I think this guy is re-casting figures and selling them on e-bay - the lack of any manufacturers' names is very telling - Vladimir - hope you're reading this - he's possibly ripping of your excellent work...

His e-bay name is model-incn

bravo 6

Hope this helps put an end to this...

Hi
Yep he sells copies, there not even that good a copies from what people have been saying.
Didn't take him long to get the Bravo 6 one's copied.
Wont buy from him & Ebay dont seem to care about him selling copies either.
If you look at his feedback there's a lot of complaints but he's still selling.
Be Warned.

Richard,

Right you are.. I have looked over his stuff and have found MANY Verlinden figures as well as Warrior figures and Bravo 6 stuff...

shame that these guys do this an are getting away with it... I thought doing such was breaking copy right laws... or am I wrong on this?

Thats stingy of him shame on him!,

They look really poor he should get a grip

he absolutely is! unless Vlad allows him to do it ( which I doubt)..problem is that the Chinese may or may not have a concept of what copyright really means so they just do it like its okay... or he could be just a filthy parasite sucking off of someone else's creativity and labor. BUT at the same time.... Does Vlad have permission from Oliver Stone to produce these figures? I would assume he does otherwise there are different issues involved..

i have to agree, ive been to china, people will do anything to get money,i have already reported him to ebay but i doubt they;ll do anything.

Not wishing to divert from the main issue here, which is this loathsome characters continued trade in illegal copies, I don't think he (Vlad) has permission or needs it, and it's easy enough to get round the issue.

He hasn't named the figures by their character names in the movie. I doubt if Olivier Stone would be too bothered by it anyway, probably take it as a nice compliment, but the money hungry studios and their suits might see it different. Don't get me wrong, this is not a pop at Vlad, he is an amazing artist and I've admired his work ever since I first saw it, but he has done what many others in the past have done, simply not referred to the film directly in his product naming.

As for the ebay scumbag, he appears to be earning, judging by his feedback numbers, more money than I am a month. Ebay fail to do anything about him, indeed he almost has their endorsement by being described as a Power Seller, even carrying images of him with a senior member of ebay staff on his site.

Without a doubt every single figure he is selling is a ripped off copy.

Alan

Can we do something about him, collectively, as a web group? Some mass pressure on e-bay perhaps?

Taesung from Alpine put a stop to him doing Alpine figgys. There was an earlier thread on this awhile back. I do anime figgys as well and he is making poor copies of them too. He branched out into other areas. He is not alone, the best way to eliminate these guys is to ignore them and not buy from them.

short answer...nope.

Ebay takes the view that the only legitimate claim against a person selling copies is from the original company/person they are ripped off from. I've done what others have done, written to ebay...no response whatsoever. What I have done, and what anybody should do is let the companies know they have copies being sold illegally.

Amazingly even then I've been ignored by certain companies. Taesung Harmms of Alpine Miniatures did reply and thanked me, so did Tank in Russia, but not a peep from Verlinden or Pegaso.

All you can really do is not buy his stuff, no sales, no business.

One suggestion was and if you don't care about getting a bad rep with ebay is to bid and win on everything then refuse to pay saying you will not buy illegal copies, but then all he's got to do is come up with a genuine one to dispute it and you end being in the wrong fouling up your life on ebay and possibly beyond.

Alan

As for the "web group" doing anything , this has been touched upon when it was alleged a member of armorama was selling illegal copies. The view was that beyond the web site it wasn't armorama's responsibility to police ebay or any other outlet selling illegal goods, and action would only be taken if illegal copies were being sold via armorama., which I think is fair enough and agree with.

After all it does allow such postings as this to inform potential buyers of the wrong doers then it's left to each individuals honesty to do the right thing.

The really annoying thing is that producing the original figures requires skill and patience, the investment in time and material to produce the moulds, the box art, the packaging. Nobody is going to become a millionaire making and selling resin miniatures. Consequently scumbags like this really hurt the figure manufacturers and this in turn hurts us. Reduce their income and you'll either see less figures produced because there is less profit to use to invest in new ones or the manufacturer simply can't survive on what is coming in and closes down.

Alan

Thanks Alan. We aren't the 'Web-Police' (nor would we want to be) this is individual reponsibility and that of the company.

Oh, and should anyone get the 'bright' idea of buying from this thieving low-life, just remember a couple of important facts:

a) These knock-offs are always TOTAL crap.

b) Supporting this pond-life will eventually mean severe damage to the LEGITIMATE traders like Taesung or Bodi (or whoever) and in some cases will destroy their business entirely.

