An open letter to all people involved with Quikly.com..... (please sticky)

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Jeku

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Posted: 3rd Jan 2007 21:32 Edited at: 3rd Jan 2007 21:34

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Quote: "There is however NO EXCUSE for you not responding to these things earlier. There are many places where you can get access to the internet at no cost for a few minutes. How many months has it been?"

Almost 11 months

And I agree with your post 100%.

Quote: "there's no point getting worked up about it, it is better to be forgiving than to hold grudge for what they did and should have done. Hence I've taken it well (although not a buyer"

But you didn't spend your money on it, so how can you talk? Not trying to being rude or anything, but there's nothing worse than someone telling you how to act in a situation when they haven't been afflicted themselves.

Quote: "If some lines of communication would have been left open, I'd be a little less skeptical."

Exactly. I emailed Kang 2 or 3 times afterward with no reply. The Quikly website was up for months after he disappeared, probably still attracting new customers.

If you shred away everything but the facts, the fact is we gave ~$50 for absolutely nothing.

Seppuku - Would you not be upset if you walked into EB, bought a game off the shelf for $50, brought it home only to find the CD was not there? Would you not try to get your money back? That is all we are trying to do.

And yes, it has made people more weary of the indie market. As an example I will never purchase another product as an early adopter, no matter what discount or pie-in-the-sky promises are made. Only after people have legitimately started using the software will I make a decision to purchase.

And:

Quote: "I ended up with paypal giving refunds to the vast majority of people woh bought"

I'm still waiting for those customers to speak up. There were many vocal people on the forums who were screwed over, so I still have a hard time believing that.

Ben Stein's Christmas Thoughts

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David R

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Posted: 3rd Jan 2007 22:48 Edited at: 3rd Jan 2007 22:53

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[Ok, I removed the post that was here, because I wrote it in a tired trance-like state (in between debugging a physics engine), and realised the argument it created made no coherent sense what-so-ever. I'm sorry to anyone who saw it/tried to respond to it]

"History shall be kind to me, for I intend to write it" - Winston Churchill

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Seppuku Arts

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Posted: 4th Jan 2007 00:22

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Quote: "But you didn't spend your money on it, so how can you talk? Not trying to being rude or anything, but there's nothing worse than someone telling you how to act in a situation when they haven't been afflicted themselves."

I was expressing the way I handle things, whether or not I have be involved and I have seen it is the same way others seem to be taking it, hence my comment, he, you and anyone else can take it anyway they want, but I can still make my opinion. Just because I haven't bought the product, doesn't mean I haven't been involved, I was one of the regulars at his forum, kept an interest, gaining the money and became very trusting of Sam, where I had begun creating media I was going to donate to his product, but then he disappeared and I eventually realised that he wasn't going to hold up and felt that I have been betrayed.

Quote: "Seppuku - Would you not be upset if you walked into EB, bought a game off the shelf for $50, brought it home only to find the CD was not there? Would you not try to get your money back? That is all we are trying to do."

Yes, I would, and I have bought a game with no CD before. But what I was saying was about, we know what the situation is now, as a response to WOLF's post, it was just how yes, people are more forgiving and are not holding a grudge. I know it has been a year, but it seems that people haven't held a grudge for it, because they know it was a difficult situation, that the problem should happen, but it did and it does. Like I wasn't annoyed that I didn't find my disk wasn't in its case when I bought it, I took it back and they sorted it out, if for any reason, when taking it back, the sellers were no where to be found, I would try to find out what on earth happened, but on return if they had a reasonable explanation, I would have been forgiving, which it seems has happened here.

Quote: "I think it is silly NOT to hold some sort of "grudge" though until all wrongs are fixed. I feel bad for any personal situation that he is dealing with, but I feel worse for all of the people that he ripped off."

I would keep an open eye (for the possibility of being true or false) and have assertiveness, I personally wouldn't hold a grudge, what would make me hold a grudge is for his excuses to be lame excuses, or lies. But that's me.

