Jared doesn't realize how annoying he is

We established in the sizzle that I am a sensitive person. That parts not for TV... thats true. So, reading (8 pages) of this has been a little tough for me. I am sure this wont be (anywhere near) the end of it. (Haters love when they see blood)

I would like to remind anyone watching that the show sizzle (which was never shown on television) ((and was never intended to be shown to the public)) contains fictional situations, exaggerated characters and clever editing to portray us in certain ways and make you the viewer, feel certain emotions.

***

Im not saying I am not annoying at times in real life... I am. What I am saying is that, even I, hid my face in shame and turned red the first time I saw how I looked in the sizzle... even I... wanted to reach through the screen and punch myself in the face. "Emissary of Fun"... lol... like I would actually say that.

I am sorry for anyone who is offended by Lionsgates $60,000+ failed show sizzle idea. We had fun making it.

Yes you are right, but it would sell 10.000 more new pinball machines worldwide.
And secondhand prices wil go up.
Everybody wil see pinball is alive.
So Garry Stern pay discovery channal a million and you sell 10.000 more machines.

At least he's trying to make pinball more fun.

This, his KISS Party, Stern's Facebook page.

Ignore him if you like. I appreciate that he is trying, like many people. To make pinball a little bit better.

LTG : )

While I didn't particularly like the sizzle, this seems unnecessarily mean.

I completely agree, I hope he didn't take offense to my critique, I just don't like that style of show and thing it will only bring a negative image on the hobby and bring in scum bags.

Yup, still hate it.

Couldn't agree more. Don't like the theme of the show at all but as pinballwil pointed out, the best thing that could happen to this hobby is an injection of cubic money. You can't sustain this kind of insanity without it.

I'm trying to get good at explaining to CoD/WoW weirdos how satisfying it is to play a 250lb game that ONLY PLAYS ONE GAME, and it isn't easy. Especially the younger ones who have never stepped up to the plate before...

Eh, F them man. Yall tried which more than most can say.

Pay no attention to the haters Jared. You keep doing your thing. If someone is annoyed by your enthusiasm that's their problem.

Jared, grow some thicker skin man. Anyone who puts themselves in the public eye will have to deal with criticisms. Especially when they come off as self serving. How many times has it been mentioned that the "Sizzle" cost $60,000+? We get it. How many times was Hollywood mentioned? No kidding? Wow! Outside of this forum you'd probably be fun to hang with and play some pinball, but in this thread I'm getting an impression of self importance and it's annoying.

I'm sorry.

Jared.....you rock man! love what your doing over at Stern! Public forum equals public feedback. Ive said my thoughts, but you guys have done something that I could have never done

No need for an apology, I'm just one internet stranger with an opinion. Thicker skin. You can't please everybody, no matter how hard you try. But that doesn't mean stop trying, whatever motivates you to be you.

Thats ok. I'll be fine never seeing you again in my life.

Looks awesome
But please for the "+$8500 profit" on the MB
Put -$200 for new cab decals and everything else that Was put into restoring it.......
The prices are going to be insane when people don't understand how much time & money goes into restoring a game and making it minty fresh

I'll admit, after this revelation I'm rethinking my involvement in this show ... But Danni is still keen. She said big flames are no worry to her.

rd.

Are you still upset about that F-14 offer being rejected out to half court? TPF 2014, right? I was witness to that string of conversations, and who acted like what.

Absolutely Honey Boo Boo made millions. Probably not for the cast members, but for the producers.

I have been on three reality tv shows, auditioned for the Apprentice and Real World. I have three friends who are currently on reality tv shows: two ghost ones and another about thrift store hunting. Some can make good money, but most of the contracts are crappy. I was just trying to be supportive. But some reality shows are more or less "real." Others are total fabrications. I think we can guess which is which.

Hey, remember "No good deed goes unpunished" around here.. lol

I think it's important that people not take stuff too personally. Everybody exaggerates the degree of their emotion in an online atmosphere like this. I don't think anybody wishes failure for anybody (or I'd hope not)

EPIC Sizzle!

I enjoyed the concept, and I think it would have been good publicity for pinball if it was on Discovery or another TV network. I don't think it's going to garner much attention with non-pinheads online though. I regularly watch and love Todd Tuckey's [1] videos, but he doesn't have a huge number of subscribers or views. I would imagine most of his viewers are already pinheads and not the general public who are channel surfing or lead-in by a proceeding tv show on the same network.

Jared, I like and appreciate your enthusiasm for pinball. You're a colorful character and you appear to be sincere about your enthusiasm and self-appointed ambassadorship.

