DJ Models Announcement 01/05/19

[Ouroborus]

2 hours ago, royaloak said:

Uh it always did, the point I am trying to make (and you appear to be missing) is DToS are still advertising the APT. 

 

Uh, nice try, but as the preceding posts make clear, what is on display on the DToS website is very different to what it was at launch.   The 'advertising the APT' is just a link - it gives no details of the spec or prices, and in fact only even links to the DJM homepage.  It's no different to the various posts here that link to DJM.  Back at launch, the site allowed you to order it from DToS

[classy52]

 

OO gauge BR Class 370 APT

"This OO gauge model, is available to pre-order right now for delivery once the model reaches production around December 2018 / January 2019."...oh dear

[jjb1970]

All this talk about the DJM business plan would seem to be based on a rather large assumption......

 

 

[Daddyman]

2 hours ago, David Stannard said:

So after 44 pages of angst, speculation and vague accusations what has been achieved in this thread  . 

Catharsis. 

[micklner]

2 hours ago, David Stannard said:

So after 44 pages of angst, speculation and vague accusations what has been achieved in this thread  . 

Very simple, avoid Crowd Funding like the plague !!!! 

[Darius43]

11 hours ago, spikey said:

 

Hmmm ... is that better or worse than being a damp squib?

 

I think the squid would prefer to be damp.

 

Darius

[DavidH]

5 hours ago, David Stannard said:

So after 44 pages of angst, speculation and vague accusations what has been achieved in this thread  . 

 

Scales falling from eyes? Maybe with any luck an end to blanket supporting of new projects on the basis of their promoter "being matey" and replaced instead with a careful appraisal of a scheme's, and promoter's, merits*?

 

* Or at least as far as can be concluded from information in the public domain ...

Edited May 10, 2019 by DavidH
adding footnote

[David Stannard]

I have never been a fan of Crowdfunding or Kickstarter projects as by their nature can be rather risky and many of them have ended in failure, that said people should be aware of what they are signing themselves up for before committing themselves to it. They are in some respects a great way for small suppliers to raise capital for projects that most likely would never have seen the light of day, however if they fall flat on their face it leaves a sour taste in a lot of peoples mouths and creates a lot of angst. 

 

 I do agree that Mr Jones did make somewhat a **** of himself with the initial post and has to a fair degree brought this upon himself, however the general response akin to an online lynch mob hasn't helped the situation, if people were worried about certain projects being doomed to failure the responses here have certainly helped exacerbate the situation. The speculation, thin accusations and assumptions put out by many have probably destroyed the faith in any future projects using Crowdfunding as a source to raise capital, as I mentioned before if you feel unwary about making a financial commitment to this style of project then don't do it.  

 

What I was trying to allude to in my now deleted post several hours before was what are we achieving here with the wave of negative comments being made, I for one would like to see small suppliers thrive as they offer more diversity to the hobby, or should we go back to the "good olde days" where the market was dominated by a small number of players that would keep on pumping out the same tired old models.

Edited May 10, 2019 by AY Mod
Offensive term removed

[Ravenser]

Unfortunately the angst, speculation, and vague accusation is contained - in the first instance - in the  DJM Announcement of an Announcement, Statement , and Clarification.

 

We seem to have established so far :

 

- You can't claim "the shape of a D600 / APT-P" as your intellectual property and you can't then use this to block other people independently making a model of that loco

- Dave Jones has fallen out with a long list of parties with whom he has collaborated, and is now in some kind of dispute with them and has taken some kind of legal step to create leverage

- Most of DJM's registered designs are invalid, and there are questions as to whether the IP in CAD design he  has registered is his own

- DJM have announced and not delivered 31 projects in 3 scales, at least 15 of which are nominally pending, most of them "crowd-funded"

- Dave Jones is very concerned that someone in China or the UK may pirate his designs to produce their "own" model

- In only one case has money been returned to crowd-funders 

- It is not clear how much money DJM has taken from crowd-fundered, or how it is held. The accounting rules mean  some could be off balance sheet. But it could be of the order of £50K to £100K

- The £250K of tooling DJM claim to have lost access to in China do not appear in DJM's accounts

- Nobody knows any terms and conditions for DJM crowd-gfunding projects.

