Has *anybody* received a refund from OpenPandora Ltd (Craig's) in 2013?

[Mr_Loon]

Hi Craig, welcome back, and thanks for giving a straight and unambiguous description on your view of the Pandora situation.

It's highly unusual to see things done this way (on an open forum) between you & ED but also highly positive, compared to ignorance (of each others view points) / silence on both sides.

We obviously have a dispute situation but what should be beyond dispute is that everyone who pre ordered a Pandora should get one. I'm sure you & ED both agree on this, use this as a starting point for discussions. Look for the best way to make this happen. The past can't be changed but the future can be improved.

You really need to give a clear number of your outstanding Pandora pre orders so plans can be made to fulfil those orders.

Shame to hear you're 'washing your hands' of the Pandora, hope that the iCP2 is a huge success.
______________________________________

Craig, here are a few things that would help a lot :

1) Give some support on the official iCP support forum & deal with things like this That sort of stuff is frankly embarrassing on an official product forum. 

2) Seek to engage & enthuse the iCP2 community, talk about the keyboard layout, the Firmware, where the Dev units are etc.

3) People are told they have not got a Pandora due to mistakes from Circuit Co., let them know why you have not sued Circuit Co.

4) Give a clear and detailed account of what happened to the money raised from the 1 Ghz pre orders. I think that people who were told to pre order at a premium cost to help cover development / testing, i.e. true supporters of the project, deserve to be told why they are still waiting for units.

EDIT :

5) Let people who are asking for refunds for Pandoras know when / if they are going to get their money back.

 

[Nintendo]

reading all this saddens me deeply

:mellow:   i wish i was a millionaire, would solve OP financial issues in a minute

if you figure a way to promote it better, we'll definitely help spreading the word

I wish this as well.

Last year Ed has made it clear to me he runs the OP show now. He has his own team of people who he takes advice from.

I have no influence on what he is doing or if we will ever get those missing units which he promised when he asked to take over production. That's just business I suppose. I do believe Ed did think he could supply them when he took over, but things often don't go to plan.

Occasionally he will send units to me which we then send to outstanding customers. 

I now work 95% of my time with a job elsewhere. My partner was made redundant from her job at the end of last year. The Pandora cost me hundreds of thousands of dollars to make happen, which I will never get back. I've come to terms with this.

Ed asked me to reduce my forum presence because I make waves or cause trouble for him or whatever, and I've done so.

I don't know who his 'investors' are, I don't know his business plan and have minimal contact with him. 

OP Ltd runs as a shell trying to finish up the remaining outstanding orders, and it will have done so before the end of this year (if things continue at the current rate), at which point it will be wound up. There are a few hundred remaining outstanding orders at the last count.

Alternatively if things do not continue at the current rate via Ed then the company will be placed in to liquidation (it has no assets - no one would get anything - not good). Ideally being patient means everyone gets their refund/Pandora, this is what we would like to happen.

The buy back/upgrade option is in process and should allow for enough money to finish things up.

There won't be a Pandora2.

God speed.

 

[Exophase]

I hate to be the one to say this but let's face it, this isn't progress, this argument is pretty much an exact repeat of the one months ago. Obviously neither side is going to change their stance and nothing is going to happen. This reminds me of a really bad relationship I had several years ago.. there were so many lies and deception and ambiguity that it felt good to finally have the chance to actually get things out in the open but after that the same stuff just kept being brought up over and over again.

 

[notaz]

And I told you over and over again when you were taking this over that the returns were coming in at an alarming rate, and yet here you posting that somehow that took you by surprise and now there are many more units to replace, suggesting I somehow lied. You have known about the rate of case, LCD and PCB failure for as long as you have been in charge with constant emails and reminders from me about just how bad the situation is/was.

There were no posts by ED stating returns taking him by surprise, what are you talking about here?
As far as I know ED never had problems with returns, sometimes people would have to wait several weeks for repairs because ED was too busy handle them, but now with Askarus the repairs are fast and there is no backlog AFAIK.