"Listen to Jah Music..." - Bob Marley

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Jeku

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Posted: 4th Jan 2007 00:49

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Quote: "but on return if they had a reasonable explanation, I would have been forgiving, which it seems has happened here. "

And I will be forgiving too, upon refund. Same at EB--- I will do everything in my power to get my money back, regardless of excuses. An excuses, whether real or not, is just that-- an excuse. But proper compensation has to be made, so it's kind of foolish to 100% believe somebody when no proof has been shown that proper money will be returned.

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x1b

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Posted: 4th Jan 2007 00:56

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I'm kind of with Jeku and kauroto on this. Personally, id put more focus on completing, releasing and maintaing the software than issuing refunds. Just a personal opinion.

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Ron Erickson

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Posted: 4th Jan 2007 01:26

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OK...well how about this then?
Sam sold the rights to Quickly, right? If he did, was there a clause in the contract to provide a copy to the people that purchased it? If there is not, then he screwed all of the people that he sold a copy to. If there is a clause in the contract, then aren't they buyers of the Quickly brand in breach of contract? Why hasn't Sam posted up some contact info for the people that purchased it? Then we could turn the frustration toward them and demand a release of it in it's current state. Maybe the "contract" should be posted up here so our resident lawyer (Philip) can tear it apart.
Somehow, I doubt that there is any kind of contract, buyer or anything to do with another party. It is more likely a convenient way of deflecting the blame. For everyone's sake, I'd love to be proven wrong, but I seriously doubt that will happen.

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Jeku

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Posted: 4th Jan 2007 02:40

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Quote: "I'm kind of with Jeku and kauroto on this. Personally, id put more focus on completing, releasing and maintaing the software than issuing refunds. Just a personal opinion."

Wait a second--- that's not my opinion at all

I would hope Kang would put our refunds as top priority right now *before* releasing and maintaining the software.

Ben Stein's Christmas Thoughts

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Kaurotu

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Posted: 4th Jan 2007 03:59

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Ok, I think we can all say that this is getting out of hand. Jeku, I think you should lock the thread and say anyone who was involved with Quickly can talk to Sam (Kangaroo) personally if they have a problem with it.

Threads like this suck when they are put in such great forums.

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Jeku

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Posted: 4th Jan 2007 06:12

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No, I'm not locking it. Personally I'd like to know about the developments of the refunds and the product itself. Since Kang2 has stated that nobody should email him, this is the only way to get in touch with hiim

We'll just wait and see what he says.

Ben Stein's Christmas Thoughts

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Hobgoblin Lord

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Posted: 4th Jan 2007 08:48

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Quote: " if for any reason, when taking it back, the sellers were no where to be found, I would try to find out what on earth happened, but on return if they had a reasonable explanation, I would have been forgiving, which it seems has happened here. "

Sometimes though an explanation is not enough without a resonable action following it.

Personally I had an experience like this involving a department store chain named Bradlees. December 24th, 2000 I went into one of the Bradlees stores and purchased $200 worth of gift cards with my Bradlees Charge Card to give as Christmas presents. Gave them out (easy shopping) great.

December 26th, 2000 Bradlees declared Bankruptcy, they had all these great big color posters and all saying that they no longer took charge cards or (get this) gift cards, so they knew when they sold me the cards they were going to do this (makes it even worse). Bummer, I buy people some new gifts and bring the gift cards back to the store but they will not refund them, but still insist on billing me for them on my Bradlees charge

I ask to pay the "bill" (which the cards were the only thing on) with the cards but that's not allowed either.

Needless to say I still have this bill (now about $620 from each collection agency adding some fee to it etc) on my credit report and the agencies have the nerve to call me to get this money. They are basically asking me to pay for someone to steal from me. Bradlees gave me a great explanation (they went Bankrupt), but a damn poor solution to the problem after, so I redress, an explanation is not always enough.

Kanga, I am not directing this at you just replying to that post. That said however, sounds like you had a rough year, but we all have them, that's life. Focus on anything good in the last year instead and you will likely find that list longer and better to think about.

Cheers

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Kangaroo2 BETA2

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Posted: 4th Jan 2007 13:24 Edited at: 4th Jan 2007 13:25

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Ok, this is becoming too much to fully answer all the points without either repeating myself or other people thinking I'm going into too much details looking for sympathy/making excuses etc. Its a fine line for me to know how to answer and appease everybody. I'll try to be simple in this post, please don't take the direct approach as to being arrogant or blunt, I'm just trying to keep things clear

1. I shall be refunding everybody as soon as I can, regardless. this shall be as soon as I can possibly afford it, and should start withing a month after I've cleared the backlogs of my electricity and gas bills.