 

This is something in terms of knowledge

 

[Ravenser]

8 minutes ago, David Stannard said:

I have never been a fan of Crowdfunding or Kickstarter projects as by their nature can be rather risky and many of them have ended in failure, that said people should be aware of what they are signing themselves up for before committing themselves to it. They are in some respects a great way for small suppliers to raise capital for projects that most likely would never have seen the light of day, however if they fall flat on their face it leaves a sour taste in a lot of peoples mouths and creates a lot of angst. 

 

 I do agree that Mr Jones did make somewhat a pillock of himself with the initial post and has to a fair degree brought this upon himself, however the general response akin to an online lynch mob hasn't helped the situation, if people were worried about certain projects being doomed to failure the responses here have certainly helped exacerbate the situation. The speculation, thin accusations and assumptions put out by many have probably destroyed the faith in any future projects using Crowdfunding as a source to raise capital, as I mentioned before if you feel unwary about making a financial commitment to this style of project then don't do it.  

 

What I was trying to allude to in my now deleted post several hours before was what are we achieving here with the wave of negative comments being made, I for one would like to see small suppliers thrive as they offer more diversity to the hobby, or should we go back to the "good olde days" where the market was dominated by a small number of players that would keep on pumping out the same tired old models.

 

 

I for one was very concerned about the implicit threat to other parties , and their own projects . There seems - for example - to be an attempt to stake some kind of legal claim over the Kernow D600 project. As someone who has occasionally done business with Kernow and may well do more, I would be concerned by any legal threat to Kernow's activities

 

The Statement was sketching out a future diametrically the opposite of your desire , in which DJM would carve out sole rights to produce certain subjects by means of "blocking entries" of CAD as registered designs at the IPO - and in which other companies wuld be forced to follow suit if they wished to retain rights to produce their models. "Can he do this???" was an obvious and necessary discussion

 

In view of the Little Loco Company situation "how is crowd-funding accounted, and what forms./rights are involved" was a necessary discussion 

[classy52]

9 minutes ago, David Stannard said:

What I was trying to allude to in my now deleted post several hours before was what are we achieving here with the wave of negative comments being made, I for one would like to see small suppliers thrive as they offer more diversity to the hobby, or should we go back to the "good olde days" where the market was dominated by a small number of players that would keep on pumping out the same tired old models.

 

I respectfully disagree with the above post.

I am personally supporting Accurascale, Cavalex, Dapol & Hatton's by purchasing their products because at the end of the day they have and will deliver unlike DJM which means we are not going back to the good olde days of just Hornby & Bachmann and putting up with their same tired old models.

The like's of Accurascale & to a certain point Hatton's are shaking up the market with their detailed models which is great because the big players such as Hornby & Bachmann will need to up their game which is great for all of us, like I said DJM is being left behind and more than likely end up as a casualty for the reasons already discussed here and elsewhere and I personally cannot support DJM in it's current state.

[DavidH]

25 minutes ago, David Stannard said:

The speculation, thin accusations and assumptions put out by many  [...] 

 

... or should we go back to the "good olde days" where the market was dominated by a small number of players that would keep on pumping out the same tired old models.

 

Probably should add "wild over-exaggeration" to your list? 

[DY444]

1 hour ago, David Stannard said:

I have never been a fan of Crowdfunding or Kickstarter projects as by their nature can be rather risky and many of them have ended in failure, that said people should be aware of what they are signing themselves up for before committing themselves to it. They are in some respects a great way for small suppliers to raise capital for projects that most likely would never have seen the light of day, however if they fall flat on their face it leaves a sour taste in a lot of peoples mouths and creates a lot of angst. 

