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In lugnet.events.brickfest, Larry Pieniazek wrote:
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This is the text of Jake’s speech.
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snipped
I really hate to say this, but rather than feeling inspired about the great
future to come, Jake’s speech has instead left me completely disheartened. The
bottom line is this: TLG has betrayed my trust. And unfortunately, the only
way I can see them regaining it is by changing the grays back, which looks like
is not going to happen. I can’t believe that 20+ years of momentum cannot
overcome the last say 2 years when the so-called color “improvement” decision
was made.
TLG as a whole seems to have little concept of its fan community. We are LEGO’s
greatest evangelists. We bring others into the hobby and provide an incredible
amount of inspiration and free advertising. It’s often touted that we only
represent 5% of sales. I dispute that claim. I agree that AFOL sales may
represent only 5% of TLG sales as a whole. But if TLG sales are dominated by
Bionicle, where AFOLs have little interest, this dilutes our relative
contribution. Likewise, if DUPLO, Clickits, etc. are included, our relative
contribution is further lessened. On the other hand, TLG’s decisions in these
areas hold less interest for most AFOLs. But what about the themes where the
AFOLs’ interests lie primarily: Technic, Star Wars, Sculptures, Legends, etc.
I’m sure our relative sales are significantly greater than 5%. For
S@H-Exclusives and Hard-to-Finds, such as the ISD or 8455 Backhoe, AFOL sales
may even dominate. It makes plain sense to seriously consider AFOL
interests/opinions in the themes and issues where we actually care.
None of this seems to matter, however. TLG barely has (had?) a clue that AFOLs
exist. Apparently, many in TLG were surprised that customers were upset by
the color change. They had no clue that anyone might care about the
20-yr-standard colors. In essence, the thought hadn’t even crossed their
minds! Jake and Brad have made great strides in waking up TLG to our
presence. And I do believe that his post above is sincere and his intentions
are true. But how much can one person do? It’s hard to get the battleship to
change course. Despite Jake’s best efforts, his little tugboat cannot keep the
battleship from plowing over the AFOL sailboats, which are (supposedly) too
little for it to see.
I recently took the AC Nielsen survey about the 8455 Backhoe, a set that
obviously relies on strong AFOL sales, since people must actively seek it out
to purchase it. After asking if I was a “Boy” or a “Girl”, it asked for my
birthday and who the purchase was for, so it did know that I am an adult and
bought it for myself. Questions included how “cool” I thought the model was
compared to my other toys, how “cool” my friends thought it was, how “cool” the
box was or how “cool” minifigs are compared to my other toys, whether I needed
help from my parents or friends to build the model, and asked me how well I
agreed with some statements made by “other children”. These are the issues TLG
cares about (how cool...) and the style of the questions shows where their
focus lies. They’re blind to my presence as an AFOL. (Perhaps this example is
unfair, since the survey is run by a third party.)
As with all things, part of the blame lies with us, the AFOL community. (As an
aside, note that this community arose with essentially no
participation/help/interest from TLG.) Jake, in nearly every discussion
regarding the color change issue, mentioned that TLG had gotten very little
negtive response through the channels they watch, Customer Service. (Of
course, relatively few customers actually know the change is a permanent
replacement, rather than an additional color.) In this (spotlighted) thread
http://news.lugnet.com/general/?n=44983, I made a plea for the community to
write letters to TLG. The thread got 18 responses. How many letters did the
community send to TLG? 25? 50? 100? I doubt much more. People were quick
to respond to Jake’s threads with complaints and to set up polls, etc. How many
of those posts/results were seen by anyone at TLG other than Jake? If we want
to succeed, we need to put our protests in the places where TLG is looking.
Margaret Mead said “Never underestimate the ability of a small group of
conscientious individuals to change the world. Indeed it is the only thing that
ever has.” We need to lash our boats together so the corporate battleship
can’t help but see us!
As Jake has basically said, the awareness/involvement of AFOLs in the corporate
mind is increasing (and I thank him for it). I think a main reason for this
desire to include AFOLs, however, is the incredible success of LEGO Direct.
This is fine. LD’s success is due in large part to their engagement of
AFOLs. Through the Sculpture, Legend, S@H-exclusive, etc. lines, LD has proven
that capturing the AFOL market can increase TLG’s bottom line. We’re here. We
want to give TLG our money. Well, we did. But TLG corporate is making it
so difficult by sapping LEGO’s appeal to us.
I’ll end this post the way I started it. The definition Jake gave of LEGO
community revolves around the concept of “LEGO Moments”. One of my most
memorable LEGO moments was deciding that I, as an adult, could buy the UCS
TIE Interceptor for myself and enjoy it, which led to my emergence from my Dark
Age. Unfortunately, another equally powerful moment that has indelibly marked
my LEGO experience was the betrayal I felt (and still feel) finding out that
TLG had replaced light and dark gray. How could they be so ignorant and
careless? I know they weren’t actively trying to “screw” me, but rather were
just oblivious to the fact that I might care.