2. I shall be trying to get the rights to quikly back so that I can finally release the full version for everyone and also release the source code here. As I said before legal implications etc prevent me from doing so, but I hope to simply refund the guys who gave/lent me money in the first place to save a nasty and unneccessary fight. Personally I feel this should be a lower priority to the refunding of people's money, so I'm not sure of a time scale on this. rest assured that all spare money I have will be saved and spent on refunds and this, I shalln't be "wasting" any money.

3. I have been kindly donated by a friend of mine a pc with modest specs (900mhz, 256mb, fireGl) which should happily run dbpro stuff (without shaders obviously). I shall start developping a new games developpment software package from scratch with a few new ideas I've had for improvements on the reported problems I had about the quilky code. Obviously this shall be a slow start for me to get back in the flow of things, but I should be able to dedicate at least an hour of time a day to it. I shall learn from my mistakes with quikly and probably not attempt to make it commercial, it will most certainly be free for people who purchased quikly at the very least.

4. Its becoming obvious that this thread/forum isn't the best way to discuss such matters, so I have set up a hotmail account specifically for enquiries from Quikly purchasers. Obviously I can't post it here for fear of spambots and also random abuse/unrelated emails making it hard to keep up with the genuine messages. This evening I'll fish out all the old email addresses from quikly purchasers and send them and email from that. If anyone can no longer access that email address, let me know here and I'll try and sort something out. Perhaps I should start a new website with a forum/guestbook etc for people to contact me on? Let me know your thoughts.

Hopefully people agree this is the best way to sort things? Thanks for your input, Sam

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Cash Curtis II

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Posted: 4th Jan 2007 16:01

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Quote: "Obviously I can't post it here for fear of spambots"

That is not a concern. In all my time having mine posted, I've never received a resulting piece of spam. Rich has some good software.

Come see the WIP!

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Kohaku

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Posted: 4th Jan 2007 17:53 Edited at: 4th Jan 2007 17:58

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My hotmail account has never had spam for the three years I've been using it. Ever. Plus I've only been using it on this forum, and I have recently add it to my site. It really is not necessary to take this whole discussion anywhere else, and I think you owe this community the form of open communication that can only really be found on a forum thread. That said, the people who purchased Quikly do indeed need priority, so I'd definitely have isolated communications between all of them.

Anywayz0rz, Sam, I think that you're coming back here is a big enough sign to warrant a bit of understanding, as you could have easily persisted in avoiding the matter. I doubt many more problems would have arisen for you if you had just been trying to steal everyone's money. I did a vanishing act myself just before you did and have also returned just before you. I was of course shocked at the whole thing and I think I made a message or two to share my thoughts on the matter. I have to go now because I crave tea.

All in all, depending entirely on your honesty, I admire your strength to come back and face the music. Keep it up!

You are not alone.

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Seppuku Arts

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Posted: 4th Jan 2007 18:05

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Quote: "And I will be forgiving too, upon refund. Same at EB--- I will do everything in my power to get my money back, regardless of excuses. An excuses, whether real or not, is just that-- an excuse."

Well that is fair.

As for spam, I wouldn't worry about it, it will either go into your spam folder, or not exist, I get tonnes of spam in my gmail, but I never see it because it all goes straight to my spam folder, I only see newsletters of sites I've sign d up to, their offers they like sending me as they do and emails from people.

Good luck with your new product Sam and best wishes on getting your problems solved, including those with Quikly.

"Listen to Jah Music..." - Bob Marley

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Kangaroo2 BETA2

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Posted: 4th Jan 2007 19:56 Edited at: 4th Jan 2007 20:10

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Ok

I've updated my profile with a hotmail address so hopefully it will now appear as a little email button below this post. If anyone has any private matters or questions etc they can send them to it. Please try not to flood it however as my internet time is farily limited as I'm trying to stay on schedule with work, family, sleep etc obviously and can't answer a million emails a day - that was the main problem before, along with an increase of spam, probably from spambots finding my various quikly related websites

[edit] Yup it appearred to work. I'll endeavour to check and answer this email at least once every few days, thanks.

