DJ Models Announcement 01/05/19

[Ravenser]

there are some issues raised by all this that are worth considering, but don't necessarily relate to the future of DJ Models and cash sunk into crowd funding.

 

1. We are moving into an era of 3D printing - and that is driven off a CAD file. In the case of 3D printed models there is no tooling - only the CAD file. How does the concept of registering your CAD file as a registered design sit with 3D printing? Perhaps quite well. How does this relate to a) Shapeways business model and b] small businesses selling ranges of 3D printed models....

 

Can a registered CAD design for 3D printing obstruct a RTR project or a kit???

 

2. The potential implications of this episode for other parties (not DJ Models) 

 

Given that designs have been registered for models which are not being made or sold by DJM - but are being sold through leading retailers:

 

Are there any risks that some of the models for which DJ M has registered designs could cease to be available to the hobby as a result of all this? I would be a little surprised if there was another run of the 1361 , but another batch of O2s somewhere down the line might have been natural. The 14xx is a model that Hattons must have hoped would be a staple product for years to come. Is there any real risk that availability of this - or even the D600s - could be curtailed?

 

Could we see small stockists being "warned off" stocking certain products in future because someone had registered a design and claimed IP in them? The smaller the company the more effective legal threats might be. (That isn't confined to this case - it's a general question - this could be an issue we face again with other parties involved. There was a DCC decoder sourced from the Far East by a UK party that TCS claimed was a knock-off of one of theirs)

 

Is there a risk here to the whole developing "retailer/commissioner" business model that Kernow, Hattons and Rails have been developing? Is there any risk that small model developers could be blocked out of the game by aggressive legal moves against their projects - resulting in the loss of other future projects of their own, which had no relation to the dispute

 

3. What else is DJ Models going to claim as its design and what implications will that have??

 

 

 

Edited May 2, 2019 by Ravenser

[Ely_South]

28 minutes ago, 37505bstp said:

He is the only trader I deal with that cannot send emails to my address, they don't just bounce back, apparently my service refuses to accept them, I pointed out that his business is the only one of several that appears to have this issue with a BT address and that it was peculiar that the only emails I did receive were the invoices for the deposit.

 

I’m in the same position regarding his emails not being received. For some time, I have strongly suspected that this is due to Dave’s use of a hotmail mailbox to run his business from. Hotmail is a free personal webmail service & is not supposed to be used for sending to mailing lists. Many ISPs will reject mail that appears to have been sent in this manner, as there’s a high likelihood of it being spam.

 

A proper business mailbox would cost him just a few quid each month, but despite owning the DJM domain name, he seems to only use that domain for email receipt (presumably via a mail forwarder).

 

It’s been said before; he’s a talented designer; in severe need of help in running a business. I suspect it’s a bit late now.

[imt]

34 minutes ago, 37505bstp said:

I have considered dropping a line to Trading Standards to see what they think in general as the way this is progressing......

 

 

I think you need to be very clear about what you signed up to if you are to take this course.  You need to document what you were told, what promises were made (express or implied), what milestones were agreed (published), what the reporting process was to be, how it was to be accounted for and what the actual performance has been.

 

Before you use any accusatory words you do need to be clear what it was that the money was agreed to be spent on and how it was intended to be disbursed and accounted for.  There seem to be suggestions of travel expenses and advertising to name but 2 items which I would perhaps question.  I note the VAT implication - but you would need sound tax advice on what the payment could be seen to have been intended for (professional services? it wasn't for a physical item) and when any tax liability would have/should have arisen.

 

Certainly the fact that it has been spent (all or in part) does I believe require more detailed explanation than "leaves a very large problem in the fact that your crowdfunded monies have been spent on the models development in line with the crowdfunding principal [sic]".

Edited May 2, 2019 by imt

[jjb1970]

39 minutes ago, adb968008 said:

Don’t forget that some of us received emails, posts etc of the Chinese factories claims and their desired outcomes.

Though for obvious reasons the content isn’t something that is recommended to be shared.

Its best to take it on merit...

 

Earlier in the post it was suggested you can recognise a Bachmann from a Hornby... it’s more than that... can you recognise specific factories... I have Proto 2000 locos running with identical class 50 spares, useful as proto 2000 spares are hard come by and Athearn spares in the UK are hard fought.

 

But When I look at this parts box... which is a Dapols and which is Kernows ?

Or the packaging...

