Craigs Preorder List Update

[akarolick]

Craig did well enough getting people to sign up for his iCP2 kickstarter last year. He's moved on to ships anew a while ago now, I'm afraid.

Yeah and he hasn't finished that either.

He seems really good at getting lots of people's money so that he can make toys for himself and then never deliver on his promises. I was SHOCKED that so many people from these forums were willing to give him money for the iCP2.

I'm looking at you ShleeDragon.  

 

[Hồng Thất Công]

I wonder why the cops have not been after him yet?

 

[akarolick]

I wonder why the cops have not been after him yet?

Someone establish contact with the constabulary POST-HASTE!

 

[Timstertoo]

I wonder why the cops have not been after him yet?

Probably because no one could be arsed to file a formal complaint yet. I think that one person doing so would just get the reaction that it's a civil matter and they should go to small claims court or whatever UK equivalent there is. And for that the amount is too low, cheaper to just say goodbye.

Only way would be if the remaining pre orders would do a joint thing, the police might be a bit more willing to look into it if they get a couple of hundred formal complaints and for a civil case the expenses could be shared and thus doable. 

Either way it would be just a getting your revenge thing. Craig probably doesn't have any assets anymore and as we say in the Netherlands, you can't pluck a bald chicken.

 

[WizardStan]

I wonder why the cops have not been after him yet?

Because being bad at business isn't a crime. As near as anyone can tell he hasn't actually done anything illegal.

 

[MaxNormal]

I am still very curious at what happened to all the 1GHZ money Craig got last year. All of the upgrades and NONE of the money actually got to ED for those units. As we have no way of telling what actually happened - we cannot see Craigs books - his claims that "lots of refund requests appeared and took all your money" seem ridiculous. I havent seen a single person confirm they actually got a refund at that time.

Yes we cannot tell he did anything illegal. We can however quite reasonably suspect that we have been taken for a ride.

 

[kasp]

I honestly think it is time for ED to feed Craig to the sharks.

The queue is killing the pandora and at the current rate of sales and donations the queue will never be solved. If there are 500 pre orders left and lets say it costs 250 to make a pandora that means they require 125,000.

Now I am unsure of the timeline on getting that 8000 dollars but I suspect its around 6 months but lets say it is 3 months. That means it is 4 years before all the preorders are taken care of. If it was 6 months for the 8000 that means 9 years.  Obviously sales are going to drop as the technology gets older and older and other products become cheaper and cheaper.  The pandora only has around 1-2 years before it is completely outdated and it obviously can't afford to drop prices while the preorders are getting funded to make it appealing to a broader market.

What ED should do is send all the pre orders an email.  Saying that he is terribly sorry but Craig has abandoned them and he can no longer afford to subsidise the pre order queue.  If they have a problem they can feel free to take Craig on.  All he can do for them now is offer Pandora's a severely discounted price with minimal profit made. Explain the situation clearly and concisely and tell them how Criags shop has also ripped you off with money as well with the 1 Ghz.

The fact the pre order queue is a lot bigger than even ED feared pretty much means Craig is a thief and was skimming off the top.  He probably pocketed that 1 Ghz money  too as can anyone actually report that they received a refund from Craig? That's where he said the money went but I think he is full of shit to be honest.

 

[EvilDragon]

Okay, I've now counted everything together.

26 agreed to upgrade to the 1GHz unit for 270 EUR, all of them have been sent the coupon for that, but only 13 really did upgrade. No idea what's up with the rest.

Okay, let's check how many other customers remain after those 71 units have been shipped.

Upgrades for 150 EUR: 41

Upgrades for 100 EUR: 108

Customers who are fine with CC units: 48 (Craig should have enough of those with the PCBs I sent back to him)

Customers who don't want to pay but want to wait for Rebirth unit: 130

Customers who would like to wait for a Pandora 2: 17

Customers asking for a refund: 76

(So basically, 469 customers completed the survey).

Now, how much money is needed to get all those Pandoras out?

As mentioned, I will not take care about the refunds or CC units. That is something Craig needs to figure out himself.

Let's take a look how many Pandoras need to be funded:

149x 1GHz Pandora    (= 42.000 EUR)

130x Rebirth Pandora (= 35.000 EUR)

Total: 77.000 EUR

How much money is being safed with the upgrades?

  41x 150 EUR:    6150 EUR

108x 100 EUR: 10.800 EUR

Total: 16.950 EUR

How much money needs to be funded then?

77.000 EUR - 16.950 EUR = 60.060 EUR

How many Pandoras would need to be sold for the current price (539 EUR) to fund that?

667

That's quite some amount of units... it will be nigh impossible to achieve that, to be honest.

So yes, everyone who decides to upgrade to 1GHz to get the unit will certainly help!

Let's take a look at a different scenario.

