3000 A.D.'s response to Matias Zadicoff

From: http://www.3000ad.com/bin/about-matias-zadicoff.pdf

About Matias Zadicoff

Relocated from main forum.

RT said:

I had a good laugh reading that.

As first, I wasn't even going to delete it, but then I decided to just leave it. Until Lisa decided to remove it and contact

IGN.


I even mentioned something about this in my latest dev blog. But unlike him, I didn't mention any names.

Some guys pad their resumes, say they can do stuff. Then you ask them to do a test, they flunk it, you don't hire them

or accept the work, they cry foul. This guys spent almost two months doing a SINGLE set of animations. They were all

rubbish. None of them were signed off on. We scrapped them and Joerg (who has been with me for over ten years

now), had to redo them from scratch. In fact, I consulted with Joerg before we even decided to hand them back to

him. For contractual reasons, I can't even post Joerg's comments. He's German - a perfectionist - so just imagine his

commentary about this guy's work that he assumed I was going to sign off on and pay for.


You should see some of the emails he was sending Lisa (who vetted and hired him, before passing him on to me).

When we'd had enough, we just said screw it - and took him off the project, deleted all the stuff. Thats why you - who

have the BETA - don't see his name anywhere in the game's credit section in the manual (p40). It was my decision to

make. And that cost us almost three months of work but it was either that or put up with this guy.


We later discovered that one of his friends (a guy named Fernando) did most of the work you see on his site.

This sort of thing happens all the time and not just to us. A lot of devs experience the same sort of problem with

outsourcing and blog about it regularly - even in post mortems. Go over on Gamasutra and take a look.


None of this guys references even checked out. We were in a hurry to hire someone, so Lisa didn't complete her due

diligence. But that was my fault because I needed the animations done without lumping them on Joerg (who usually

does them and has done for ALL our games) who was already swamped. That mistake set us back about three

months.


ALL our contracts are work-for-hire. We don't pay by the minute or by the hour. We pay when you complete the work

and it is signed off on. We never accepted his work and just trashed it and had Joerg (already swamped) redo them.

Which is why HE is now behind on his work (getting the 3D cockpits finished). We're not idiots to use someone's work

in a commercial project and not pay for it.


Of course, you have to wonder about a guy who signs an NDA and then goes on forums to post his side of a twisted

story, thinking anyone is going to even pay any attention.


Been doing this for almost twenty years and there is nobody who can say that they've worked for us and not been

paid for their work. This guy was completely unprofessional, none of his references checked out (in fact, after we

started working with him and Lisa started checking, one of them said "I wouldn't hire him if I were you" and wouldn't

elaborate, and he never delivered on anything promised. Thus setting our project back.


He posted the same crap he posted here at Gamespy, IGN, CGtalk, 3DTotal, FiringSquad, TeamXBox etc - all of

which have been deleted and in some cases (e.g. GameSpy forums) he was banned.


Just so you know, we're talking a measly $1,075 here. Which is what he was asking us to pay for stuff we didn't sign

off on nor accept. Like we would ruin our rep by stiffing someone on such a small amount. Especially for a multi-
million dollar commercial project. He has a signed NDA* and a signed work-for-hire* agreement in which Section 4.1

clearly states that unless the work is signed off on or accepted we don't have to pay for it. Standard industry

procedure.


We removed him from the project, trashed the stuff since we didn't want it and hired someone else to do the job -

which we of course accepted and currently working their way into the game.


Thats when he started this vendetta last week or so when we made it clear to him that we weren't paying him a dime.

This fool actually sent emails in which he threatened to release materials he had stolen from our FTP, on the Net

unles we paid him. Yes blackmail in addition to harrassment, libel, IP theft etc. This guy is very disturbed because I'm

not sure if he realizes just how many laws he has broken. We've already filed a complaint with the Argentine Federal

Police (the equivalent of the FBI) last week.


