I guess we're all very emotional at this very moment, But if you take you're own advise and read some of the posts flaming this group you'd see that it was the way they did it that stunk not the action itself. Ask any 10 pinsiders if they had found out that Fox had definitley told them that there was no license how many of them would sit on the info and form the so called Anon-myass group, then wait four more months while coming here and baiting us everyday. Then watch from a far as the train comes off the track. I know I would have come here shouting it from the roof top and shown the proof.

If you're reading this Mr. X, on behalf of the community I want to say F U very much for your service.

Don't understand the people defending Kevin here, he either sold a product knowing he didn't have the rights too which is scamming people or he initially thought he had the rights but kept selling it and kept taking money without alerting his customers once he knew there was an issue (when he got the c and d letters). Either way he was scamming people by selling something he didn't have permission to sell.

It's hard to retroactively judge the people who knew and waiting to spill the beans as well, who knows what could have happened if they had told everyone with out Fox's permission and Kevin had run off with the money or something else had happened which leaves them on the hook.

Just out of curiosity does anyone here work on manufacturing licensed products and do you ask to see 100% proof before working on something every time?

I don't think it was intended as a scam. But he was in way over his head and it appears was committing fraud to acquire funds.

Even if the license was legit, these were never going to be made. Making a few prototypes to bring to shows is one thing, producing 250 of these out of your basement at that price point is impossible.

I get it...they got their money first, then ....

I never could could imagine how they were going to do that. They couldn't even get the prototype to work fro more than 30 minutes the times I saw it.

Go back and read Skit-B threads for the past year. Lots of reason to be suspicious and do some due diligence. Some did. Most didn't. But there were plenty of warnings. Anyone denying that needs to go back and read. Special arrangement with Paypal my ass. Have you ever heard of such a thing? Disappearing for months. Come on! And those ridiculous answers that sounded like something you would tell a 5 year old to get them to shut up and go to bed. Please don't try to blame others. Withholding info is BS, but strong signs were there.

Please. The preorder thing has effected us all, and not in a good way. It's the reason shit is so insane in general. It's no secret that i've always said preorder is bullshit and when people whine about it when shit goes wrong, over and over and over again. Why should this thread be any different. Preorder screws us all over, not just the one who preordered.

I am a paid in full buyer and not pissed one little bit at the guys that exposed all this and went to fox.
I'm not the tiniest iota upset with them.
In fact, I'm a little grateful that this whole long drug out fiasco has finally come to a conclusion. The only thing left to figure out is if any of us will get some/all of our money back.

I've said before it ALL starts and stops with Kevin.

Working on a set of Madonna style C cup cones, al a 'like a virgin'.

that's exactly what my business example said. To a tee. You need to learn to read. Lying about licensing or lying about manufacturing costs/tooling, is pretty much the same damn thing and happens all the time with new business, when they are trying to get backers. The story wasn't that complicated, my example wasn't that complicated. Pretty straight forward yet, there are many who seem to can't read worth a shit.

How do people overlook this or think this issue is not a big deal?

I only blame Kevin and myself, the warning signs were there but I was blinded with Predator themed pinball goggles and Kevins attempts to put my mind at ease which were not exactly tangible proof of anything happening since the tutorial video came out. I just made a final deal for a Centaur 2 which will happily fill the spot i had for Predator but I do feel decieved and I don't like it one bit. Lets see what happens in "a few short days" then lynch mob.

lynch%20mob.jpg

Not at all the same thing. Not even somewhat related. No.

Damn.

She turned me into a newt.

I'll share a rumor I heard at a recent pinball bash. A Stern employee (not Gary) "allegedly" was involved at least in discussions with some people about false license issues before the shitstorm hit. Back at Chicago Expo. I don't know what to believe anymore but there you have another allegation heard.

BTW....talk to a pinball designer over a beer sometime. They will tell you about how they "share" ideas from each other then apply for patents. Yes, even from the small guys. It's business my friend - war is war.

No, your example was a bad one. If you want to compare it to a new stock, it would be like if somebody said they had the rights to mine a new gold mine with x ounces of gold in it. They go public and sell a bunch of shares in the company and 4 years later people find out they never had the mining rights to the property they said they did.

They would be prosecuted for fraud and go to prison. Whatever money the company had would be split amongst the shareholders and the company dissolved.

From the wordpress page

"Play the extremely good odds that Fox (and others) will simply never find out."

