Quoted from Highclasspinball:It is weird that you claim you have a 8 color printer after I mentioned that we use one... earlier you wrote you have a 5 color cmyk plus white machine....
You felt the urge in your gut so strong, that you actually made the calculation, and felt the need to jump into our Announcement thread and publicly post this? I don't understand what you felt you'd get out of it, or accomplish. Enough already. Swinging dix and bravado don't go over very well on Pinside, as proven by history. You remind me of the way Wayne Gillard used to behave. The veiled threats, the braggadocio, the jabs & goads... People didn't like it. Wayne became persona non grata for a long while back then. He since calmed down, and nobody really bats an eye anymore. But those were the days, I remember them clearly. You're starting to go down that road. In more ways than one. If people could only see the PM's you have sent me on occasion...
You need to relax, do what you do, and just go and build your stuff. That's all everybody wants you to do. We've been doing this 15 years, and you just have to accept we are slowly moving toward your model (except never the robots). But that should be no matter, because we should be working on *different* things (as I have insisted to you over and over) but you seem to want a competition and conflict. A race of some kind. "People have asked me to make this" is your excuse - but you DO have the decision making authority over yourself to NOT duplicate playfields we are showing on our site as In Production. You've done THREE duplications now, coming out in the 11th hour, just as we're nearing middle to late stages. Addams. Joust. Banzai Run.
CPR is eight people working on this stuff, and you seem to think you and a fleet of robots makes us obsolete or something. It's the attitude that radiates, at least to me. That everything you have going on is the best and the greatest way. Well the truth is, not necessarily. I won't get into it here. There are advantages and disadvantages to everything.
If you must know (and anybody reading, sigh) - we always have had an 8-head press from the beginning. But we had it configured CMYK + quad White. Three months ago we changed it to CMYKlmlc + dual White. Happy? Are you going to tell us all again how much you (allegedly) paid for yours? LOL As if you don't think we didn't either... Sheesh.
And this. This blew me away today. Had John Greatwich phone Mike today, seeing if we knew anything. We never got your email "C&D thing", oddly enough. Hmmm. Although, for the record (and everybody reading) - this isn't the first time Mirco has PM'd threats of "suing". Not veiled. Outright. To us. Yes.
Where all this bravado & gusto is calculated to be beneficial or positive for the hobby, I have no idea. I simply don't understand the state of mind. Think about that for a minute. Micro is a VERY smart guy. How he comes to these attitudes and decisions... Jeckyl and Hyde or something... not good.
I have spoken behind the scenes to many people today, and I found out exactly the gist of what John Greatwich was told by Mirco. I realize that a copy (or dictation) of the PM is not allowed. So I hope admins will allow my brief synopsis as it was told to me... these are MY WORDS. Not a PM, or even close to a PM. If this DOES need to be removed, then so be it.
" Hey John this is Mirco. I have been given legal rights by Gary at Stern to make all parts for classic Stern. This includes... all playfield, backglasses and parts. You must stop production immediately. Unless you have a paper from Gary at Stern show me the paper or you will get sued. Don't think that just because you are out of my country and I am in Germany that I can't sue you, think again. Please stop all productions unless you want to get sued" or something to that effect.
THIS IS THE LAST I'M GOING TO COMMENT ON THIS (Hell, this is my Sorcerer thread!):
I personally spoke to Gary Stern a few hours ago.
He WAS contacted by Mirco asking about doing a classic Stern project, and some mild discussion of royalties, how it works, etc. Gary gave him permission to proceed, and future details of paying royalties to Gary and his ex-wife would be put in play. Gary acknowledges that Stern Electronics Inc is defunct, but the IP fell to him and his ex-wife (ex-wife because part of assets in divorce settlement). He realises he hasn't cared nor policed IP for the old Stern Electronics stuff at all. He's got bigger fish to fry. He even recalls our 2005 meeting in his office, when we started - he gave us carte blanche to touch on any of the old Stern games if we wanted... he didn't care. Today in 2019, he does acknowledge that the hobby had significantly grown and changed - and him and his ex-wife ARE looking at exploring their options for setting up some kind of interface with the makers out here. But this is a new thing for them. They are very busy.
Gary invited CPR to email him a list of all current Stern Electronics repro projects we still have interests in, plus any future plans. There is NO EXCLUSIVITY, and he has no problem (he is half the decision, with his ex-wife) seeing the stuff getting made - wherever and whoever does it. But the time is coming where we need to sit down and discuss some royalty on the IP. He chuckled at the Mirco story... even said George Gomez got a call about the same thing today.
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Anyway, time to get back to manufacturing. This is what I get when I have a break before suppertime
This was likely better in another thread, but people can link freely obviously, if they feel the need. This is my thread, so I'm fine staying here.
I'm not going to get into a back-n-forth, with Mirco or anybody, from this point. HE came in here to beak off, and I am doing this one response. I feel like I'm within my rights to do so, without getting into "drama". So there will be no more from me on this. If y'all ask questions on this topic, I'm going to not be able to reply further. I hope that is fair. I don't want this crap anymore than any of you. I don't know why it's happening.
KEVIN
Classic Playfield Reproductions
http://www.classicplayfields.com