Trying to find a fair solution

[ekianjo]

Your the one wanting to give the pre-order people nothing. Don't you think this would be a better idea than nothing or do you not see that??

First, I never said "give them nothing". Read my posts again. I said that their money is gone, and they have to live with it. They can't expect to get anything for free at this stage.

No amount of complaining will change that. And if they are not happy about that, they better share some of their dissatisfaction with Craig who is doing nothing at all to fix things and not ED who is at least trying to provide some options. 

 

[Trip]

Your the one wanting to give the pre-order people nothing. Don't you think this would be a better idea than nothing or do you not see that??

First, I never said "give them nothing". Read my posts again. I said that their money is gone, and they have to live with it. They can't expect to get anything for free at this stage.

No amount of complaining will change that. And if they are not happy about that, they better share some of their dissatisfaction with Craig who is doing nothing at all to fix things and not ED who is at least trying to provide some options. 

You really don't get it do you? They don't expect to get anything for free, just what they are owed.

The original deal for the pre-orders was simple..

The pre-order money will help bring the Pandora to market and the people that pre-order will get a first edition Pandora in return.

The devs have yet to keep their side of the bargain.

You can throw any excuses you want as to why but it doesn't change the fact that the pre-orders are still owed, not expecting anything for free.

 

[ekianjo]

You can throw any excuses you want as to why but it doesn't change the fact that the pre-orders are still owed, not expecting anything for free.

 

Then I can throw the same thing back to you :

"You really dont get it, do you? Pandora LTd (Craig) owes the Pandoras to the existing pre-orders. Dragonbox (ED) owes nothing to Craig's pre-orders."

Seriously, have you been following the fact that there are two different companies? 

 

[Trip]

You can throw any excuses you want as to why but it doesn't change the fact that the pre-orders are still owed, not expecting anything for free.

 

Then I can throw the same thing back to you :

"You really dont get it, do you? Pandora LTd (Craig) owes the Pandoras to the existing pre-orders. Dragonbox (ED) owes nothing to Craig's pre-orders."

Seriously, have you been following the fact that there are two different companies? 

And as it has already been stated on this thread; the pre-orders were all collected and directed from one page and people didn't get to choose who they ordered from. Most people didn't even realise that there were more than one company. All the devs were responsible for getting the Pre-orders out, not just the ones that got directed to them.

Without all the pre-orders there wouldn't have been any business for any of them.

It's funny how all the companies were putting up a united front until things started to go wrong :rolleyes:

 

[_jr_]

This is becoming ridiculous. Are you really hinting at having legal grounds to sue ED?


Are you sure you are not Craig?

 

[Trip]

This is becoming ridiculous. Are you really hinting at having legal grounds to sue ED?


Are you sure you are not Craig?

I've never said anything about suing ED. I'm just saying that the pre-orders are owed and not asking for free stuff.

 

[ekianjo]

All the devs were responsible for getting the Pre-orders out, not just the ones that got directed to them. Without all the pre-orders there wouldn't have been any business for any of them.

It's funny you keep changing your story in every post. In your previous post you said the pre-orders are still owed, now you are saying that it does not matter which company you ordered from and that kind of BS. Of course it matters, since there is no legal ground to ask something to a company where you did not place an order in the first place.  

Net, let me cut the crap out for you : whether you LIKE IT OR NOT, whether you CHOSE IT OR NOT, you ARE, ON THE PAPER, a Craig pre-order, you need to contact Craig if you are not happy with what ED is trying to do to help you. TECHNICALLY ED does not OWE anything to any of your guys. He is doing this out of pure kindness and generosity.

Good luck getting in touch with Craig. He does not seem to answer, refund, or do anything at all these days. 

I've never said anything about suing ED. I'm just saying that the pre-orders are owed and not asking for free stuff.

That line does not mean anything anyway. Then ask for refund. But since your money is gone, who's going to refund you ?

Stop dreaming, it's time for a reality check. 

 

[elwing]

and even if ED got nothing legally to force him to help us I can only regret ONCE more craig incompetance to have "sold" the right to produce the pandora for too low... I still have problem to see how ED could make money of pandora when the "development" costs have not being fully paid yet, but that's just craig incompetance ocne more...