 

[Maquis196]

I for one really hopes there is a Pandora 2, so much was learnt with this experience that done properly there wont be any of the same issues. Hell, with a kickstarter project that succeds you'd know from day 1 what's doable, etc.

I'll donate some money to the cause, because I think we will all celebrate the day there are no pre-orders or refunds left.

All the best in your future endeavours Craig.

 

[rohezal]

I think there should be a (phone) talk about this between ED and Craig. Writing stuff sometimes leads to misunderstandings, since you can't hear how the words are meant.

Agree with that. Maybe get some sleep and then do a phone call.

 

[Klumpen]

Craig, here are a few things that would help a lot :

1) Give some support on the official iCP support forum & deal with things like this That sort of stuff is frankly embarrassing on an official product forum. 

2) Seek to engage & enthuse the iCP2 community, talk about the keyboard layout, the Firmware, where the Dev units are etc.

3) People are told they have not got a Pandora due to mistakes from Circuit Co., let them know why you have not sued Circuit Co.

4) Give a clear and detailed account of what happened to the money raised from the 1 Ghz pre orders. I think that people who were told to pre order at a premium cost to help cover development / testing, i.e. true supporters of the project, deserve to be told why they are still waiting for units.

EDIT :

5) Let people who are asking for refunds for Pandoras know when / if they are going to get their money back.

You still expect, that Craig is answering direct questions and giving real facts/data straight away? oO

This is a farce.

 

[ShleeDragon]

Real true facts: Craig lost a metric fuckton of monies and experienced lots of setbacks.. ED takes over the clusterfuck but has had slight success.

So, craig has lost money, and ED is in debt..... booooooooooooourns

Edit: Anybody notice that ED is like a week away from clearing his queue... LET'S CELEBRATE!!

 

[Nintendo]

Just sell OP Ltd. to Sony or Nintendo.

 

[Maquis196]

Just sell OP Ltd. to Sony or Nintendo.

You misspelt Valve!

 

[Nintendo]

I also misspelled Google and Apple.

 

[grydholt]

And I told you over and over again when you were taking this over that the returns were coming in at an alarming rate, and yet here you posting that somehow that took you by surprise and now there are many more units to replace, suggesting I somehow lied. You have known about the rate of case, LCD and PCB failure for as long as you have been in charge with constant emails and reminders from me about just how bad the situation is/was.

There were no posts by ED stating returns taking him by surprise, what are you talking about here?

As far as I know ED never had problems with returns, sometimes people would have to wait several weeks for repairs because ED was too busy handle them, but now with Askarus the repairs are fast and there is no backlog AFAIK.

As I read Craigix reply, he informed ED at some point that X orders were outstanding. If Craigix then had Y faulty pandoras returned to him after that point in time, the queue would have grown to size X + Y. Craigix is now saying that ED shouldn't be surprised that the queue grew by Y since he was informed that a lot of customer's were returning faulty Pandoras.

 

[mmKALLL]

A very.. Heated conversation has been here, it seems.

I for one believe that this is a good chance for both unsatisfied customers and the masterminds, so to say, to broaden their point of view.

It's very understandable for the people who have probably invested the most time and money out of us all to feel the greatest dissatisfaction. From my neutral viewpoint, it seems that both of you have said false and true things alike. (The most confusing one for me is how ED claims to be friendly and makes several offensive claims in the same post) Or perhaps, more likely than outright lying about facts is that you both view the things you present as true, even though they are clearly perceived differently by the other person. I suppose that can happen, when two people with differing views on same subjects engage in a heated conversation. Personally I would advice against doing such conversation, apologising from the other party - even with spite - and then choose a specific time to settle any unsettled feelings through a private chat - professionally and without offensive comments, where possible.