I have to disagree on this point, in fact quite the opposite.

th.jpeg

Paging Martin....
That itself is a big story...a competitor company taking Skit-b down. Fox denies Skit-b the license after he tries to apply for one because they refuse to work with an idiot who tried to pull a fast one on them. This is genius..at least diabolical.

Man what are you talking about.

Skit-B took Skit-B down.

Any other accusation is false.

The time fore Skit-B to apply for a license was before he announced that there would be such a thing as "Predator Pinball". Once he went on about it the "punk rock approach" as he stated to PBN, he knowingly risked everyone's investment. Its a fact.

I need to learn to read? Maybe you need to learn to communicate? Once again.. here is your post

Where in there does it talk about FRAUDULENT ACTIVITY causing them to fail? 'finding out costs are higher than expected' is not fraud. Stupidity is not fraud (tho one could argue negligence and the liability that came come with that depending on your role). 'higher than expected' is not the same thing as DECEPTION and LYING.

Point the finger.. when you should be looking for a mirror. Saying investing in stocks or startups is the same thing as backing a fraud is right up there with your past Top 10 Dumbest things Neo rants about.

Ok has anyone received a direct refund from Kevin in the last 5 hours?

You don't look like a newt.

Don't be so modest.

Wasn't that the girl in Alien??

The actions of the 'anonymous' group don't sound selfish to me at all.

They thought the situation wasn't on the up and up, so they and theirs got out. At the time they got out, their fears probably amounted to conjecture and a sober evaluation of the situation, but not necessarily hard evidence. It's perfectly fine to act on your gut for your own sake. When you start advising others and potentially damaging a company, the burden of proof is higher and the consequences greater. You need absolute certainty.

Even when learning about the license, was there something they missed? Maybe spoke with the wrong person at Fox? It's an extremely damning allegation and not one that I, personally, would have made without being 100% certain.

Had they told you to "get out now!" and you did, what would you be saying if the project went forward successfully? You'd be crying that the "well-meaning idiots robbed me of my chance to own a Predator, and look, they're already being resold for 10k!" Cue the WAHHHHmbulance.

I got out last June because by then I started having strong doubts:

1. Very little communication in the year prior to asking for $3000.
2. No evidence of mfg facility or ability to mfg. (No staff, tools, facility, etc.)
3. Dragging the game to shows where it more often than not wasn't working.
4. Dragging the game to shows to promote it when it was already sold out (why?)
5. Excuses of not having time to reply to email or write status reports but time to take it to shows, build Duckhunt and revamp a website.
6. Later on: Excuses of not having time to reply to email or write status reports but time to design Experts of Dangerous and promote it.

Did I think the project was doomed then? Yeah, pretty much. I told my local pinball friends as such. Did I post on pinside shouting to the rooftops? Hell no. I had no smoking gun, and back then, nearly everyone was sunshine and lollipops about this project. I would have been branded a doomsayer who partially caused the project's demise.

TLDR: You got screwed by Kevin, no one else.

Stolen artwork is pretty much par for the course here. The vast majority of alternate translites made blatantly rip off others work, and most don't care

dear lord...

Nice one! I see what you did there.

That's not even remotely a story, let alone a big one. Kevin IS an idiot who tried to pull a fast one on them!!!! Stern works with licensors all the time, including Fox (Simpsons, Family Guy, Avatar, 24). If they spoke with their contacts and found out whether Kevin had the license or not...that is not "taking Skit-B down"...it's finding out information! STOP BLAMING EVERYONE ELSE! Kevin is a f%$king idiot when it comes to making a licensed product. He did it WRONG. He never had the right to do it, there was no guarantee Fox would have EVER granted him the license. Look at Jpop with Kiss. Kiss said no. Probably because Jpop had zero record of manufacturing pinball machines. Fox would have never licensed anything to a guy in the middle of nowhere with no legit business or manufacturing ability. Kevin was f%$ked from Day 1. No one involved in finding out the truth is "responsible" for ANYTHING in this clusterfuck.

I think you guys blaming the anonymous group just don't grasp how making a licensed product like a pinball machine works at all. You just can't start making a product THEN try to get the license. Even though Dutch made some mistakes with Lebowski - they HAD the license before going public. They almost got in trouble by showing the game before approvals were made....but they legitimately had the license and a working relationship with Universal. Kevin never had ANYTHING.

Welcome back Rarehero..enjoyed your write up on the emails. Again it was the way it went down that was wrong in a big way. Not the action.