[edit 2] Thansk again for yet more messages of support. Its all appreciated and possibly more than I deserve. I'm definitely trying to do the right thing here, and as pointed out, that is a whole lot more difficult than chickenning out, as I did a few times previously. I'm determined to improve my life in every way and get back to being a good father, husband and friend, I'm trying to stay focussed and committed, as much as circumstances will permit

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Jeku

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Posted: 23rd Feb 2007 10:09

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Any updates on this? It's been over a year now since we were supposed to have the product

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Chris Franklin_

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Posted: 23rd Feb 2007 19:43

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E-mail him?

llllRgt

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BiggAdd

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Posted: 24th Feb 2007 02:12

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I was never involved with quikly... But something just doesn't feel right. Ignore me if im being an A-Hole.

Something that stuck out.. is that you said a bunch of people paid off a large debt for you and now they have your source code... unfortunately, you continued, you lost contact with them as they went back to university.

2 points to make about this:

1. I dont know how many of you are students out there, but in the final year of my A-Levels, i know full well that i wouldn't be giving ANYBODY large sums of money to pay off their debts. Unless it was CLOSE family. I work about 10 hours a week, on minimum wage, giving me about £50 per week. I'm not in a position to pay off friends debts, and im sure any other uni student wouldn't be, as they would be worrying about the ever increasing debt they are building up just being there.

2.Your trying to tell us you never put all your code on a CD? I'd be glad to let you have server space to upload this source code and whatever else. But you said in your later posts that you will consider such offers once you have your source back.......?

A few more points. If this is true (And im terribly sorry if it is... and i'm just being a massive jerk if u are being honest and im deeply sorry)...... If i were in your position of massive debt, i wouldn't be spending about £14+ a month on an internet connection. I'd be slumming it.
I also find it odd how people called your home to receive no reply. How people posted on your forums, and you didn't know anything about it for ages.

Anyway, I apologise again if im being an idiot, and also if you were being true to your word.

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Jeku

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Posted: 24th Feb 2007 04:33

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Quote: "E-mail him?"

Seeing as how he's never replied to any of my emails since he dropped off the face of the earth, I'm not going to hold my breath over that one. I figured he might still be browsing this forum is all.

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Chris Franklin_

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Posted: 25th Feb 2007 12:13

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Quote: "
Seeing as how he's never replied to any of my emails since he dropped off the face of the earth, I'm not going to hold my breath over that one. I figured he might still be browsing this forum is all."

Ah ok, wonder where he's got to.

llllRgt

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Kieran

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Posted: 1st Apr 2007 11:30 Edited at: 1st Apr 2007 11:31

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EDIT: my bad didn't see the date

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Benjamin

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Posted: 1st Apr 2007 12:21

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Quote: "EDIT: my bad didn't see the date"

Erm, you must have known it was old considering it was many pages back.

Tempest (DBP/DBCe)
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Chris Franklin_

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Posted: 1st Apr 2007 12:25

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Where's kang got to?!

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SageTech

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Posted: 1st Apr 2007 12:27

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Quote: "Where's kang got to?!"

if I had a dollar for everytime thats been asked.

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Chris Franklin_

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Posted: 1st Apr 2007 12:32

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haha

I'll add some free mmo codez here

+ Code Snippet

Happy april fools haha

Sorry for the off topic

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Zombie 20

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Posted: 1st Apr 2007 13:05 Edited at: 1st Apr 2007 13:12

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sir, i don't even know you but your story moved me. It made me cry. That must have been so horrible, locked in a cage of mental despair with no hope of escape. I don't understand why people would be mad at you, but i see no reason for them to be, you've been through so much, i think we give you a piece of good luck again.

however after reading the other posts, you really should fix your mistakes. You had an obligation and ran away from it, that can lead you down a darker road, jail or a dark alley. Please right the wrong.

Welcome back, i hope to share funny stories and make ones here in this community, and i'd like to see you there alongside us.

my dearest regards to you and your family.

zombie