In my mind, I could be wrong, but the DJ 71, Dapol 52, 22, 73 and Kernow D600 seem to be from the same factory, based on more than the box. Whilst Dave cries fowl about customers going direct to China, you have to remember where DJ worked before himself. Someone leaked the Chinese supplier genie out of the bottle that allowed UK commissioners to go direct ?

 

indeed they aren’t secret... I can list many off the top of my head.. SKmode, Shinedew, Shenzhen Mould, Regalway, Nanjing Artko, Rolland Industrial, Hobbyriver tech, even parts companies like Dakunla  (wheels),  plus the likes of Kader, Piko, Oxford and Rapido... and I’m not a commissioner... to think you can’t find a manufacturer on the Internet in 2019 is a bit naive, they all speak English, have websites and their staff are on linked in... indeed two years back an engineer in China (3rd level from my profile) had CAD pictures of a UK outline model on his LinkedIn page, which kind of told me what was coming down the pipeline for that manufacturer.

 

I think it is like the elephant in the room to question why the companies that entered into agreements to use DJM to manage their projects all walked away. The companies concerned are all professional enough not to hang out washing in public, but something seems to have changed between them entering into an agreement and then cancelling it.

 

Part of it may well be that if you can go direct to a factory then why use an intermediary, but I am not sure that is the whole story. Businesses use outside contractors to provide services they could do themselves all the time, for a variety of reasons. In my own working life I've bought in lot's of services on behalf of employers I could have delivered using internal resource because those internal resources could deliver more value doing other things. Hattons and Kernow have successful shops and mail order/e-commerce operations to run, the Revolution guys are doing this as a secondary interest, I don't know about the Irish Rail guys. If you have other things to do then even if you could go straight to a factory there is a strong case for using a specialist service provider to manage projects, liaise with the factory, look after quality assurance and all the 101 things that need to be done and which are probably not the most riveting or interesting jobs.

 

Something which is striking is just how much more quickly the projects of those suppliers are reaching maturity since parting ways with DJM, some of the Kernow projects such as the D6xx and Bulleid diesel had basically been written off by many for lack of progress when they decided to take thing in house, then suddenly things started happening.

 

At the end of the day it is frankly none of our business what happens B2B as long as we get what we've paid for rom whichever retailer we order from, but it is nevertheless striking how these relationships which started so full of goodwill and optimism didn't seem to last very long.

[JSpencer]

Ok his clarification is that it is mainly to prevent someone else using his tools to sell further models made from them in the UK.  Fair enough, though I don,t think it was something magazines and end customers needed to know.

 

Yesterday's thoughts (it seems) about possibly avoiding duplication etc are just his thoughts (oooffff). I don,t think any manufacturer in their right mind are going to another makes CAD work as a basis for a new model. However scaling down a prototype is bound to lead to both models being 98% similar.

The only real hope to avoid duplication is to get stuff out quickly! It also helps to satisfy customers.

[Tic-toc]

22 hours ago, LaGrange said:

This is someones intellectual property

So, according to you, Dave thinks of himself as a psychopathic, genersidal, lunatic, who should, really by now, be erased from history as someone who said "I don't need an excuse to kill, but I kill and an excuse is made up"!!!!

I've got to pull you up on this, because Che Guevara is not 'an icon', but a murderer.

Very bad, and backwards, taste, I'm afraid. After all, we're in the 21st century now.

 

I know, nothing to do with DJ Models (but, then again, neither is Che), but I thought that this issue needed to be brought up.

[57xx]

16 minutes ago, Tic-toc said:

So, according to you, Dave thinks of himself as a psychopathic, genersidal, lunatic, who should, really by now, be erased from history as someone who said "I don't need an excuse to kill, but I kill and an excuse is made up"!!!!

I've got to pull you up on this, because Che Guevara is not 'an icon', but a murderer.

Very bad, and backwards, taste, I'm afraid. After all, we're in the 21st century now.

 

Woosh...

[Rob F]

2 hours ago, Markwj said:

He is just protecting his own models and mounds which is fine. 

I am always very fastidious about protecting my mounds. 

[m0rris]

At the end of the day, a common issue with model railway firms is cashflow... Whilst crowdfunding is supposed to be a new approach, turning models into money is an massive problem when you have sunk £250k into a project and years later it isn't paying for itself. It is something we have seen elsewhere and is likely to be a major cause for the slow (but tangible) progress on other firms such as Dapol's projects (many in number but slow in progress until they stopped announcing new ones!). Ultimately, few of Dave's projects have got close to tooling instead being stuck at the comparatively cheap CAD stage and whilst money has trickled, peacemeal on a variety of projects that haven't reached the thresholds. If he can't get a shark to market yet, what can he actually provide?