Fully understand.

Then it seems he did a hell of a lot of work for a "scam". Perhaps the only "scam" he was running was trying to fly under the fox radar. But, he messed up by taking basically forever to finish and produce the games and the crusaders jumped in to save us all. And by save I mean prevent the game from ever being made.

If he refunds everyone then there was no scam and it explicitly proves the crusaders(and kevin taking 4 years lol) ruined the project.

Don't irrationally get your emotions involved people and think I'm defending Kevin. I never bought into his preorder and thought after the 2nd year the development time was ridiculous and would've thought everyone should pull their money till an item was produced.

Hah, you think I'm part of the anonymous group?

Sorry...your insane witch hunt is taking you down the wrong path.

I never had any money in on the game. I was on the list initially - but bowed out when they called me for a deposit. I've just been following the trainwreck on Pinside like everyone else.

No.

No what? No you have no debate to this or what?

I'm looking at this form a factual, non emotional/drama stance.

Does kevin suck the worst so far out of all botiques? Yes, of course. He made a neat, unfinished prototype and went around the country. Would he have ever produced the game? Probably not. Did he intend to take everyone's money and not produce? Doubt it. I bet he didn't realize what it takes. Just like Jpop's game. That's not happening either.

nope, you don't understand at all...

Sorry, but this mad me laugh. I needed a laugh. Back to storming the castle.....

I know who that employee is. And he's maintained that for ages, long before Kevin took down the website and everyone got suspicious. If he wanted to sabotage things he could have done it a long time ago.

So let's not try and turn this into corporate espionage or anything.

So you're saying kevin started this entire thing to be a scam? That's the counter to my only point I'm making. If so, that really sucks of him

Nice suggestion but you forgot your Journalism 101 and buried the lead. Here's your headline:
Fox denies Skit-b the license after he tries to apply for one because they refuse to work with an idiot who tried to pull a fast one on them.

Or better yet:
Fox sues idiot who tried to pull a fast one on them.

The rest of this stuff about the motives of anonymous sources is just background noise so long as what they were saying was true (which it apparently was). Might be an interesting side-note to this story some day in the future when the real issues are resolved (like where's the money and how will the buyers be getting it back), but that day doesn't seem too close at the moment.

I work for Warner Bros. and trust me...they care. In fact I know they have sent letters to alternate translite makers. Disney too.

I believe a trust is safer. Check with your local attorney specializing in elder law. Lots of protections to having everything in a trust. Technically you own nothing...the trust does (or so I am told). We are in the process of setting ours up.

The scam was he started selling a licensed game, WITHOUT A LICENSE. There is no way these two things are congruent with the intent not to scam.

The scam continued when he decided to take in money after he received a C&D letter for selling a product with content which required a license that he did not posses.

a C&D letter means exactly that. CEASE! He did not. The law will not be as friendly as you seem to be.

see below...

the scam started day 1, as tamoore points out... no license, collect money...

the hole got dug deeper when he did not comply with the c&d...

whether or not he refunds every dime has zero bearing on the above...

With all do respect, did you enjoy "The Decision" televised by Lebron James? At least he had the balls to do it himself. It's not that they found out - its how they chose to communicate it. Worked with FOX lawyers, sent notes to PBN, sent different notes to different pinsiders, heckled Whysnow in many of the notes gloating. Really? Really? Greg, come on.

Yes, Kevin is the only one to blame and should be primary focus until money is returned. But I'll say it again, the ethics in this pinball community need questioning. Serious questioning.

Ok, so I get that. Again, that doesn't mean he wasn't going to produce the games and ship.

He would obviously be sued by Fox at that point, but still not a scam perse to the end user.

We haven't ruled out that Kevin is literally that dumb/ignorant to ignore and continue to produce lol/

I get what you are saying, and do agree to a point, but Im just saying maybe he really did have the anticipation of thinking Fox would simply let this go? Obviously an ignorant stance of his if he took that, but not unlikely.

I honestly dont blame any manufacturer doing things legitimately for being disgusted by guys like Kevin. It's not "sabotage" when you point out someone is blatantly stealing someone else's IP. Worse, it's impacting business of those doing things legitimately.

To add to it, I 've received two cease letters in my life. Both from Fox for hosting simpsons and some other audio files for a .wav sound bite site I had years and years ago. I ignored them both. Then got another more threatening letter. Ignored again and never heard from them again.