Wasn't there a recent PAPA video "podcast" on Youtube where they'd go around the country checking out various pinball communities? I remember watching the first couple of episodes and then it stopped appearing in my main "recommended videos" window. Is this show still going? (Maybe it wasn't PAPA, but I'm pretty sure it featured Mark S. from PAPA?)

[1] https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCyjs8rzlagt8XfWxdPQnVRw

Does someone piss in the Canadian equivalent of your Cornflakes every morning?

You're such a grump.

There's constructive criticism, there's having a difference of opinion, and then there's being just plain rude. Try and think of others feelings when you post people.

Looking like another tread to drain, bye bye!

Yummy

That and a piping hot cup of Tim Horton's coffee would be part of a nutritious breakfast!

I've always wondered, do Canadians call Canadian Bacon... just bacon?

does it matter. Lets say it is 2K and someone buys it ?

I hope all of you Pinballers will be at the Kiss party Sunday. I'm looking forward to hearing about it.

I don't know why everyone keeps saying this looked staged. If I would have known I could have sold the Kiss for 4k, I would have never thrown it away. Damn

Let's be honest, to answer the original question, 90% of the "people" (see what I did with the quotations) on this thread would watch this show. The ones who liked it would watch cause they enjoy it. The ones who didn't like it would watch just to see what happens next.

I've read a lot of stuff in these forums about attracting new people to the hobby, especially young people and women. Just about every girl I know and most young people watch lots of reality TV. What better way to get people interested in pinball?....I'd love to hear a better idea than this from those that are criticizing. A show focusing on the latest pinball designer or how many pop bumpers that are going to be on the next pinball machine coming out will get turned off faster than you can say 'show cancelled'.

Just go take a look at the TNT video's (which I watch and love) and see how many hits they get. There are quite a few that don't even have a thousand hits. Which means that not even a lot of Pinsiders are watching it. Those videos focus a lot on some of the suggestions I read here and nobody is watching except for hardcore arcade game collectors.

All us of except Marc I think.

This thread in a nutshell:

"We aren't douchebags, but we play ones on TV".

I hope that for your sake you can develop a thicker skin if your show ends up on TV...

Agree 100%. This will not help our hobby nor our reputation one bit. In fact, it will have a negative impact. This isn't about enhancing the hobby, it's about enhancing personalities and self interests.

No, what you call Canadian Bacon we call Peameal Bacon. Regular bacon is the same for both of us.

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I thought the editing in the sizzle was good. The content is typical scripted reality show fluff. Would I watch it? Yes! It's about pinball and pinball personalities!

Is it good for the pinball hobby? Probably not. The sizzle's underlying theme is competitive greed. There is very little pinball actually in the show. I'm not in this hobby because I like to flip games... it's because I like to play pinball. Most of the sizzle was about turning a profit. I do not want to be associated with "turning a buck" in my hobby. I also want to be able to afford the hobby.

The personal ridicule for the show's participants is uncalled for in this thread (some of it was sarcastic but others... I'm not so sure). I don't know any of these people personally, but I'm certainly not going to judge them from an edited, staged, scripted made-for-TV sizzle.

I just hope that, if this show ever does get picked up, we can see some real pinball enthusiast content and not typical story lines where the pinball machines can be replaced with custom cars, rare baseball cards, or an attic find of Civil War paraphernalia. Flipping is certainly a chapter but it should not be the entire book.

Wait, is this because Marc has a scheduling conflict, or because he's the Pinball equivalent of Genghis Kahn, and is therefore no fun at parties??!!

Am I reading too much in to this? I sort of got swept up in the drama.

The Sizzle looked as good or better than most of what is already on television. They all do the same thing... They invent drama. They stage false peril. It's a tried a true formula. People watch it.

If they'll watch guys build fish tanks, and cakes, they'd certainly watch people hunt for, and restore pins.

Anything that promotes interest in pinball is a good thing in my books. I'd get tired of staged abandoned pin discoveries, but there's enough actual drama in pinball to make a great show.

Good luck to all involved.

The production quality was good. The dancing was kind of scary. Please, no more dancing.

I'd like to see more of a Bob Ross type of show to introduce people to pinball. "Pinball with Phoebe!", or that sort of thing.

I don't watch TV, so my opinion isn't worth much. But, shows like this are one reason I don't watch TV. Too many great movies on Netflix, and my screen time is limited by how many hours I put into restoring games.

I think you guys are missing the big picture here and are looking too much into the content of this one sizzle reel.

