official announcements and filter out the other noise. Nothing good comes from some of this chatter other than people trying to steer a certain narrative. As I already stated, it will only make things harder, if not impossible to go back to any sore of normal life after all this is said and done. 

Well then looking facts from the official statements:

RB wasn’t paid by ED for the sale of the F-15E. ED, yourself actually, has confirmed that ED withheld and is withholding payment. ED claims they aren’t paying because of an IP issue.

So then ED knew about the IP issue while releasing the F-15E and knew they weren’t going to pay RB? How did ED not think this was gonna blow up? ED seriously thought that RB would just roll over?

Or did the IP issue happen after the release of the F-15E? If so, then why was RB not paid before the IP issue?

Not using any outside information, just what’s in official announcements. How do either of those situations seem fair? 
 

I don’t want ED to fail or anything like that. I just think developers of modules should be rewarded for the tireless hours they put into creating a wonderful sim. Third party developers included. 

[Esac_mirmidon]

So more wait and hope. No communication.

We are in the "legal" phase so no more talking between partners. Lawyers time

5 months waiting and counting. This could take years. Im also a lawyer so i know how much time it would take

Thanks for your passion and support

 

Edited September 3, 2024 by Esac_mirmidon

[NineLine]

Just now, JuiceIsLoose said:

Well then looking facts from the official statements:

RB wasn’t paid by ED for the sale of the F-15E. ED, yourself actually, has confirmed that ED withheld and is withholding payment. ED claims they aren’t paying because of an IP issue.

So then ED knew about the IP issue while releasing the F-15E and knew they weren’t going to pay RB? How did ED not think this was gonna blow up? ED seriously thought that RB would just roll over?

Or did the IP issue happen after the release of the F-15E? If so, then why was RB not paid before the IP issue?

Not using any outside information, just what’s in official announcements. How do either of those situations seem fair? 
 

I don’t want ED to fail or anything like that. I just think developers of modules should be rewarded for the tireless hours they put into creating a wonderful sim. Third party developers included. 

There is a lot more to all this than the months that all our customers were brought into this. Nothing can be discussed now as there are lawyers involved. Could I say a bunch of stuff to defend this action or that, probably, but it would do nothing other than make this rougher than it already is. None of this is ideal, none at ED wanted it to go this far, but at this point we have to deal with what we have. I know most hunger for more info, the nitty-gritty details, but it's not gonna happen. Ask a lawyer if they prefer to debate issues like this on a public forum with customers, it's probably not desired. I am not trying to convince you to be on our side or their side, I'd rather we were all on the same side, and I personally just want it to be over either way. 

1 minute ago, Esac_mirmidon said:

So more wait and hope. No communication.

We are in the "legal" phase so no more talking between partners. Lawyers time

5 months waiting and counting. This could take years. 

Thans for your passion and support

 

It sucks, but it is where we are at, I am hopeful it won't be years but I won't pretend to guess how long it will take. I won't give my impression of where I feel it is at as I have already been accused of trying to steer a narrative, all I can do right now is keep this thread somewhat reasonable, keep the tabloid stuff out if it, and hope along with everyone else the best outcome happens. 

[JuiceIsLoose]

2 minutes ago, NineLine said:

There is a lot more to all this than the months that all our customers were brought into this. Nothing can be discussed now as there are lawyers involved. Could I say a bunch of stuff to defend this action or that, probably, but it would do nothing other than make this rougher than it already is. None of this is ideal, none at ED wanted it to go this far, but at this point we have to deal with what we have. I know most hunger for more info, the nitty-gritty details, but it's not gonna happen. Ask a lawyer if they prefer to debate issues like this on a public forum with customers, it's probably not desired. I am not trying to convince you to be on our side or their side, I'd rather we were all on the same side, and I personally just want it to be over either way. 

I too would hope we would be on the same side. And I too want it to be over.  And to be clear, the side I am on is that developers get paid for their work. I wish we could agree on this. 

Edited September 3, 2024 by JuiceIsLoose

[NineLine]

7 minutes ago, JuiceIsLoose said:

I too would hope we would be on the same side. And I too want it to be over.  And to be clear, the side I am on is that developers get paid for their work. I wish we could agree on this. 