You really WANT to have THAT on your conscience?

Unless this is photchopped, and given everything else, I wouldn't doubt it, don't expect much action frm E-bay.
This is the pirate with E-bay's CEO, according to his website.

I know Pegaso tried, but I think they didn't get as far as Taesung to actually bid on the figure and leave negative feedback to the seller... I haven't seen a single Alpine figure copied ever since.

Vladi, we are on your side... hope you can do something about it as our reports to eBay obviously can't change a thing.

Mario

Sorry - I know we're not the internet police - but come on! We have the power to affect the output of manufacturers; there's not a modelling question we can't answer between us; the support on this network is outstanding; we really do have the capacity to change things! - let's get a campaign started to rid our hobby of people like this - Vladimir, Taesung, and all of of our friends deserve our outright support on this matter...
I'm willing to jeopardise my 100% rating on e-bay to bring this sod to his knees - who's with me?

Rich i am not a ebay user but my parents are. Im in this should be stopped!

i ahd wondered how long it would take for it to hit this hobby. one of the other hobbies i have is long range precision shooting. kind of work and personnel life coming together. but, the chinese have been making copies of leupold, nightforce and more recently USO scopes for the last couple of years. i know those companies were seeking copyright infringement on ebay and eventually got the items pulled from being sold on their site. they pop up from time to time, but not like they use to. they even used the company names on the products and fake serial numbers. you can read about it here.

http://www.leupold.com/corporate/resources/counterfeit-warning/

sadly, as long as people buy them people like this guy will continue his buisness.

I bought a cheap resin kit from this guy, two US marines figures on one small base (vietnam theme)

The guy had actually an add here on armorama that I just clicked and brought me to his ebay shop

Thought it was a rare and good mould looking at the photo at the time, only cost me $00.99 cent and shipping was $6.00 so cant really complain but when I started work on it I discovered it was actually [auto-censored]e!



dont say you were never warned..

This E-Bay CEO is running for Governor of California in the next election. She has already begun to campaign and collect money, etc. I'm sure she would appreciate it if this photo, and a letter explaining what this guy is doing was sent to all the newspapers in the Bay are (SF BAY, and Silicon Valley); see her explain why this happened right under here nose at E-Bay, and what can happen in CA. She's also a Republican, so the liberal media should jump on this . You just can't make this stuff up!

Matt

Ok, lets try this... I went to his listing,and his "store" I have reported about 5 of his items so far useing E-bays "report item" system. I let them know it is a possible copy or unattributed item!! I made sure to let them know the rightfull manufacturer and gave item #'s etc. where I had them, very easy just go through his "store" with a Verlinden catalog,or any other you find appropriate.Maybe if we all spend a few minutes doing this as well as letting the rightfull owners know whats up......well maybe SOMETHING will be DONE!!

Hi All.
This guy is counterfeiting models.
surely its breaching the law as say copying DVDs or computer games?

Ebay don't care.

Matt

This guy has been at it for awhile and no ebay won't do anything about him; the only way to stop his piracy is to not buy from him.

Bottom line is that ebay do not care enough. The pros of having him operate far outweigh the cons...
This type of illegal copy will undermine the hobby to its detriment unless something is done. Do you think he cares he is ripping off what are basically cottage industries which are run by folks with a vested interest in modelling as opposed to solely a profit margin? Nope. The rip-off merchant's prices are directly proportional to the quality. Same goes with the manufacturers we know and trust.
Put your hard-earned where you know it counts, people.
Brad

I think part of the problem is the Chinese don't have the same copyright laws as we do here in the West. And they don't seem to care if they break someone elses copyright laws either.

(sort of)
Remember back over the Summer when Matell had to recall a lot of toys made in China becuase of lead paint? Well, my sister is a VP of Customer Relations over at Matell, and got beat-up pretty good over this. (If you ever read a press release from Matell where it says, "A Matell spokes person said...", that's her.) Apparently the president of Matell had to go to China to appologize to the Chinese because the Chinese manufactures was painting Matell's toys with lead paint, and it was Matell's fault that they didn't test them; not the Chinese manufacturer's fault for not following Matell's specs & US laws. Hey, folks! It's a Wal-Mart world!

Jim

So we know for a fact they are bootlegs ?