I can tell you first hand that the original bit with me & Earnie was going to be a segment of us starting to do a playfield swap out on my Marilyn Taxi Pinball. I was hoping to talk briefly about how there are two variations of this game and how it was later changed to Lola for legal reasons. However 24 hours before we shot the scene our executive producer decided on the idea of us dumpster diving. Why not? It's fun and more exciting pulling a gem out of a dumpster than just doing a blah swap out. Besides that Ed was already doing a bit on cabinet restoration on Monster Bash. Was it setup, yes. But is it unheard of to find a pinball in a dumpster? No. You have to understand the purpose of the sizzle was not designed to appease the pinball community, but to draw interest from network execs. Thus all of in the cast doing different things was essential in trying to build our characters.

Further more as stated in an earlier post by me. This show was not going to be purely transactional. We have ideas for future episodes that involve competitive pinball tournaments, The cast attending pinball shows, game restorations and modding. Yes there will be drama & comic relief mixed in. There has to be, that's what makes entertaining television.

So odd that the pinball community is on the brink of having its first nationally televised show on TV and instead of being behind it, yall are against it. Oh well, watch if you want. I'm sure you ALL will. I truly don't believe those that say they won't.

Step outside for a second and ask yourself if you'd want to hang out with any of the "personalities" presented in that reel. I wouldn't. And that's the image you want to present to the world as representing pinball hobbyists.

That's the issue people have.

With all due respect...

Do you think Deadliest Catch is about crab fishing? Isn't it often more about people getting their hands crushed, power struggles and bar fights. You think it's made the crab industry better?

Do you think Hell's Kitchen is about cooking? Or more about watching a middle-aged tyrant scream at young people until they cry?

Do you think American Idol is about singing? Or is it more about watching people screw up until one person is left that will be packaged into a product and sold like a commodity by a multi-national media company?

Do you think Storage Wars is about storage auctions? And not, "Let's see these greedy vultures mess with each other in order to make a buck over someone else's financial hardship?"

Or Hardcore Pawn is really about the pawn business, and not "Let's watch this store owner bully a belligerent customer."

Or Ice Road Truckers being about trucking? Instead of, "Let's watch the big rig crash and the hot chick handle a big stick."

Why does anybody think reality tv is about anything more than trainwrecks, sex and money? They are all the same basically. They're not there to really educate you. Almost every one is about either watching people unravel, or seeing them try to make more money than they deserve.

I wonder, would it really be that boring to do more shows about normal stuff? The world may never know.

I think it's a great idea and hope it gets picked up.

As for how it portrays pinball I'd only be concerned if it's in a particularly negative light but some of that is inevitable for the sake of drama. You know, cause there's never any drama in pinball...

Whenever something takes a mainstream leap there's a certain level of misinterpretation. Pawn Stars, King of Kong, etc. Yet positive things can still result.

Just curious, what was the logic for picking KISS? Was it just that it's the most recognizable pin?
I talked to an older relative about pinball recently, and the first thing he said was: "Oh, do you think I could find a KISS?"

I know where they could find one

King of Kong actually isn't a bad comparison. A completely fabricated and edited storyline, but that stortline made it a hit movie and look at the positive exposure that gave Twin Galaxies and video gaming, and Bill Mitchel is a big name now despite being edited as the villain.

Chasing Ghosts which featured all the same people and presented more as a documentary never had the commercial success KoK had.

I wish they would just do a pinball version of "the space invaders - in search of lost time"
https://vimeo.com/50465335

Give it a rest. Go read a book.

Aint that the truth. Slightly over the top. These are good people.

Yes, the contracts for this were effectively selling yourself into slavery for a year. In the OFF CHANCE that the thing went multiple seasons, you might make some bucks...course, they might just kick your ass to the curb and find some other schmuck to sign up for a year with a pipe dream of another season before they're in the money too. The whole idea was that if it took off, the "group" would try and force the hand of the producers, basically say "we're not going along with this contract, it sucks, we want a new one with better pay".

I did the math on it, they basically wanted unlimited access to all aspects of my life and for me to be available to them without any notice at all, did not want to pay my wife for appearing on the show, we didn't want the kids to be on camera, and the producer is such a ditz he couldn't even provide us a valid place to send him the intro video we were requested to record and wasted hours on. Basically, they were asking me to work more than full time, tell my primary job to go screw dogs while I was off shooting ridiculous TV episodes, and all for less pay than I make BEFORE overtime at my current job, which is laughable. Not to mention that I was basically going to be cast as the "dickhead", which no doubt would be AWESOME for future potential jobs, right?

Here's my honest opinion of each of the people involved. I think you'll be able to tell that the producers did not do a fantastic job of taking the strong points of each of these people and making it something immediately interesting to those outside the hobby...