Let's assume everyone who decided to upgrade for 150 EUR will upgrade for 200 EUR, everyone who decided to upgrade for 100 EUR would upgrade for 150 EUR, and everyone who didn't want to upgrade would do it for 100 EUR.

How much money would be safed in this case with the upgrades?

 41x 200 EUR:  8200 EUR

108x 150 EUR: 16.200 EUR

130x 100 EUR: 13.000 EUR

Total: 37.400 EUR

Total left that needs to be funded: 43.060 EUR

Which would equal 480 sold Pandoras.

Better, but still seems like a very high number :/

If everyone would be forced to pay 200 or not get a Pandora:

Total left that needs to be funded: 25.200 EUR, which would equal 280 Pandoras.

Still a lot, but a lot more possible (especially with more donations).

Basically, we'd need everyone to pay at least production costs to continue in a proper way...

This is a pretty hard thing to decide.

 

[Hồng Thất Công]

I wonder why the cops have not been after him yet?

Because being bad at business isn't a crime. As near as anyone can tell he hasn't actually done anything illegal.

??? Took people money and never delivered the products is not a crime?  Stealing is not a crime?  Con-artist is not a crime?

 

[EvilDragon]

No, it's not crime.

If CircuitCo wouldn't have had these issues with the production (which lead to a loss of 300K EUR in the first place), then everything would've been fine by now.

It never was his intention to NOT deliver. THAT would've been crime.

It's sad, but no crime.

Everything else after that (what happened to the 1GHz payments, etc.) is just speculation. Without any knowledge what's true and what not, we can't tell for sure if he did commit a crime or not.

 

[WizardStan]

??? Took people money and never delivered the products is not a crime?  Stealing is not a crime?  Con-artist is not a crime?

Nope, he didn't steal. People paid money for a product that never materialized. It actually happens a lot, pre-orders implicitly carry a risk. Bad business is not a crime. He didn't take your money, nor did he con you out of it: you wilfully gave it to him with the promise of some return in the future; you made a contract, and if you wanted you could sue him for breach of contract, but there's nothing here that would involve the police.Now, if you successfully sue him and he refuses to honour the judgement, then it may be illegal (depending on jurisdiction) and you can get the police involved, but you need to take him to court first.

 

[MrConfusion]

Customers who don't want to pay but want to wait for Rebirth unit: 130

Some of us who chose this option in the survey are probably willing to pay more than the minimal 100 (like me). They just need to be 100% sure they actually get what is promised and quite frankly the long message with "OpenPanodra" as subject did little to invoke confidence unless you actually spent a good hour or two to read the forum to really understand what is going on.

...and for some (most?) in this 130 people group there is no way you can get them to give a cent more; they will request a refund if asked for more money, even if they know getting a refund is practically impossible.

 

[kasp]

Well those 76 who want a refund are completely stuffed. 

??? Took people money and never delivered the products is not a crime?  Stealing is not a crime?  Con-artist is not a crime?

Nope, he didn't steal. People paid money for a product that never materialized. It actually happens a lot, pre-orders implicitly carry a risk. Bad business is not a crime. He didn't take your money, nor did he con you out of it: you wilfully gave it to him with the promise of some return in the future; you made a contract, and if you wanted you could sue him for breach of contract, but there's nothing here that would involve the police.
Now, if you successfully sue him and he refuses to honour the judgement, then it may be illegal (depending on jurisdiction) and you can get the police involved, but you need to take him to court first.

Not paying ED for the 1 Ghz units is a crime.

To be honest the situation is untenable as it is.  For the survival of the Pandora Craig's queue needs to be abandoned but do offer them a lifeline of a dirt cheap unit with virtually no margin on it.  Sad fact is Craig dug this massive hole for himself,.

I know ED wants to do the right thing by the initial orders but right now it is in a death spiral situation.  People aren't buying the Pandora because it is too expensive and they can't afford to drop the prices because they are funding all of Craigs bad orders.   Either scenario they aren't going to get a Pandora just one way might ensure the survival of the project.

 

[PokeParadox]

Wow... with the numbers confirmed you can see why Craig has stuck his head in the sand... hmmm What's frustrating is this could have probably been mitigated more easily if he had cooporated more closely with ED in the first place and been more communicative in general...

 

[vcoleiro1]

I know what those refund requesters are going to do.  Expect the rerbirth or the CC queue to grow - probably rebirth

 

[ElPoco]

I don't think selling 500 Pandoras will be impossible. If every preorder can generate another sale by showing his Pandora around and spreading the work. I know I will, and I'm pretty sure I can get some people interested. It'll probably be harder than it would have been four years ago, with people now expecting quad-core and stuff, but I don't think that's impossible.

 

[Nagelfar]

It would be VERY hard and it would take a very long time, months at least and I'm not talking 2months. Also with those numbers now out in the open I say it is now time for Craig to come clear and show some numbers himself, especially where all that money for the 1Ghz units went to. This is not going to happen unfortunately so I think this sad saga has to be considered over and done. Perhaps then, finally, Craigs remaining preorders will do something about the situation and demand some answers in an efficient way (meaning not posting in a forum but going to the authorities).