 

 I do agree that Mr Jones did make somewhat a **** of himself with the initial post and has to a fair degree brought this upon himself, however the general response akin to an online lynch mob hasn't helped the situation, if people were worried about certain projects being doomed to failure the responses here have certainly helped exacerbate the situation. The speculation, thin accusations and assumptions put out by many have probably destroyed the faith in any future projects using Crowdfunding as a source to raise capital, as I mentioned before if you feel unwary about making a financial commitment to this style of project then don't do it.  

 

What I was trying to allude to in my now deleted post several hours before was what are we achieving here with the wave of negative comments being made, I for one would like to see small suppliers thrive as they offer more diversity to the hobby, or should we go back to the "good olde days" where the market was dominated by a small number of players that would keep on pumping out the same tired old models.

 

That seems to me to be tantamount to blaming customers for the actions of a business.  As I posted way back in this thread I could not see what the potential upsides of this announcement were perceived as being, particularly given the apparent misleading (and subsequently amended) statements concerning the scope of the protection afforded by the IP registrations in question.  Those who have lodged funds with the company are, not unreasonably in my view, questioning what the announcement means in terms of the financial stability of the company and its ongoing prospects.  *If* the comments here have damaged the business then it just reinforces further my view that the risks inherent in making the announcement were not properly assessed and that the best course of action would have been not to make it.  Had Mr. Jones pursued his legal issues in private then this thread would in all probability not have happened and neither would any alleged resultant collateral damage.

Edited May 10, 2019 by DY444

[njee20]

3 hours ago, micklner said:

Very simple, avoid Crowd Funding like the plague !!!! 

Rubbish, it's a perfectly good mechanism for delivering products, as other manufacturers have shown. The problem is that one man has potentially poisoned the well for everyone, and whilst I'd hope that people would be grown up enough to appraise each project on its individual merit I suspect many will go down the "crowdfunding's dodgy" route.

 

It's even more of a shame that's the conclusion people have come to when there's not actually been a failure of a project yet. No one's lost money, no one's said that a project is being cancelled, it's purely the inference people have taken from a different announcement, which is a bit curious. I can understand people not wanting to invest further in projects they've signed up for, but that's not the same.

[David Stannard]

1 hour ago, classy52 said:

 

I respectfully disagree with the above post.

I am personally supporting Accurascale, Cavalex, Dapol & Hatton's by purchasing their products because at the end of the day they have and will deliver unlike DJM which means we are not going back to the good olde days of just Hornby & Bachmann and putting up with their same tired old models.

The like's of Accurascale & to a certain point Hatton's are shaking up the market with their detailed models which is great because the big players such as Hornby & Bachmann will need to up their game which is great for all of us, like I said DJM is being left behind and more than likely end up as a casualty for the reasons already discussed here and elsewhere and I personally cannot support DJM in it's current state.

 

 This is the point I am trying to make, I remember the dark old days of Hornby and Lima dominating the market with their substandard models, anyone for moulded handrails on their locos or generic underframes for rolling stock please put their hands up now. If it wasn't for the entry of Mainline into the market back in the 80's I dread to see what we would be getting today, I quite like the fact that there is such a diversity of small suppliers that have pushed the major players to up their game, the level of detail we get in RTR models these days is someting we could have only dreamed 40 years ago unless we had a fortune to spend on brass kits.

Edited May 10, 2019 by David Stannard

[woodenhead]

10 minutes ago, David Stannard said:

 

 This is the point I am trying to make, I remember the dark old days of Hornby and Lima dominating the market with their substandard models, anyone for moulded handrails on their locos please or generic underframes for rolling stock please put their hands up now. If it wasn't for the entry of Mainline into the market back in the 80's I dread to see what we would be getting today, I quite like the fact that there is such a diversity of small suppliers that have pushed the major players to up their game, the level of detail we get in RTR models these days is someting we could have only dreamed 40 years ago unless we had a fortune to spend on brass kits.

The big push by Lima came after Mainline so your argument is flawed.

 

Mainline & Airfix did make an impact but I didn't notice a great deal of change from Hornby at the time and Lima churned out their models from the late 80s into the 90s.

 

It was around the time Bachmann took up the mantle and the whole market began to shift - but even they were lazy at times - it took Dapol to push Bachmann to make better Graham Farish models, remember the Farish V2?