That said, I have deep respect for the both of you for investing so much from your personal lives to this project, even though most customers don't probably give even a fleeting thought to that. Every time I've read posts complaining about long delivery and/or loss of money and time, I've felt that it is almost insulting towards the people who have had the most hardships with the project. Even when a reply has come and the issue is settled, it breaks out a month or so later. I suppose it just goes on to show how selfish people are - of course, it's fairly understandable at the same time, taking into account what has been promised and what has been delivered, but the aforementioned holds true regardless.

However, as for the comments regarding out-of-thin-air funding (, written by others than ED or Craig) - I'd say that there are more pressing matters in the world than a few delivered computers.   (disclaimer: I do not in any way try to underestimate the amount of frustration or personal impact the potential chance of said potentially undelivered computers would make, though)

 

[notaz]

There were no posts by ED stating returns taking him by surprise, what are you talking about here?

As far as I know ED never had problems with returns, sometimes people would have to wait several weeks for repairs because ED was too busy handle them, but now with Askarus the repairs are fast and there is no backlog AFAIK.

 As I read Craigix reply, he informed ED at some point that X orders were outstanding. If Craigix then had Y faulty pandoras returned to him after that point in time, the queue would have grown to size X + Y. Craigix is now saying that ED shouldn't be surprised that the queue grew by Y since he was informed that a lot of customer's were returning faulty Pandoras.

But these fall into repair category that ED has been handling since he took over production and should not go back into preorder queue.

 

[atari_afternoon]

Thank you for having done your best to make your dream come true. There wouldn´t be the best handheld of all time (IMO) otherwise.

It must have been very depressing for you the past months ...

 

[craigix]

Real true facts: Craig lost a metric fuckton of monies and experienced lots of setbacks.. ED takes over the clusterfuck but has had slight success.

So, craig has lost money, and ED is in debt..... booooooooooooourns

Edit: Anybody notice that ED is like a week away from clearing his queue... LET'S CELEBRATE!!

We should celebrate that Ed made his queue a priority over mine? And thus resulted in my customers thinking I'm somehow scamming them? Even though I have no control over the distribution of units?

It does make me sad that, inevitably, when Ed clears his queue the usual shit will come my way, but I've had no control over this for over a year.

So Ed gets himself out the shit but leaves me in it, this is not what we agreed back when he wanted to take this over.

The units should have been distributed evenly, no queue should have been prioritised, I certainly didn't do that when I was building the units.

There were no posts by ED stating returns taking him by surprise, what are you talking about here?


As far as I know ED never had problems with returns, sometimes people would have to wait several weeks for repairs because ED was too busy handle them, but now with Askarus the repairs are fast and there is no backlog AFAIK.

 
As I read Craigix reply, he informed ED at some point that X orders were outstanding. If Craigix then had Y faulty pandoras returned to him after that point in time, the queue would have grown to size X + Y. Craigix is now saying that ED shouldn't be surprised that the queue grew by Y since he was informed that a lot of customer's were returning faulty Pandoras.

But these fall into repair category that ED has been handling since he took over production and should not go back into preorder queue.

Notaz, are you one of Eds investors? I think cards should be on the table if you are.

 

[_wb_]

I think ED did exactly that: for each unit he sent to one of his preorderers, he also sent one unit your way. It's just that your queue was longer to start with.

 

[moxie]

May I cordially and officially remind everybody to keep it civil? Heated arguments, lots of feelings: Good. "He's off his rocker!": Not good. Keep the personal attacks out of it.

 

[rohezal]

We should celebrate that Ed made his queue a priority over mine? And thus resulted in my customers thinking I'm somehow scamming them? Even though I have no control over the distribution of units?

Craig talk to ED not (yet) to the Community about this. For real, phone ED. Or ED phone Craig. Best now or after some rests and thinking.

 

[Linux-SWAT]

In a few posts, we will read that if iCP2 are not yet mass-produced, it's ED's fault.