 

Of course, but as I have said, it's more complex than just this. 

[rob10]

10 minutes ago, JuiceIsLoose said:

Well then looking facts from the official statements:

RB wasn’t paid by ED for the sale of the F-15E. ED, yourself actually, has confirmed that ED withheld and is withholding payment. ED claims they aren’t paying because of an IP issue.

So then ED knew about the IP issue while releasing the F-15E and knew they weren’t going to pay RB? How did ED not think this was gonna blow up? ED seriously thought that RB would just roll over?

Or did the IP issue happen after the release of the F-15E? If so, then why was RB not paid before the IP issue?

Not using any outside information, just what’s in official announcements. How do either of those situations seem fair?

The problem is none of us have any idea of the facts of any of this.  If you just look at questions you pose in this post, yes it seems unfair.  BUT we have no idea how Razbam was supposed to be paid.  They might have agreed to what seems to you an me to be an unfair contract that meant they had to wait for 6 months after the module released to be paid or they didn't get paid until they hit certain milestones or who knows what in order to get a contract.  So it may be completely legit that they didn't get paid before this conflict blew up.  Or maybe Razbam is getting screwed by ED.  There really isn't enough information in either the official releases or leaks to know the true answer to all of this.

[Esac_mirmidon]

When lawyers time opens between comercial disputes all goes directly to the toilet.

No more partners, no more passion and support between former fellows developing flying simulators together, sharing the same love for the same thing we have in common.

I was keeping a little hope inside me waiting for a resolution between partners with same goals in common, but now im convinced this is not going to be solved.

RB will not be payed any longer, ED will resume his activity without RB modules, that will fall inoperative over time and us, customers, will loose those modules. 

Sounds depresive, but, call me in a year, you will see.

Edited September 4, 2024 by Esac_mirmidon

[JuiceIsLoose]

14 minutes ago, NineLine said:

Of course, but as I have said, it's more complex than just this. 

Well ED has had plenty of time to talk with lawyers or Nick about how to explain this complex topic to community. About why they feel a third party doesn’t deserve payment for a product they created.
 

Or what plan ED had after legal resolution. You say you want things to return to normal. While not paying a developer and taking legal action. And you just expect the situation to return to normal after all this? Theres no way ED expects anything to return to normal after taking legal action. At the very least ED could be honest about their intentions for how they want this resolved. 

Edited September 3, 2024 by JuiceIsLoose

[NineLine]

3 minutes ago, JuiceIsLoose said:

Well ED has had plenty of time to talk with lawyers or Nick about how to explain this complex topic to community. About why they feel a third party doesn’t deserve payment for a product they created.
 

Or what plan ED had after legal resolution. You say you want things to return to normal. While not paying a developer and taking legal action. And you just expect the situation to return to normal after all this? Theres no way ED expects anything to return to normal after taking legal action. 

This is not how these things work, I don't know what else to say. You have said your opinion. We are not withholding anything to be mean, you just need to wait at this point. 

[Citizen]

1 hour ago, NineLine said:

If there is any hope to move forward together after this,

There is not.

RB has lost irreplaceable talent and the trust is broken.

There is no reasonable future for a caretaker of the DCS platform that allows so much talent to walk out the door and find their way to a competitor.

[NineLine]

1 minute ago, Citizen said:

There is not.

RB has lost irreplaceable talent and the trust is broken.

There is no reasonable future for a caretaker of the DCS platform that allows so much talent to walk out the door and find their way to a competitor.

That is your opinion, you are welcome to it, but we disagree. The longer it goes on though, the tougher it will be though. 

[Rudel_chw]

15 minutes ago, Esac_mirmidon said:

When lawyers time opens between comercial disputes all goes directly to the toilet.

No more parterns, no more passion and support between former fellows developing flying simulators together, sharing the same love for the same thing we have in common.

I was keeping a little hope inside me waiting for a resolution between partners with same goals in common, but now im convinced this is not going to be solved.

RB will not be payed any longer, ED will resume his activity without RB modules, that will fall inoperative over time and us, customers, will loose those modules. 

Sounds depresive, but, call me in a year, you will see.