[classy52]

17 minutes ago, David Stannard said:

 

 This is the point I am trying to make, I remember the dark old days of Hornby and Lima dominating the market with their substandard models, anyone for moulded handrails on their locos please or generic underframes for rolling stock please put their hands up now. If it wasn't for the entry of Mainline into the market back in the 80's I dread to see what we would be getting today, I quite like the fact that there is such a diversity of small suppliers that have pushed the major players to up their game, the level of detail we get in RTR models these days is someting we could have only dreamed 40 years ago unless we had a fortune to spend on brass kits.

 

Yes agreed but the hobby isn't going that way even if DJM folds which would be down to him and not the other players squeezing him out.

If DJM goes the way of the Dodo I don't think it will put off any newcomers and you can see that with Accurascale, Cavalex & Hatton's and it just comes down to business management in what you are trying to achieve which Dave has seemed to struggle with and is now lashing out like a cornered cat.

Yes the model railway market today is fantastic and those who deliver will survive & prosper with or without DJM.

Edited May 10, 2019 by classy52

[DY444]

17 minutes ago, David Stannard said:

 

 This is the point I am trying to make, I remember the dark old days of Hornby and Lima dominating the market with their substandard models, anyone for moulded handrails on their locos please or generic underframes for rolling stock please put their hands up now. If it wasn't for the entry of Mainline into the market back in the 80's I dread to see what we would be getting today, I quite like the fact that there is such a diversity of small suppliers that have pushed the major players to up their game, the level of detail we get in RTR models these days is someting we could have only dreamed 40 years ago unless we had a fortune to spend on brass kits.

 

The key point however is that most of the new, smaller entrants seem to have managed to announce, develop and bring products to market in reasonable time frames and without getting into public legal spats with the major retailers and the manufacturing base.

Edited May 10, 2019 by DY444

[njee20]

Agreed, any failings the lead to the ultimate demise of DJM, I would say, lie squarely with DJM and not the industry, nor the methods he employed.

[David Stannard]

29 minutes ago, DY444 said:

 

That seems to me to be tantamount to blaming customers for the actions of a business.  As I posted way back in this thread I could not see what the potential upsides of this announcement were perceived as being, particularly given the apparent misleading (and subsequently amended) statements concerning the scope of the protection afforded by the IP registrations in question.  Those who have lodged funds with the company are, not unreasonably in my view, questioning what the announcement means in terms of the financial stability of the company and its ongoing prospects.  *If* the comments here have damaged the business then it just reinforces further my view that the risks inherent in making the announcement were not properly assessed and that the best course of action would have been not to make it.  Had Mr. Jones pursued his legal issues in private then this thread would in all probability not have happened and neither would any alleged resultant collateral damage.

 

 I am not blaming the customers for the actions of the business, I am however saying that the customer needs to be aware of what they are signing themselves up for as it is not a stock standard retail transaction, as I said before I am not personally a fan of this sort of business model but for some people it has had positive results. Just like the stock market you have to know what the risks and liabilities are before you buy shares, if you just jump in and buy shares without taking these things into account and blow your dough who have you got to blame.

[phil-b259]

4 hours ago, micklner said:

Very simple, avoid Crowd Funding like the plague !!!! 

 

A very silly statement to make!

 

Much like a city investment - put your money with a 'good' company and you gain, put it with a 'bad' company and you lose.

 

As with any 'investment' it is important to do your research and do the necessary due diligence. As has been pointed out there are plenty of examples both inside the model railway world (some of Revolution of Rapidos projects for example) and outside it where Crowd Funding type setups have resulted in superb products.

 

Yes in the current situation, DJM does not perhaps 'inspire investor confidence' - but to use one organisations performance to label an entire way of doing things as to be avoided is just as foolish.
 