The stuff he put up offering for free and saying are his, are not. The character model was an early proof-of-concept of

the Gammulan Vanguard marine created by Califf Guzman (we didn't accept the work, but you don't see him going all

over the Net saying we owe him money). This is the alternate design and final version that made it into the game. The

weapons were created by Joerg and a bunch of people several years ago. Those of you who have played our games,

should recognize them since they were all done back in 2001 for Universal Combat. The only reason he had access

to these assets is because - like all our contractors - he had access to our assets dB via our secure FTP. Plus he

needed weapons in order to get them to fit the characters correctly. Good thing we changed the login details when we

dropped him from the project or he would probably have downloaded and stolen our entire assets dB. He has simply

STOLEN our copyrighted works and passing them off as his own and then giving them away.


There is a reason that instead of actually, you know, working, he's out on the Internet on a smear campaign. The

reason is that nobody will hire him. Which is why NONE of his references checked out. He even told Lisa, Joerg and I

that he worked on Halo. We have the emails to prove it. Thats why warning bells started going up once we saw the

crap he sent in.


The first clue that he was trouble was when he made his first submission. Then Joerg sent me an email saying

"Currently i did not find an animation that doesnt needs a fix. Wow...what did he do on Halo?" . Followed by "He

worked on Halo, un-packing the boxes and put them on the store shelf".


And here is the email between him and Lisa where he clearly told her that he worked on Halo, Perfect Dark etc. So we

figured that he had that experience and thus hired him based on that. BEFORE she finished her due diligence checks.

But that was my fault. Of course we later found out that it, like everything else, was false. He never worked on Halo

and never worked on ANY computer game in his entire life. Now WHY would we hire ANYONE who never worked on

a computer game? All we hire are people with gaming experience. Thats like hiring a car mechanic to work on an

airplane.


When the attorneys finished outlying all the laws he'd broken, it dawned on me that this guy really thought that I'd

leave this alone. Given that Argentina - as per their WTO membership - have strict laws about stuff like this, coupled

with the fact that his websites are hosted here in the use (GoDaddy and HostDime, both of which complied with our

DMCA takedown), by the time I'm done with him, he would'nt be able to post a resume on a milk cartoon, let alone

online.


Every employer has had to deal with a disgruntled employee or contractor at some point or another. In some cases

where outright libel and harrassment (as in this case) is involved, people find themselves in court and wonder why.

The only difference in our case is that we ended up hiring the wrong person for a job. And when we fired him, he stole

our materials, tried to pass them off as his own while engaging in a protracted smear compaign. But I think those who

know me know by now that he's picked on the wrong person. Attacking me is one thing. That I can handle because

everyone has their right to Free Speech. Committing outright libel and harrassment as well as IP theft while trying to

distrupt and or harm my business and livelihood is clearly another matter - as he will soon find out.

* Digital signatures redacted for security and legal reasons


UPDATE (04-30-09): We've had his website suspended by both of the ISPs (the one he has his site on and the one

he hosts the stolen materials on). You can view the DMCA takedown notice over here. They say that once he

removes the material he stole from there, he can put his site back up. But the crime was already committed and the

ISPs have their logs and image captures as we do. So we're pursuing that as well.


Edited 14 May 2009 by Supreme Cmdr

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Relocated from main forum: http://www.3000ad.com/forum/topic/50026748-about-matias-zadicoff/#comment-171353

http://www.3000ad.com/aaw/2009/04/developer-blog-8/

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2009/03/18/all-aspects-the-derek-smart-aaw-interview/

http://www.3000ad.com/bin/INVOICE_matiaszadicoff.pdf

http://www.3000ad.com/bin/MatiasZadicoffNDA.pdf

http://www.3000ad.com/bin/Contract_For_MZadicoff.pdf

http://www.3000ad.com/aaw/media/shots/09-04-30/

http://www.3000ad.com/aaw/media/shots/09-04-26/

http://www.3000ad.com/bin/MatiasZadicoffHalo.png

http://www.3000ad.com/bin/DMCA_TakeDown_Letter_To_ISP.pdf