 

Having my own experience of commissioning models, it is very stressful and I am not doing it for my primary income. I don't envy anyone who does it for a day job, especially with the complicated logisitics, but there has to be a better way than this...

Edited May 2, 2019 by m0rris

[Clive Mortimore]

I notice in yesterday's announcement DJM are not doing a class 306, despite my reliable insider information. Well that is the last time I listen to Su Lin at the Peking Cantonese Chinese Restaurant,  you know the waitress with the pretty smile and the bottom that wiggles nicely. Well she told me that her cousin's husband's brother works in a toy factory and they are going to be making class 306 trains.

 

 

She might have said a different company come to think of it....roll on the Bachy or Hornby announcements.  

[miles73128]

31 minutes ago, Tic-toc said:

So, according to you, Dave thinks of himself as a psychopathic, genersidal, lunatic, who should, really by now, be erased from history as someone who said "I don't need an excuse to kill, but I kill and an excuse is made up"!!!!

I've got to pull you up on this, because Che Guevara is not 'an icon', but a murderer.

Very bad, and backwards, taste, I'm afraid. After all, we're in the 21st century now.

 

I know, nothing to do with DJ Models (but, then again, neither is Che), but I thought that this issue needed to be brought up.

To describe Che Guevara as a “murderer” is a gross missrepentation. He was much more than that. The historical context of Cuban history and it’s exploitation by the USA (prior to the revolution) need to be considered.

Time magazine named him one of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century. 

 

[Steamport Southport]

34 minutes ago, Tic-toc said:

So, according to you, Dave thinks of himself as a psychopathic, genersidal, lunatic, who should, really by now, be erased from history as someone who said "I don't need an excuse to kill, but I kill and an excuse is made up"!!!!

I've got to pull you up on this, because Che Guevara is not 'an icon', but a murderer.

Very bad, and backwards, taste, I'm afraid. After all, we're in the 21st century now.

 

I know, nothing to do with DJ Models (but, then again, neither is Che), but I thought that this issue needed to be brought up.

 

I think the original poster was with Jeremy Corbyn's name...

 

In that he thinks he's a great socialist hero of the left rather than being seen as an old man still playing student politics.

 

Not a political comment. I just want to put it into context.

 

 

Jason

[adb968008]

As we reach 25 pages, the last half page of posts suggest the fire is at last starting to dampen.

 

But the naked flame still burns.

[The Ghost of IKB]

1 hour ago, Clive Mortimore said:

I notice in yesterday's announcement DJM are not doing a class 306, despite my reliable insider information. Well that is the last time I listen to Su Lin at the Peking Cantonese Chinese Restaurant,  you know the waitress with the pretty smile and the bottom that wiggles nicely. Well she told me that her cousin's husband's brother works in a toy factory and they are going to be making class 306 trains.

 

 

She might have said a different company come to think of it....roll on the Bachy or Hornby announcements.  

I see the mistake you've made. Number 306 does not have anything to do with the toy train you are thinking of, it is in fact a reference number for "set meal number  2  (min 4 person), sweet sold separately."

[wombatofludham]

Apart from my earlier tongue in cheek comment I have largely been a passive, interested observer of this thread so far.  There's been a lot of pitchfork waving and torch waving towards Dave Jones, some of which understandably is generated from concerns over crowdfunding sums put his way and which seem to be generating anguish as to their relative safety due to glacial progress and patchy communication, and some of which seem to be borne of other, more personal gripes.  As someone who hasn't got into crowdfunding any of his projects (mainly because nothing was of interest to me) and having not bought anything of his catalogue of currently released models (see earlier comment) I nevertheless remain concerned over the furore this has generated.

 

I don't fear for the future of RTR in the UK, it's clear that the initial response to his Alan Partridge-esque "big announcement" was misconceived.  However, I am concerned for the impact this will have on other companies using Crowdfunding or pre-ordering as a way of bringing forward more esoteric, small market items.  UK modellers trust in crowdfunding was brittle to begin with.  Whilst Revolution managed to deliver an amazing product, building trust with a slick, professional approach which has given them kudos and built a good relationship with the UK market, and proving the concept can work if professionally managed, what is happening with DJM is potentially going to sour the potential for any other new entrants looking to crowdfunding to bring forward models.  Irrespective of the "meltdown memo" on IP rights, Dave has lost a huge amount of goodwill amongst many modellers and as a detached, non-involved observer I would probably feel wary of getting involved in any crowdfunding proposals from not just DJM but any new sole trader wanting to kickstart a project.  Even if they were proposing my beloved AM10 or Class 323 emus.

