I don't have a problem with KO's, only with people trying to pass them off knowingly as the real thing.

 

 

I'm sure Hal told you all you needed to know.

 

then you LEARN before throwing a few hundred dollars at it. People who don't know what a G1 prime looks like in it's packaging shouldnt bid on one. its the most iconic transformer and box there is. if you're in the TF collector community, you better have one hell of a good excuse for not knowing it when you see it. I can understand being fooled by the flap crease, and the gray border. but not the trailer stickers and lack of a silver stripe. no way.

if this was bought by someone's kid intended as a gift, then I do feel sorry for the buyer.

and lets not forget, yes, the seller is an absolute piece of shit for lying in the auction.

 

...I dont get it....Never even talked to the guy. I just read the threads here when that arcee first surfaced like everyone else, despite my lack of reading comprehension skills. Griff76 said in the thread with the HOS steel that he made the arcee for rabid squirrel who was a customer. I never asked hal for info. So where am i wrong again? I don't mind being wrong, but you have yet to point anything out?

 

Firstly, Hal hailed himself as a super neat guy for doing the "fans" a "favour" by charging the earth for what was a rather poor "mass produced" custom.

Now, any good businessman knows not to piss of his target audience, regardless of the quality of his product. Yet he came here and flamed anyone calling his ARC for what it was. Overpriced twaddle. That's just dumb. He then went and made it all public on his website, which is even dumber than coming here to heatedly debate whether or not his product was any good. Again, always trying to hammer home how "ungrateful" we were for not fawning over him and his generous and oh so selfless gesture of providing this product "for the fandom".

Then he went on a crusade around eBay after his Quintesson jobby was announced. He was accusing other custom makers, selling their own work, as theives and braggards, and how we should all band round and protect "him" from these "frauds".

I'm not really sure I need to go on, needless to say he got the ban he rightly deserved.

 

Hal is a fucking asshat. Never mind the product, never mind the price, his behavior is what makes him such a douchebag.

He puts personal insults and jabs at people on the front page of his business website...highly unprofessional, and downright childish. Don't forget about when he went on a rampage about the quintesson thing - none of his business, but he got up in it anyway.

Now, if you find that acceptable behavior, go right ahead and continue defending his dumb ass, but do not attempt to call it a double standard when we tell you he sucks and KO makers don't - they aren't in the same league.

 

Buuuut don't you remember the time when Happywell flipped us off on their front page?!




...oh wait, that didn't happen :3

 

the pot calling the kettle black

coughtonypostingahugeattackonthefrontpageagainstjackattformersafterorsonsworldgotshutdown

 

Hal was a real asshole who defined Shaun's old term "keyboard courage" to a T. He would post pictures of himself at Transformers conventions with a full sales table, his items hardly moving, talking about the amount of financial success he had had at so-and-so convention. He had a few contests for the the art and details regarding the Arcee kits and then, in some cases, either didn't ship the prize-winning artist a kit at all. (He might have actually sent them later, but I think a whoooole lot of time passed between people "winning" his prizes and him actually putting them in people's hands. I remember some folks having to convince him that "winning a prize" meant that, like he had said at the beginning of the competition, winning an Arcee kit.)

...he was also, yeah, impressively rude to just about everyone here, claiming that his creation of the Arcee kit was such an incredible service to all of us and that his $400 or so pricetag was totally justified...and then he'd turn around and ask all of us why we weren't buying any...and he'd get the response "They're too expensive..." and then he'd bitch about the fact that we didn't appreciate what he was offering to the fandom and how it was all our fault.

Now, to bring the conversation full swing, Hal was, ostensibly, "selling knockoffs," since they were being fan-created, fan-distributed and fan-endorsed. However, there is a WIIIIIIIDE range of difference between Hal's KOs and the KOs that are showing up these days, one difference being price, the other being quality.

* * *

I speak only for myself here (although I think a few folks probably agree with me) - you can put a price on the quality of your collection, and that price is how much you're interested in investing. That's a personal decision and NOBODY, regardless of race, color, creed, economic status, etc. EVER DESERVES TO BE JUDGED BY THAT. NEVER.

If I decide to buy a knockoff and display it with my collection, it's my DAMNED RIGHT AS A MEMBER OF A CAPITALIST SOCIETY.

Rendering a judgment about someone - ANYONE - based on the authenticity of their toys is both impressively shallow and ridiculously trite. That another person would care so much that they'd need to tell another "your collection is bad because you have knockoffs in it" is, honestly, impressive. Of the multitude of problems that I could devote my time to in the course of the day, the fact that my toy is KO or not is probably at the ABSOLUTE FUCKING BOTTOM of my priorities.

...and, honestly, if this offends y'all, so be it - if you're causing yourself an increased heartbeat, an overt amount of stress and a rise in blood pressure over the fact that somebody else (or you yourself) own a knockoff, then have fun making yourself physically and mentally uncomfortable about ABSOLUTELY NOTHING.

 

I don't think flaming Tony is a bright idea AT ALL.

 

Sorry, Mike, but nobody discussing this here is affiliated with Tony or 2005 other than being a member of the boards. Although if you want to call out Tony, by all means, do so, just try and make sure it's during a relevant discussion next time and not because you're trying make yourself look cool.

Which you failed at, by the way.

 

im really not worried about what a few guys on the internet think of me  

just stating the facts

 

Which has less than nothing to do with a discussion about knockoffs.

And rampantly irrelevant ones, at that.
FAIL.

 

zomg, fail, *acts like a *******

you guys are just too easy, sorry but I have recordings to do, have fun

 

Well, I think you're really cool if that helps any.


Blow something else up!

 

.....

 

why would you say something stupid like that mike?...why?

thats cool if youre secure in yourself or whatever (ooh, so mature)...but why? not only youre opening yourself to unnecessary trouble, but for hal? why?

i do not understand.

 

This was my introduction to HAL. Excellent business skills right there! Although damn entertaining watch him and Kickback go at it.