As you may know, I have been running Castle Infinity, paying for the Internet connection and new hardware to keep C8 running. Nobody else is providing funds or equipment. This is not something I can afford to do forever, not even counting how much of my time it takes.
So I came up with a plan: I would start a not-for-profit, educational corporation to run Castle Infinity. This corporation would be able to accept donations and sell merchandise to pay for the upkeep, repair, and expansion of the Castle. US Interactive holds the license to operate Castle Infinity, and because of an arrangement I made with them, they are willing to assign their rights under the license to that corporation.
Unfortunately, according to the license, they are required to get the approval of Starwave before they can make that transfer. Starwave, of course, no longer exists, having been bought by Disney, then given to InfoSeek, which in turn was given to Go.com. Nobody at Disney or at Go was involved with Castle Infinity, or knows anything about it.
So I contacted Go to try and get permission for USI to transfer their license to that corporation. I also inquired about the possibility that ownership of the Castle could also be transferred. Their first response was that the transfer of license was possible, but the transfer of ownership was unlikely.
I wrote them a letter, where I spelled out my ideas for what the not-for-profit corporation would be doing: operating, repairing, and growing the Castle. Further, it would help bring the Internet and the Castle to kids in places that wouldn't otherwise be able to get it, such as in hospitals. That I would support this effort by seeking corporate sponsorship and by selling Castle Infinity merchandise. This did not sit well with them.
I was told today that the transfer of license was problematic, and that the transfer of ownership is impossible. That even were I to get the license, I could not modify the Castle in any way, nor sell merchandise or otherwise collect revenues for the operation of the Castle.
The reason for this is simple: Go/Disney does not have any paperwork that shows that they own Castle Infinity. Or rather, they may have it tucked away somewhere, but nobody has any idea where, and Castle Infinity is certainly not worth their expensive time to try to find them. And once they found them, they would have a great deal of work to determine who owned the rights to what parts. So it's not worth their while to do it, and so Castle Infinity dies.
Next month, the bills are coming due for the phone line, and several pieces of hardware for the server need to be replaced. Quite frankly, I can't afford to do this anymore; not the money, and not the time. Not for a Castle that's stuck with a DSL line that is so poorly maintained by the phone company that kids keep getting disconnected, and for a Castle that can't be fixed, and that can't grow.
At this point, there's only one thing I can think of, and that's to write to Michael Eisner, the CEO of Disney, and ask him to just decide to give Castle Infinity to the kids. Go/Disney doesn't want it, so why not give it to the people who do? If they give it to the not-for-profit corporation I will form, the kids will always have it.
You can write to Mr. Eisner, and let him know how you feel. Maybe if enough of us write, he'll do something about it.
Chairman Michael Eisner
The Disney Company
500 South Buena Vista Street
Burbank, California 91521