 

[rohezal]

(meaning not posting in a forum but going to the authorities).

Probably they get insight in Craigs books but it would not help. He has no money (even he had taken a high credit for the production), even if he did some illegal, which I doubt. So it won't help.

An idea to sell more Pandoras:

Selling the cheap one (CCs, refurbished with no wifi) at people with lots of love for gadgets and linux but little money. This mean computer science students. Bundle for the no wifi units a USB wifi stick like this one for free (it costs 5€). Sell the refurbished Pandora for something around 199€ (incl. tax). http://geizhals.de/allnet-all0234nanov2-a939003.html

Maybe do an extra student offer, if you are a student you don't have to pay postal costs. This can easily checked if the mail ends with name@tu-braunschweig.de or an other university address. If you could refurbish some pandoras (lets say 10, more are better) and can't sell them, you can write to the fachschaften and ask them if they want to tell their members (several hundreds of computer science students) about the Pandora. Maybe add some motivation to them. Like: "Shipping costs for students are free", and give them a coupon code or check it via the mail ending (most universities got student@tu-cityname.de).

An email to the fachschaften could be something like this:

"Liebe Fachschaft Informatik,

beim Pandora Projekt ging es darum einen Nintendo DS großen Mini-Laptop (mit Linux als OS) zu bauen, der über 10 Stunden Akku Laufzeit und ein eingebautes Gamepad hat. Das hat geklappt, Angstrom, Debian, Slackware laufen perfekt und es gibt massig optimierte Software (Open Office, QT Creator). Emulatoren für den Nintendo DS, PSP, N64, Playstation und andere Systeme. Dazu noch Klassiker wie Jedi Knight 2, Free Space 2 und so weiter. Jedoch haben einige Geräte kleine Macken. Bei einer Serie funktioniert das Wlan nicht richtig. Darum bieten wir einen gratis Wlan USB Stick zum Mini Laptop an und fast 50% Preisnachlass. Und für Informatik Studenten sind die Versandkosten gratis. Falls ihr das Gerät cool findet, wäre es lieb wenn ihr das an eure Mitstudenten weiterleiten könntet.

https://www.dragonbox.de/en/main-consoles-and-upgrades/149-classic-pandora-wifi-bt-defective.html

A quick overview about the Pandora:

https://www.youtube.com/embed/qPyzC1NFkJE?feature=oembed

Gutscheincode für Informatik Studenten: ilovetux

Gruss

ED"

 

[Blimp]

Before I start giving my thoughts, I'm a preorder of craig still waiting (sounds like a meeting of AA), so I might be bias.

Lets get some things straight, Ed never had any legal obligation to fulfil craigs orders, not now not ever. Saying Ed should stop fulfilling craigs orders because of that doesn't help, he knows already. Now lets rewind a little, after losing the money because of CircuitCo, craig had no legal obligation to fulfil his orders any more, but neither did Ed with his own preorders (according to what Ed wrote above, this makes craig statement about having to refund a little iffy..)

Ed then made a business plan to start making pandora boards in Germany with the plan to fund old preorders from himself AND craig with new sales, giving himself a moral obligation to fulfil all open preorders. And this is were I think Ed made his biggest mistake, he should have acquired craigs preorder list before setting up the plan (easy saying it now, I know. And you could argue that Eds biggest mistake was trusting craig...but he knew/knows craig is good in making thinks sound better then they really are). This obligation doesn't change because of what craig did after that time, craig giving Ed false numbers aren't craigs preorders fault but puts Ed in major trouble.

So the problem is how far does Ed want to go(can go?) in keeping his moral obligation given the things he now knows, I don't think there's a easy solution for Ed what ever HE decides. I think Ed should NOT ship out any more preorder pandoras before making a decision. I plunged for €150, but might be willing to go up (if tv-out cables are in stock).

Ed whatever you decide, I'm willing to support it, good luck.

 

[MrConfusion]

Sad fact is Craig dug this massive hole for himself,.

Be careful.

I know people who, when young (early 90's depression) swore they'd never make the same mistake their parents did: pay debt with debt.

Yet in this depression many of those 35-40 year old dads and moms have had to say "whoops".

To imply someone does that intentionally is... well... not nice.

Also, about Craig's lack of communication etc. I though many of the people here knew him for years. And now he's suddenly the BoogieMan.

Somehow that also reminds me of being a young adult in the early 90's: Some of my friends fathers were turned from the "cool dads" to "tomato eyed, snapping zombies" in just a few months. And it's happening again.

Communication could not bring money and didn't it work until things started going wrong? Instead of lack of communication, how about blaming the timing. It would be really interesting to peek into some alternate reality where the Pandora had started a year earlier, thus dodging the worst recession.