[wombatofludham]

I would be reasonably happy to go down a crowd funding route for a model I really wanted depending on the manufacturer.  For example if Revolution decided to pump growth hormone into their N gauge Class 321 as an OO project, I'd be very happy to join them.  They have delivered and managed a crowd funded project and have demonstrated not only the mechanism can work but their own professionalism and project management skills in doing so.  That builds confidence.  If a retailer decided to use the mechanism to bring something forward, or one of the other new entrants who are bringing projects forward on time and at a sustainable rate, I'd probably join them subject to a bit more research.  

Unfortunately, and despite (or possibly because of) no communication as to the actual status of his crowd funded projects, Mr Jones has managed to tar all crowd funding with a very big brush by completely destroying the already brittle and fragile confidence in the mechanism by naturally conservative UK modellers who were, let's face it, pretty hostile to the concept from the start.  Hopefully, the gadfly minds of modellers will kick in next time a crowd funding scheme for their favourite wet-dream project comes forward and the woes of Mr Jones will be put to one side in the excitement that they are in sniffing distance of getting their pet project and some confidence may be restored.  Revolution demonstrated clearly the fault isn't with crowd funding, the fault lies with the individual(s) behind the scheme and that is where the caution, due diligence and process of "caveat emptor" should lie, not with a blanket "a pox on all crowd funding" viewpoint.

[Legend]

29 minutes ago, David Stannard said:

 

 I am not blaming the customers for the actions of the business, I am however saying that the customer needs to be aware of what they are signing themselves up for as it is not a stock standard retail transaction, as I said before I am not personally a fan of this sort of business model but for some people it has had positive results. Just like the stock market you have to know what the risks and liabilities are before you buy shares, if you just jump in and buy shares without taking these things into account and blow your dough who have you got to blame.

 

Its certainly a case of buyer beware and I was.  As I've said before I wasn't a fan of the Adhoc approach of announcing models  and the track record of delivery , so I didn't sign up for APT even though interested . But I note "in the other place" that you are critical of the response on RMweb accusing people of lynch mob mentality.  The facts and record as brought out by Ravenser and The Stationmaster speak for themselves , and as you say people should be aware.  You accuse this thread of making things worse. Can I suggest that it was DJ himself that is responsible , the rest of the thread is trying to figure out what happens now . Would you put money into these projects? I wouldn't.

 

Curiously I think we are all saying the same thing but its not a Lynch mob

Edited May 10, 2019 by Legend

[raymw]

The only fail-safe way of buying the sort of items we are talking about,  is to see it, pick it up and pay for it*. Crowd funding, prepayment, mail order, can give problems. There are more steps in the transaction, any of which can have a problem. In most cases, the thought of any risk is overshadowed by the 'want', and often everything works out OK - until it doesn't.

 

* yeah, you can think of situations where even that doesn't fail safe if you try really hard

[The Stationmaster]

4 hours ago, micklner said:

Very simple, avoid Crowd Funding like the plague !!!! 

Not necessarily.  I don't like the idea of crowd funding myself but as I think was made clear in the thread about crowd funding it really comes down to trust.  And, in the model railway world, that means trust in the person/organisation which is using crowd funding as a means of achieving the production and delivery of something you might want and think might not be delivered by any other route.

 

I would be extremely wary of a 'manufacturer' with a poor record of delivery of own account models transferring from bearing the risk of producing something to a situation where that risk is transferred to others if there is a poor record of delivering what has been promised by them in the past.  If they couldn't hack it on their own where, logically, there was greater incentive to succeed, why should I carry the risk for them?

 

Rather different is the situation where a group of modellers, especially a group with a mix of the right managerial skills, get together to develop an idea in respect of something they want and invite others who might be interested to join them in funding a manufacturer with a good track record to produce what they want.   A big difference here is that in this case you are not directly funding somebody's business but getting together as a group to make something happen.  And if said group has a record of achievement working with whichever manufacturers then it becomes an even more attractive (reliable) proposition.  It still remains a risk - which would put-off some people (you and me perhaps?) but I wouldn't confuse the two and Revolution has exactly that sort of approach and composition with a record of achievement.

 

So well founded crowd funding probably has a place in our hobby but it is always going to be a place for those who are prepared to, and have the money to, take the risk (and won't be too upset if they lose their money).