Jared - Going to write the most about Jared, because I frankly have talked to him and been around him more than the other people involved, and that he's far more active on Pinside than anyone else on the list. Regardless of whose "fault" it was, Jared's direct actions and attitudes clashing with "the establishment" early in the hobby that basically destroyed any sense of community we had in Dallas between competition and non-competition players due to the interactions between him and a few other people. The competition players have gotten over the whole damn thing, and we all still hang out and talk and go to league and do things. The non-comp players? It's a miracle if I have seen the vast majority of these people more than twice in the last year. Most of them turned into cave hermits after "The Jared Incident", including the moderators of our local groups. These "casuals" don't hold events, don't plan events, don't bring new people into the hobby, and for all intents and purposes basically DO NOT PARTICIPATE in the community at large anymore. Was -that- good for the hobby? Nope. Could the whole situation have been avoided by two or three people realizing that their actions were fueling this inferno? Yep. Is Jared one of those people? Yep. Jared is a marketing guy, to the BONE. That will never change, and anyone that thinks they can change that behavior at this point is really just a moron on every possible level. He does shit on a ridiculous level, and yeah, it doesn't always go according to plan (truck height.. ) but at least he is doing SOMETHING, which is more than I can say for a lot of people. Love or hate his attitude, it won't really matter in the end. I've gone back and forth on it several times myself. Won't change anything at all what you decide, as he is going to do what he wants to do....which is to frequently be over the top, both in his personal manner and with his events. If you think Jared is much different in person than in his online "persona".....lol....not so much.

Craig - The less I say here the better. We don't get along. At all. He tried to get me in on the show, I was interested enough to shoot the intro footage after talking to him and Marc, it didn't go any further. Craig shows up to league nights, occasionally to other tourney stuff. He's capable of fixing games, doing maintenance and playfield swaps. Will take consignments from "non-hobby" people and fix and sell their games and take a cut. Other than that.... I have him on ignore here and facebook.

Marc - I'm pretty sure for a while Marc was the most evil'est guy in DFW to me, because he bought every damn pin I tried to go after, it seemed like. He offered an honest opinion to me about the show and the proposed contracts after Craig tried to enlist me. Marc buys and sells games, and AFAIK, has a metric SH-TON of projects in storage somewhere that he gradually pulls from, fixes them up, and sells them at TPF and from his company Elevation Games. I'm pretty sure we've come to a mutual understanding that we're both dickheads that don't tend to pull punches, and in my book, I'd rather deal with brutal honesty than a two-faced jack---, so we're all good. The interaction shown between him and Barry is not something that would NOT actually surprise me to see off-camera, but as stated elsewhere, they know each other, and this *is* Texas...

Rusty and Shelley - Seriously, you want to talk about people dedicated to the hobby....you don't even know. They're not real active here, but they are two of the most arcade/pinball dedicated people I have ever known. Their house is a shrine to gaming in a way that pisses me off.....because it's not mine. They are serious socialite/partier type people, which at least in this area is sorely lacking, especially as of the last two years. If you ever get invited to anything they're running, you can pretty much be assured that something awesome is going down and they are 100% invested in the idea of whatever crazy theme it is this time around. Both are incredibly smart. And they are totally bringing the jello shots.

Ed - Frankly, out of this group of people I've probably spent the least amount of time talking to Ed, which is almost ironic considering that he runs TPF, which is just bonkers. I don't know how the hell he finds the time to build a MM, plan and organize the cluster-f that is TPF, buy and sell games, build a Cactus Canyon, and have a full time job and 3 (Is that right?) kids? Good lord. I can barely handle my 2 kids and one league night a week. Not afraid to mince words that I've ever seen, but also is not "in your face" in the way that Jared would be....he knows where his limits are due to his deep association with TPF, and what to keep close to the vest. The show is presenting him as a restorer? Well, okay...yeah, he's done that. He built Medieval from scratch, and like I said, is working on CC. He's more than capable of filling that title in real life.

Steve / FUN! - Fun doesn't have auctions at the store, much less for single machines...what the hell was that? LOL. I've sold a game to FUN, I've never bought a game from them, not directly anyways. I bought a game from TPF, who gets their tourney game NIBs from FUN, so technically my Metallica came from them as the distributor. They have been having some local events for new game launches recently, which has actually attracted a ton of people that don't typically show up for launch party tournaments....to the degree it was actually hard to get a game in. Met a lot of new people last time I was there for one of those. Ultimately, they're a retail business, and they're going to do what they need to do to stay in business. I don't have any beef with what they do as a business, but I share the sentiments with some other posts on this thread....trying to make it look like a non-HEP restored Monster Bash is worth 12k+ at a fake auction that never even happened is just.....ugh....