 

I'm almost in the same mindset as you, I have little hope of a favorable resolution for those of us that have all of Razbam modules, but while I wait I'm abstaining of any further purchase (and I was one of those users that purchased almost everything related to DCS) ... already skipped on two helos and a Map, but I will keep flying my already paid Modules for as long as possible.

[Avimimus]

What I'm wondering about: If RAZBAM did eventually split-up... which teams would be likely to be able to continue work?

I've been looking forward to the Mig-23 and the IA-58... the IA-58 hasn't been announced or licensed (so far as I can tell), but the Mig-23 was relatively far along. How central is RAZBAM's leadership to that project?

I have a bit of interest in some other modules (F-8, A-7, A1, OH-58), but with the Iskra and the Su-17 not receiving licenses... the Mig-23 was essentially the only announced module I was excited to pre-order.

 

[Guest]

5 minutes ago, Rudel_chw said:

I'm almost in the same mindset as you, I have little hope of a favorable resolution for those of us that have all of Razbam modules, but while I wait I'm abstaining of any further purchase (and I was one of those users that purchased almost everything related to DCS) ... already skipped on two helos and a Map, but I will keep flying my already paid Modules for as long as possible.

I too don't have much hope, though I'm ready to be surprised.  But I am continuing to buy modules. At the end of the day, money is replaceable but time spent with all these great modules -- detailed simulations of which we have never seen and may never see again -- isn't.  

[Citizen]

13 minutes ago, NineLine said:

That is your opinion, you are welcome to it, but we disagree. The longer it goes on though, the tougher it will be though. 

If ED and RB somehow find common ground and move forward, the talent migration is a critical loss and RB will never be the same.  How long could you operate without pay before you weren't able to trust your employer?

If ED and RB don't find common ground, there is no room for trust between ED, 3rd parties, and customers.  How can we be expected to buy modules when ED has illustrated that it's not able to secure the talent necessary to seamlessly maintain them?

[NineLine]

5 minutes ago, Citizen said:

If ED and RB somehow find common ground and move forward, the talent migration is a critical loss and RB will never be the same.  How long could you operate without pay before you weren't able to trust your employer?

If ED and RB don't find common ground, there is no room for trust between ED, 3rd parties, and customers.  How can we be expected to buy modules when ED has illustrated that it's not able to secure the talent necessary to seamlessly maintain them?

We have to wait and see how things turn out after the dust settles and look at it then. The waters are too muddy to really see how it will all shake out. It's not clear if anyone has moved on, and even then it's not unusual for teams to lose people and gain new ones. It happens for other reasons, but again we are stressing results that may or may not happen. 

[XBlackstoneX]

Guys, the parties are involved in a commercial dispute and likely litigation. It happens. The world does not end when it does. Let the parties hash it out. Neither side can adequately address everyone’s concerns while litigation is pending. For all we know ED has its own claim to make against this RazBam. Maybe Razbam itself breached. Who knows!


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It is also false to suggest that parties to a lawsuit necessarily never do business together again. Litigation and contract disputes are a part of business.


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[Guest]

26 minutes ago, Citizen said:

If ED and RB don't find common ground, there is no room for trust between ED, 3rd parties, and customers.  How can we be expected to buy modules when ED has illustrated that it's not able to secure the talent necessary to seamlessly maintain them?

That’s a bit over dramatic IMO. Modules have been released and purchased by users during this dispute began, and whatever happens I know for myself I’ll keep buying them. Maybe sales are down, maybe they aren’t, but I’m imagining ED is in a better position to know that than any of us.  
 

If ED and RB can’t find common ground, I’ll be very irritated and will expect that ED would make some kind of goodwill gesture to lessen the blow.  But it won’t cause a big loss of trust or anything with me at least. I know that **** happens and it’s not the end of the world every time it does. 

[TKhaos]

2 hours ago, JuiceIsLoose said:

Well ED has had plenty of time to talk with lawyers or Nick about how to explain this complex topic to community. About why they feel a third party doesn’t deserve payment for a product they created.

