Clan Themes, We Make Clans Look Good!

Piracy has been a big issue in phpnuke for a long time.  It is a grey area of nuke because if things are released under GPL they can be given away or the owner of the site can charge you a price to download it.  Might I remind you that 100% of the products we sell today are not GPL and in order to get support for a product you must purchase it from us.

Anyway, a few days ago a user contacted us about one of our products he got from phpnuke-downloads.com.  What you see below is a series of emails from the buyer, clan themes staff, and phpnuke-downloads staff.  Every time I read them I laugh a little bit harder.  It is a lot to read and I will try to comment as much as I can.  I have removed some of the names to protect the identity of the parties involved.  We will call the client by his username Pugsley.

Initial Contact with Clan Themes

Subject: My sincerest apologies
Comment/Request/Message:
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dear Sir, It seems I have made a grievous error. I am very new to the PHP-Nuke community and have been plodding my way through hosting and populating my first ever website. Over the course of the past week I have been working diligently on designing my guild on World of Warcraft their first ever webpage. We are only about 30 members but growing every day and I volunteered to give it a try and hopefully broaden my horizons. Most of the time I have spent was during down time at my job where unfortunately many fine sites such as this one are blocked by the corporate firewall. This is where I made my mistake. I happened to stumble upon a website that I know based on one of your articles I read tonight as being familiar to you in a not so good way. Yes, that's right, I subscribed to PHPNuke-Downloads.com. From there I downloaded from them your Wrath of the Lich King WoW theme and have installed it on my website. It wasn't until I came here tonight searching for .psd files for block buttons that I realized the error of my ways. I want to make things right, but at this time after having paid for my domain name, webhost and that other subscription that I feel most guilty about I cannot afford the $52 for the theme that I feel deserves to be paid. At the same time however, I would rather not let my past few days of work go to waste if at all possible by simply uninstalling what I have not yet rightfully paid for. It is for this reason that I am writing you for your thoughts on the subject. If you would prefer me to suspend use of the theme until I can afford to pay for it I completely understand. I would prefer to come to some sort of arrangement that we can both find acceptable if that is at all possible. Thank you for your time and I look forward to your response. Once again I apologize for not doing my homework and contributing to that bottom feeder. Very sincerely, Pugsley.

Our Response (this was from me)

It is a problem we encounter often.  He is part of what we call the QBC (quick buck crew) and he steals others hard work so he can hook you for some money.  Such a rip off for you the customer.  You can keep it until you can afford to buy a legit copy, but you will only receive official support then.  Thank you for contacting us and your honesty.

Pugsley to Phpnuke-Downloads.com Initial Contact

Subject: PHPNuke-Downloads.com - Feedback: Request for Refund


Message: It has recently come to my attention that your site distributes illegal versions of software licensed and copyrighted by other developers. Not realizing that you are not the owner of software I downloaded as part of the Silver Subscription I am not able to obtain proper support for said products. I respectfully request my account be cancelled and that my $19.99 payment be refunded so that I may instead apply the funds to where they rightfully should go, to the people that actually developed the software. Failure to willingly comply with my request will result in my filing a complaint with Paypal alerting them to your illegal business practices. Thank you.

Response from Phpnuke-Downloads.com

Hello Pugsley,

There is absolutely no refund of any kind for our subscription. The terms of the subscription is clearly mentioned that(including script ownership on homepage). If you had any allegation why did not you claim that as soon as we activated your account? We are doing business with PayPal for more than 4 years. Therefore, PayPal is well aware of our business model.

Thank you for your time again.


--
Regards,
Customer Service Team,
PHPNuke-Downloads.com
ABD Inc.

Pugsley to Phpnuke-Downloads.com

Phpnuke-Downloads Staff Member,

The reason I did not have an allegation at the time my account was activated was because I was not aware that you were selling what amounts to pirated versions of themes until I needed support for the theme. Once I went looking for assistance is when I discovered I obtained it illegally from the true owners, that being the developers whose themes you are illegally redistributing.

While you try and say the scripts themselves are not for sale, making someone buy a 7 day subscription in order to download them is the same thing, no matter how you try to spin it.

I have in good faith tried to resolve this issue with your company and asked that my account be refunded and canceled prior to the terms of subscription and also as soon as I discovered that I was contributing to the illegal distribution of other peoples licensed and copyrighted material. In other words enabling your "business model" of taking other peoples hard work and trying to make a quick buck on it.

Disgustedly,

Pugsley

Phpnuke-downloads.com to Pugsley

understand your frustration. If you needed support and you purchased the subscription from here, why would you go somewhere else for support? I do not have to reply your email nor do i have to care about your complaint. We get subscriber like you once in a blue moon. I just want to see what exactly these type of people have in their head when they buy digital goods online for $20 USD and ask for refund only one day before expiration. I bet i can prove you that your so called "developer" has business plan similar to ours. Welcome to cyber world.

Pugsley to Phpnuke-downloads.com

Dear Sir,

Thank you for your response, I appreciate you taking the time to write to me despite your not caring about my complaints nor my correspondence. And why should you care, you already have my money, right ?

It is not the dollar amount that is my concern, but simply the principle of it. At this point it is not about getting my $20 back, but rather to have that $20 go to the developers who truly deserve it. They are the ones who are affected the most by this, except for perhaps my guild, whose website is being delayed while I try and work through the support issues.

The reason I did not contact your organization for support regarding the theme I downloaded is because you made it quite clear in the terms and conditions that you do not offer support for the items you have available for download. This should have been my first warning sign not to do business with you. The second warning sign should have been the lack of forums or other means of reviewing customer feedback on your website.

Secondly, I thought I had sufficiently outlined the sequence of events regarding the timeline leading to my request, but it seems that detail has escaped you. Please feel free to ask for clarification for anything I wrote that you may not understand from my prior emails.

Lastly, "welcome to cyber world" indeed. This has truly been a learning experience for me and I now know what to look for as not to make the same mistake again. I acknowledge your position not to refund my subscription and at this time do not anticipate you to change your mind and do what is right and decent. As you have stated before you do not care about me nor my stance so I will simply live with the mistake I have made and attempt to move forward. I will however, do everything in my power to share my lessons learned with others new to the community in hopes that they don't fall into the same trap I did.

Thank you for showing me the error of my ways and and educating me on how to better recognize the bottom feeders of the community such as yourself. 
 

Pugsley

This is the type of behaviour we try to warn people about all the time.  I call them the quick buck crew or QBC.  However, Pugsley I award such honesty and honour you took in supporting the developers.  It is a crying shame their isn't more of it in the world.

Clan themes is awarding you a free theme with support and 3 months free in the club.  A $100 value just for doing the right thing.  Enjoy and welcome to Clan Themes, 

Thanks again,

Mack

 Update: You can read more about this topic at these various threads and sites

• PHPNuke-Downloads.com steals designs and copyright
• Raven Nuke Flames PHPNuke-Downloads.com  Blatant Piracy Site
• NukeKorea.net says worst site in the PHPNuke community for theft of other peoples work is PHPNuke-Downloads.com
• Evo Xtreme says phpnuke.org promotes PHPNuke-Downloads.com illegal activity

You might ask yourself why give him the free press?  If you read the above and you still think his service is worth it.  Knock yourself out.  Pugsley I hope you get your money back.