I’ll close with some quotes from Jake’s speech notes that particularly hurt:
“LEGO Community Development, also known as LCD, is focused on one main
goal: help build and maintain relationships with our core consumers.
...
The important thing for all of us to remember, especially all of you, is that if
you aren’t happy, then the relationship is setup wrong. ...
But this is a relationship, and relationships are long term. In order to do
anything long term, you’re going to have hits and misses. Together, we’re going
to fall but not fail.”
-With such a spectacularly terrible start, it’s hard to get our hopes up.
“I hope that your trust in me continues to grow. I’m your advocate, and I’m your
voice in the company. I fight daily, literally daily, to get your questions and
requests answered.”
-Thank you sincerely Jake. It’s a shame that it has to be such a battle.
“So to conclude, 2003 was an amazing community year, but I truly believe 2004 is
going to put it to shame!”
-I think TLG corporate has already put 2003 to shame.
“Everybody goes home happy!”
-If only it were so.
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bionicle
(score: 0.302)
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Hello!
> It’s meant to capture
> interested builders and turn them into hard core fans.
Well, most AFOLs already have been LEGO fans as kids and - after a periode of
neglecting the brick, the so called 'dark ages' - found back to their old love.
That means: For the purpose of growing hard core LEGO fans it's necassary to
inoculate the LEGO virus into kids. I know TLC is trying to attract kids with
their products, but I'm not at all certain if the kids attracted by these days'
LEGO products will become hard core fans when they are adults.
I consider myself a hard core fan, and I am a hard core fan because I got sets
like 6374 ( http://guide.lugnet.com/set/6374 ), 6080 (
http://guide.lugnet.com/set/6080 ) or 6285 ( http://guide.lugnet.com/set/6285 ),
each embedded into a whole line of complementing sets. Sure, the Black Seas
Barracuda has been re-released, but where is the complete line that belongs to
this set?
The sets that I (quite randomly) mentioned along with the lines they belonged to
breathed the spark of the LEGO-idea into me, that is: Building, combining parts
with other parts and let your fantasy flow. Everything fits to anything. That's
what hooked me to LEGO, none of all the competing toys I had got me hooked like
LEGO.
I doubt that todays kids feel this LEGO idea when they see or play with recent
LEGO products. They can't let their fantasy flow because the storylines are
predetermined. They can't build as much as we were able to because the sets
contain less parts and much worse: less multifunctional parts. They still can
combine anything with everything but the outcome is most likely not as appealing
as it used to be due to the two previously mentioned aspects.
I know there are many kids (and adults) attracted by the Bionicle line, the
Bionicle fan forum has myriads of members, and I do not at all intend to start
another flamewar against Bionicles. Bionicle may have its place, I don't mind.
However, will kids that are Bionicle fans now still be die hard LEGO fans if TLC
eventually decides not to continue the Bionicle line? Are those kids attracted
by the "Bionicle" idea with its (quite interesting as I have to admit) storyline
or are they attracted by the "LEGO" idea? I guess the first.
To cut a long story short, I don't believe that anybody will become a hard core
LEGO fan due to any web site in the world wide web, unless he already has the
LEGO virus in himself. So TLC should concentrate on their product to get kids
(coming adults) hooked on LEGO, hooked on LEGO that will still be the same LEGO
they used to be hooked on when they eventually discover their old love again in
a couple of years. (Hm... this would be the place to throw in a little comment
regarding the colour changes that caused a big loss of confidence into the
perpetuity of the LEGO company and their products....)
Interested builders will become hard core fans as long as they find sufficient
amounts of the material they build with, that is bricks.
Bye
Jojo
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bionicle
(score: 0.302)
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In lugnet.space, Tom Sciortino wrote:
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So what if it “rides a little bit slower” -- it looks good doin’ it. ;) I
love the tail end of this thing. That grill work, the tail lights--and the
fins!!! Mmmmm, fins... When will today’s car manufacturers realize it’s
time to bring back fins?!?! And is that a premium sound system I see on
either side of the driver’s head? Man, you thought of everything. The snot
work is very interesting too. I like the interleaving of the red and grey
towards the back. Good work with the underside, too. Often people ignore
that part of a model, but yours has some great features under there.
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Thank you.
The fact that the fins can be top and bottom just doubles the fun. Yes, that’s
the best sound system possible; when you’re flying solo, ya gotta have tunes.
This is what I call a ‘studs-out’ design; there are studs facing every
direction. The main ‘studs-up’ part is the canopy assembly and there are a few
others, but there are more studs pointing down overall (though they are covered
with tiles.)
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I don’t know how others do it, but I usually build from the outside in too.