ED is a private company, RB is a private company making it private business between the both of them. It's being dealt with by the respective owners, appropriate management and their legal teams. Apart from them, no one else needs to be involved or know the intimate details of the dispute as it's no ones business but there’s, not mine, yours, the staff/contractors, the cleaning lady or the postman. That's how it is and how it will stay, I doubt we even know 5% of the story and it's likely to stay that way even after it's all done and dusted.

There's two sides to every story, apart from 99% of what Joe Public is being fed is one sided and coming from RB, both made official statements and that's where is should have ended until it's all sorted out one way or another.

Personally I wouldn't touch any business, or anything where M2M was involved, regardless of how good he is because he has shown himself to be completely unprofessional in the way he has handled the situation. I'm actually surprised RB haven't tried slapping some kind of cease and desist notice on him, he's done more damage than anyone not only to ED, he's made RB look just as bad as well on how they conduct themselves when it comes to staff/contractors.

Despite the circumstances, whatever they may be ED have done exactly what any sane legal team would instruct them to do, make an official statement then don't discuss anything any further until it's all resolved. A careless comment or leaked document could lose a court case for either side. It doesn't really make sense that once M2M started leaking stuff that RB have just let him continued, unless they use him as the fall guy if it all goes pear shaped. 

I've read posts with M2M making claims and basically trashing ED, in fact if you trawl through the Reddit forums you will see he removed several posts because users with legal knowledge told him he could find himself on the end of a lawsuit. I've also read a number of posts where several of the users are joining in telling people to go to Steam and down vote DCS and leave bad reviews.

As for the evidence, well that mostly comes from two disgruntled staff and stuff like the text messages are easily faked, I could knock that up in 5 minutes in Photoshop so can't see them having any problems. Until Ron comes forward and either shows the original documents or makes an official statement that they are genuine, then it's just hearsay.

As for M2M, well no doubt investigators have been following his tracks and keeping screenshot evidence of everything he's been doing as that will be like gold dust in court proceedings, be ironic if RB ended up bankrupt because they couldn't keep one of their contractors on a leash.

I’ve worked on plenty of contracts as a sub contractor and if I am working for ‘X’ I expect ‘X’ to pay me, not ‘Y’ who they have the contract with because that is none of my concern. If I didn’t get paid my issue would be with ‘X’ RB and not ‘Y’ ED in this case.

A professional business should have made provisions to pay it’s staff and contractors regardless. I would never in a million years expect any of the people I have sub contracted to go without pay. I make sure that in the event I did have any issues with payment then I would pay the people myself then resolve the issue with the person I had the contract with.

Like it or not as end users we aren’t involved in any way other than being inconvenienced by the unfinished models that were paid for.

I really don’’t understand people that speculate when they know tiny little fragments of unsubstantiated evidence and build a conspiracy out of it, then add to the problem by repeating those uninformed comments. I also don’t understand why so many people are getting their panties in a twist and raising their blood pressure to dangerous levels because Ron and Nick haven’t been on the phone to them and told them all their personal business.

If I went into work tomorrow and presented some of the leaked RB evidence, with no actual proof as to how genuine it was and suggested using it in a court case I would be told to get out and never get a contract with the firm again.

Edited September 4, 2024 by TKhaos
Spellcheck

[Guest]

8 minutes ago, TKhaos said:

ED is a private company, RB is a private company making it private business between the both of them. It's being dealt with by the respective owners, appropriate management and their legal teams...

 

In this entire thread including its prior iterations, I’ve never seen a more sensible take that I agree with so completely.  Well said

[TKhaos]

1 minute ago, wombat778 said:

In this entire thread including its prior iterations, I’ve never seen a more sensible take that I agree with so completely.  Well said

Can think of a few people that won't agree and try to argue the point, think I will stick that in bold text wouldn't want them to miss it

 

[TobiasDeVil]

I would like to ask whether the view of the end customer as a creditor is also taken into account in this situation. We have been offered a product for purchase that is still not in its final state. Given that the customer has invested his own money in this product, it is quite understandable that he may feel uncertain or even disappointed or even cheated. Especially if it is not clear whether the product will ever reach its final, full-fledged state. Should the customer have the right to be informed of the current state of product development and what steps are being taken to complete it? All the customer can do at this point is blow off steam on the forum and deal with the bang theories.

Edited September 4, 2024 by TobiasDeVil