I share the concerns raised by others as to whether this is indicative of a deeper problem for Mr Jones.  I feel he has tried to grow the company's range of models at too fast a rate, taking on commissions with no doubt good intentions and as a way of providing income to his fledgling company but with mixed results.  I have no doubt his heart is in the right place, and we model railway enthusiasts are notoriously quick to judge, fickle and often completely oblivious to reality, but that doesn't detract from the dispiriting lack of confidence this rush to mark out a place in the UK market has created with slipped deadlines and poor communication.  I can't help thinking, based on personal experience, if all this pressure is having an impact on Mr Jones' health.  I know how easy it is to over promise and under perform and the devastating consequences that can have personally.  Perhaps instead of making things even worse for his rapidly imploding reputation by publicly announcing something that really should have been an internal business decision, he should try and make space for some professional project management and communication experience to share the workload and double down on delivery and communications with crowdfunders.  Rebuilding confidence in his company, and the crowdfunding model should be a higher priority than washing dirty linen in public and getting in help to share the pressure would be a good first step.

 

It all seems rather sad, un-necessary and suggests deeper issues which will need tackling in the short and medium term.  

[blueeighties]

This bloke has lost the plot. He seems happy to put all of his time and effort into everything other than producing announced models. 

[Sir TophamHatt]

 

On 01 May 2019 at 18:29, sorabain said:

 

On 01 May 2019 at 18:29, sorabain said:

I was going to follow through with my crowdfunding on a few 92s out of a feeling of obligation.

 

I'm now out (consider the deposits a loss and lesson learned)

 

 

This is what I don't get about this style of "crowd funding".

 

It's rare, but through Kickstarter you can get a refund if you decide you don't want the product, even after you've been charged.

Are people seriously just giving money away for free with very little protection?

 

 

 

If you paid by credit card, I'd section 75 the payment through genuine concerns the product won't be as promised (due to the competition) and concern over mis-use of funds (IE, has he used your money to fund this IP venture?  Can he prove he hasn't?).

 

 

Edited May 3, 2019 by Sir TophamHatt

[Sir TophamHatt]

Sorry to go a little OT - could someone point me in the direction (or PM, or just reply) a little more about the tooling section?

 

I don't understand how you can own tooling but not be able to produce anything else from it?

If it were me, I'd be looking to ship that tooling (assuming it's a half sensible size) to my house.

[blueeighties]

"When i posted my release yesterday, little did i realisethe reaction it would cause."

 

Yeah right .

[Markwj]

6 minutes ago, blueeighties said:

"When i posted my release yesterday, little did i realisethe reaction it would cause."

 

Yeah right .

Surely it should read 'when I posted my poorly worded, inflammatory and totally bonkers diatribe yesterday, little did I realise how much I would damage my own business and the reaction it would cause'.

[pheaton]

18 minutes ago, Sir TophamHatt said:

Sorry to go a little OT - could someone point me in the direction (or PM, or just reply) a little more about the tooling section?

 

I don't understand how you can own tooling but not be able to produce anything else from it?

If it were me, I'd be looking to ship that tooling (assuming it's a half sensible size) to my house.

Once again you only have one side of the story.... With no way of confirming it.... Strange how none of the other start up companies revolution et all have no issues..... With rogue Chinese factories, its not there run by triads..... There was and never has been a reflection of a 250k tooling in the accounts.....

Edited May 3, 2019 by pheaton

[Markwj]

To be fair the other companies may have issues but choose not to air their dirty laundry in public and blame all and sundry.

[pheaton]

Well they must be pretty simple issues as ive yet to see major delay in their products.... 

Edited May 3, 2019 by pheaton

[jonhall]

9 hours ago, m0rris said:

 It is something we have seen elsewhere and is likely to be a major cause for the slow (but tangible) progress on other firms such as Dapol's projects (many in number but slow in progress until they stopped announcing new ones!). ..

 

And if you recall the improbable rate of Dapol announcements, with limited progress was at a time  when Dave Jones worked for Dapol, and the cessation of announcements came shortly after Dave left - Surely not a co-incidence? 

 

Jon 

[LaGrange]

9 hours ago, Steamport Southport said:

 

I think the original poster was with Jeremy Corbyn's name...

 

 

The one I altered had Russell Brand originally