 

[EvilDragon]

I'm not sure why everyone says that it wasn't clear (and still isn't) that it's two different companies.
From the very beginning I ONLY allowed ordering from me from the GP2X Shop, which always had a company in Germany in the legal information and was NEVER directly on the OpenPandora website (only linked).
It's the same now: When you choose 'Order' from the website, you have the choice of different distributors, which are linked from there.
If Sony has a link to Amazon to buy their products on the ordering page, does somebody think Sony and Amazon are the same company?
I've always kept the shop distincted from the Pandora, as the shop sells other things as well.
So anyone who ordered from me either ordered from the GP2X Shop or the DragonBox Shop.
I can only imagine that people thought it's the same company when they were in a rush to order and simply don't cared from where or because they knew that Craig and me were working together on it.

 

[EvilDragon]

I've never said anything about suing ED. I'm just saying that the pre-orders are owed and not asking for free stuff.

Yes and no. They are owed from OpenPandora Ltd., but we're not even talking about OpenPandora Ltd. here.

These are options OpenPandora GmbH is offering to you to try to help. You don't have to take up on this offer, you are welcome to try to get a refund or Pandora from OpenPandora Ltd., if you like, but I don't think much will happen here.

So all I'm trying is to help the ones still interested in getting a Pandora giving them a good price.

For that, I'm basically willing to sell up to 1000 Pandoras for a cheaper price, which means I'm giving away about 100.000 EUR profit.

 

[ekianjo]

Thanks ED for stepping in. Glad you could come and clear that nonsense by yourself.

 

[b_o_b]

I've never said anything about suing ED. I'm just saying that the pre-orders are owed and not asking for free stuff.

Already tried contacting something like the Ombudsman in the UK? Everybody is saying Craig doesn't have any money anymore, but I am not so sure about that. Apparently he could still pay 2 additional employees and he still seems to be selling stuff. 

Until an official bankruptcy Craig is the person to talk to IMO. And when he doesn't want to talk and solve things you should take legal actions. Complaining on this forum is probably more fun and convenient but it will not solve anything.   

 

[WizardStan]

I'm not sure why everyone says that it wasn't clear (and still isn't) that it's two different companies. From the very beginning I ONLY allowed ordering from me from the GP2X Shop, which always had a company in Germany in the legal information and was NEVER directly on the OpenPandora website (only linked).

Just to re-iterated, on day 1 all those years ago when I made my pre-order there were three options and it was made perfectly clear who each one was. I opted for getting it from Craig because UK shipping is cheaper than German shipping, I was honestly worried about language barriers, and Craig was a lot more active than EvilDragon so I felt I could trust him more. If I knew then what I know now, ED would have had one more order on his queue but I selected on the information I had. There may have been some encouragement for North American users to order from Craig (mostly for the shipping cost) but I don't remember being forced to do so.Actually I probably would have ordered from Fatih. His queue was tiny, I'd have gotten a day 1 Pandora within weeks of them shipping.

 

[Rockthesmurf]

I wonder if anyone would be interested in becoming a small scale distributor:

 

ED is saying that when someone updates their order to his queue for 100 (Classic) or 300 (GHz), they can also buy another GHz Pandora for 350 EUR. A new GHz Pandora from his store is 539 EUR. So each upgrade gives the upgrader a POTENTIAL to make 189 EUR (if they brought the extra Pandora and managed to sell it for full retail price).

 

I wondered if something could be struck up where ED would offer distributors the option to buy GHz Pandora's from him for 445 EUR. It would give the distributor the potential to make 94 EUR, and it would also make ED 95 EUR more than he would have got by selling at the 350 EUR price point offered to people moving to his queue. Each unit the distributor shifts is another sale (good), they have the potential to make a little money (good) and the 95 EUR that ED makes could be used towards helping shift Craig's queue (good).

 

I guess, this only works if the cost value of a GHz Pandora is 350 EUR. It also requires some people to be willing to become distributors (comes with risks for sure). Finally, the distributors could end up 'poaching' sales that ED would have otherwise got from his store (why buy from EDs store at full price when the distributors may offer some EUR off).

 

Some fun with random numbers that are probably based on inaccurate figures:

 

15 people become distributors and get 10 units each, total new units sold: 150, total profit for ED (over the 350 ED is offering to users that update their order), 14,250 EUR, giving the ability to offer 300 pre orders a discount of almost 50 EUR to upgrade.