First a frame to get the general shape, then usually engines (just the
nozzles) and landing gear. Later on I fill in the empty spaces (including
any engine compartments, weapons bays, cockpit details, and assorted
greeb’s).
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I tend to start with a seedpart or a ‘seed assembly’, which in this case was the
side panel and then the tail light/fin. I actually thought it would be a
two-seater until I tried putting seats in.
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My only complaint is that lego doesn’t make a chain-link steering wheel or
fuzzy dice. And the fact that I can’t get “Low Rider” out of my head now.
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Ah, the song-virus. ha ha! I’m glad you picked up on that one. That’s another
resonance this model has for me, though I’m not sure how the lowrider concept
maps onto the hovercar concept. But, hey, I like the song. Shall we petition
TLC for the steering wheel and fuzzy dice?
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P.S. Could you maybe make your pictures just a little smaller. While it is
kinda neat to see the individual polymer chains comprising each brick, it’s
a wee-bit slow for us pathetic dial-up users. :)
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As a pathetic dial-up user myself, I feel your pain. I did trim the extra
background of the tops and bottoms of the pics where possible. I figure that
640x480 is a reasonable compromise, but I may have saved them at too high a
quality. At least I downsampled my 4 megapixel shots from the camera. I’d like
to hear other thoughts about this issue. How many seconds at 56k is a reasonable
download time? Did anyone else see the recent brickshelf file of an out-of-focus
purple bionicle slug in the middle of a vast expanse of out-of-focus upholstery
at 1600x1200 pixels? sheeesh! Anyway, yes, I’ll try and keep them a little
smaller.
Peace and resolution,
Professor Whateverly
click to ride
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bionicle
(score: 0.302)
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In lugnet.lego, John M. Rudy wrote:
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In lugnet.lego, Gregory Muri wrote:
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That is just it Kevin, nobody at Lego got any sense. They just responded to
the one and only thing that corporate robots instantly respond to. The loss
of money, especially on the scale that Lego did last year, is a powerful
thing. It will likely take a much bigger loss than 2003 for them to change
back this color fiasco.
Greg
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See... I disagree with you on this point. The poor sales of 2004 will have
nothing to do with color change. We, the AFOLs may cease buying because of
this fact, but that is a drop in the bucket of problems, a mere 5% loss in a
world of hurt for TLG.
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a few idle remarks from the peanut gallery
Many (most ?) AFOLs buy at clearance. Because certain AFOLs stop buying at
clearance, doesn’t mean that the stuff will just sit there and go unsold
forever. Some clearanced stuff moves back up the food chain to EB, some to BL,
and some to places like flea markets. That one destination decides to boycott,
will have little or no effect on the parent 2-years hence trying to find that
discontinued (and needed) set which WM, KM, TRU, Target (et al) have dumped to
clearance. They will buy *that* set because the kid wants it. The stuff will
still most likely percolate thru the food chain, just that AFOLs won’t be taking
so much from the ‘clearance’ buffet. (and we are 6-12-18 months from when the
new colors actually make it to clearance.)
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To h@#$ with the color change, let’s say it never happened. OK, now look at
the product lines for what they are. They’re action figures. There is no
building or creativity.
The New Castle (Big Figs): Galidor Redux.
(OK, so maybe not as bad as Galidor, but still a far cry from LEGO’s core
values)
The New Castle (Minifig): Can You Say Playing Our Children For Imbeciles?
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I still prefer the term ‘Castleonicle’. Bionicle has won the battle for hearts
of minds of many of the primary target audience, now TLC is trying to work the
same magic with Castle. It may be heresy to some, but it may be a smart move to
others.
Ray
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bionicle
(score: 0.302)
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In lugnet.space, Paul Baulch wrote:
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My love affair with the 3x12 wedge slope continues:
Argent
Supra
This came out a bit more old-school than I intended. And a lot bigger (it
sort of strains the boundaries of whooshability!). It was originally going to
be an all-silver spaceship like a Naboo starship, but I changed my mind - and
conserved the lions’ share of the silver elements for another spaceship.
The landing gear is a bit fugly, but it is sturdy and extremely compact...
so I left it as-is.
Cheers,
<http://www.lugnet.com/~164/sci-fi/http://www.brickshelf.com/gallery/pbaulch/Icons/scifisig.jpg
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Man..is that ever ‘out there’. To be honest, when I first saw it in the
thumbnail I recoiled a little bit due to the lime green....truly one of the
hardest colours for me to get my head around. A closer look however reveals
that the spire formations on it seem to work with the outlandish colour scheme.
The Bionicle/Racer bits in the engine cowling look excellent.
The only criticism I would have is the interior. For some reason, the ‘plain’
colours of black/red/gray don’t seem to fit the exterior. I would almost expect
to see an all white interior with trans highlights or something. A minor
personal taste.
Innovative as always Paul.
Cheers,
-Gil
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bionicle
(score: 0.302)
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