Subject:
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Re: Pics from ToyFair 2005
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.color
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Date:
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Tue, 22 Feb 2005 14:49:14 GMT
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In lugnet.color, Tim David wrote:
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I think you are misreading. My impression (from what I read) was that Jorgen
found it dispiriting that however good a model he designed, there would be
people that didn’t like it simply because it was bley. Not, as you seem to
have read it, that Jorgen was unhappy that there would upset people whether
Lego kept bley or returned to the original colours.
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I’m going to make some big fat frothing assumptions here and try to “explain”
Jorgen’s comment - at least from my position in the company. This is meant as
nothing more than a helpful hint as to this particular situation (and a bit of
“Jake’s Personal Take”), not any sort of value judgment overall. And I’m totally
totally putting words into Jorgen’s mouth, so please forgive me!
My role at TLC is really two-fold: Bring the AFOL community into the company,
and the company into the AFOL community (in order to build a stronger bond
between the two). As such, I have A LOT of conversations with colleagues about
the AFOL community and the AFOLs. I know from these conversations with
designers, marketers, executives, and others inside the company that there is a
certain amount of excitement, as well as frustration comes inherently with
working with the AFOLs. I spent countless hours every month researching
online/offline community, reading community related books and articles, and
discussing community with industry experts. This inherent duality is common to
EVERY community.
Jorgen’s point (that no matter what happens, someone or some group in the
community is going to have an issue with it) is a common thread in most of my
discussions. For the most part, I think that most colleagues understand (after
years of training) that this is simply the way of community. After all, railing
on the company is part of the fun, right? :)
As you can imagine, however, this can get frustrating at times. I mean imagine
you’ve just spent scores of hours working on a new Death Star design that you
think the fans are going to love. You’ve put your heart and soul into it, more
than most projects you do during the day, to deliver something really cool to
the fans. But the only response you hear is “it’s bley!”. Or imagine you’ve
spent 6 months (or more) working on a kids toy, but every time you see what the
fans are saying, you’re hearing “man, this sucks! It’s for kids!”
Certainly that’s just part of the job, and I’m not in any way trying to say that
fans shouldn’t comment openly on their opinions. Not at all. Not even a little
bit. But hopefully that helps to paint a better picture of what it’s like to be
a designer. I tease people who say that they want to be a LEGO model designer -
be careful what you wish for!
But the reason I jump into these .color waters is that I think this thread has
touched no a very interesting (and deeper) issue.
The key message I’m trying to get across, I suppose, is that no matter what the
LEGO Company does, someone’s going to be upset by it. What works well for one
region, might not work for another region. If we come out with some great City
sets that are aged a little younger than before, some AFOLs will like the
products for the age range they’re meant for, others be upset about getting
aways from the 20+ year old roots of LEGO City. If we announce LEGOfactory, some
AFOLs will jump on board immediately, others will complain it’s microscale based
only. If we launch a new Technic set, some AFOLs will like the set design,
others will complain there’s not enough studded bricks included. Certainly you
can imagine that no matter what happens with the color change at this point,
someone is going to be upset about it, right?
These are not negative things, it’s simply the brilliance of the rapid, cheap,
and worldwide discussion ability that is the Internet.
Of course, you have to understand that if you’re not used to working with this
sort of input, it can be a bit overwhelming. If you want to try to experience
what they’re experiencing try this - while you’re working one day, have all the
coworkers around you come and stand behind you giving feedback. Can be any type
of feedback, good and bad. It’d get pretty overwhelming pretty quickly, right?
(There’s an entirely different conversation to have about how to best deal with
the increased feedback, how colleagues should be reacting to that feedback, and
how the AFOL opinion fits into the overall decision making process - but that’s
beyond the scope of this thread)
All of that said though, I’m personally blown away by how far, as a company,
we’ve come in the short time I’ve been here. When I first started at LEGO in
October 2000, there was very little (if any) interest in working with the AFOLs.
Today we’ve got fans being invited as VIPs to the NYC Toy Fair, we have many
projects groups completed or underway where AFOLs are invited to give feedback
and input on upcoming products, we have an entire team established to help the
community development process for all ages, we’ve launched a project
(LEGOfactory.com) that includes adults in a major competition as their very own
category... there’s even another big surprise coming that I can’t announce quite
yet, but will truly show you how far we’ve come on this journey. Soon
grasshopper, soon.
Like I said earlier, I’m not trying to make a point or tell AFOLs they’re doing
anything wrong. Not at all, not even a little. I’m simply trying to provide a
view “inside the mind of the company”. I hope it helps.
Jake
---
Jake McKee
Community Liaison
LEGO Community Team
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Message has 3 Replies:
 | | Re: Pics from ToyFair 2005
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| (...) Thanks for the discussion Jake. It's certainly true that you can't please all of the people all of the time. The danger of course is that it's easy to fall into the trap of dismissing contrary opinions, since "someone will always be (...) (19 years ago, 22-Feb-05, to lugnet.color, FTX) !
| | | Re: Pics from ToyFair 2005
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| (...) I can see how frustrating it can get. My job involves a lot of that as well, I design web interfaces that have to be useful for absolute noobs ("what's this clicky thing on a string fer?") as well as power users... it's either "too hard" or (...) (19 years ago, 22-Feb-05, to lugnet.color, FTX)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: Pics from ToyFair 2005
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| (...) I think you are misreading. My impression (from what I read) was that Jorgen found it dispiriting that however good a model he designed, there would be people that didn't like it simply because it was bley. Not, as you seem to have read it, (...) (19 years ago, 22-Feb-05, to lugnet.color)
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