20 people become distributors and get 20 units each, total new units sold: 400, total profit for ED (over the 350 ED is offering to users that update their order), 38,000 EUR, giving the ability to offer 300 pre orders a discount of almost 130 EUR to upgrade.

 

All in all a crazy idea that could never work, probably best ignored entirely! Just trying to see if there is a way to get a few people to take on some risk, boost sales, move things along.

 

[Klumpen]

I know, that many students do not have that much money to buy a top class Pandora, but the CC (especially the ones without WLAN/BT) and Rebirth (which are not nearly sold as well as the Ghz) are so cheap by now,

that I wonder, if a bigger campaign to show and sell them at Universitys/Academys with a big IT-branch would be a good idea.

 

[Grench]

I've never said anything about suing ED. I'm just saying that the pre-orders are owed and not asking for free stuff.

Yes and no. They are owed from OpenPandora Ltd., but we're not even talking about OpenPandora Ltd. here.


These are options OpenPandora GmbH is offering to you to try to help. You don't have to take up on this offer, you are welcome to try to get a refund or Pandora from OpenPandora Ltd., if you like, but I don't think much will happen here.


So all I'm trying is to help the ones still interested in getting a Pandora giving them a good price.


For that, I'm basically willing to sell up to 1000 Pandoras for a cheaper price, which means I'm giving away about 100.000 EUR profit.

You are being far more than generous in that offer.

People in Craig's pre-order queue who are unwilling to take the offer are mad that they lost their money to Craig - and since he isn't listening, you're getting their complaints.  Not your fault.

******

Hey, Craig's queue people!  ED is offering you a gigantic discount and the ability to get a Pandora.  He is trying to do YOU a huge favor.  It is your choice to take the offer or not.  Badgering ED about your failed transaction with Craig is simply bullying.

Sheesh.

 

[Klumpen]

Regarding the poll:

Fair for who?

Not fair for Ed, because he is extremely generous with this,

not fair for Craig, because he is again left out of all the problems and not punished ( ),

fair for the customers - in a way, they get the product at a good price and have got something in their hands to show them,

that they invested in something wonderful that really happened.

It's not so uncommon, that the price of a product is higher at the end than was believed at first.

I say: Take his offer!

 

[Trip]

Your the one wanting to give the pre-order people nothing. Don't you think this would be a better idea than nothing or do you not see that??

First, I never said "give them nothing". Read my posts again. I said that their money is gone, and they have to live with it. They can't expect to get anything for free at this stage.

Actually on the thread here you said..

"Like, how much "baggage" are you willing to carry forward? 

I just hope that all of this will not further negatively impact any potential Pandora successor. (like adding 100 Euros more to the planned price just to further support Craig's customers).

At one point you have to let things go."

How's that not the same as people getting nothing? And your trying to make out that I'm changing my story <_<

At one point the site did redirect people. There was a guy on the forum a while back that said that he was auto directed to Fatihs site for ordering, even though he didn't know who Fatih actually was. He also said that he wasn't complaining as it worked out better in the long run.

I really wish the old original order threads could be found. It would save on loads of pointless arguing

 

[b_o_b]

I really wish the old original order threads could be found. It would save on loads of pointless arguing

Who cares about that. Legally ED is not responsible and still he is doing his best to help customers from another company. You are barking up the wrong tree. 

 

[timwylie]

Two things.  Neither shop is ON the pandora site.  There was a very clear ordering distinction at the beginning, e.g., "if you are in north america, order from here".  However, this was not clear that each store was a different company.  I thought they were simply different store fronts setup for international reasons (currency, shipping, etc.).  If I order from Nintendo, they have a different ordering website in most countries.

Second, the conversation with Trip only demonstrates the problem here.  Is this THE pandora forum?  Yes.  So, if I want to complain about not having a damn pandora after 5 years that I am owed, where should I do that?   He's not complaining about Ed, he's complaining about the situation.  This isn't the Ed's customers pandora forum.  It's for all pandora customers. He doesn't need a bunch of people who have never had to wait and already have a pandora to start jumping down his throat about it.  Why can't we have a preorder only thread to complain?  We all know it's Craig's fault.  We know.  No one thinks Ed should have to lose money.  All we want is a pandora.  Something we paid for at the same time and following the same directions listed on openpandora.org as everyone that has one.  The difference is that we don't have one.  If you're not in that boat, please back off.