What Was With That Dumb Ed Thread On Caf

I agree actually. If he was really trying to help he would have done it via email. "We care about customers and if ED doesn't accept our offer they must not care at all."

 

I responded to that thread at the very end, right before War shut it down. I replied strictly to show the idiocy that is present in many CAF'ers. Although I still like the forum a lot, it has more than it's fair share of jerk offs that ruin every thread they "contribute" to. The zealots at CAF are starting to make SD look mature... :aurgue:

 

Honestly, I didn't share MichaelP's impression...
Although a great many people obviously did.
So who's to say who is right?

I don't share his impression, because I was browsing the forums the same way that TeamPSI was...

I learned of this new Elemental "turn of events" (the announcement of the discontinuing of the flat pistons) the same way that TeamPSI did.

If I had a pallate of flat piston cones that I wasn't going to be using, I'd absolutely make exactly the same offer to Ben, in a truly well-intentioned spirit.
It generally pays to treat people nicely... maybe your competitors most of all!
If I scratch his back, possibly he'll scratch mine someday, right?
Worst case, at least I can sleep a little more soundly knowing I helped someone out.

I used to work at a pizzeria in college.
Every great while, we'd get a call from a competitor in town, another pizzeria.
"Hey man, we ran out of sub rolls. Can we borrow some of yours? We'll replace them as soon as our delivery comes tomorrow morning."
No problem, we drove several bags over to them, always.
Why?
Think about it... if we scratch their backs, they might scratch ours. They certainly wouldn't address any aggressive competitive tactics at us. Keeps the sailing smooth. B)


And there's no reason, if I were wishing to extend the offer, that I wouldn't just post it there...

Like I said, there I was on the forum, reading the thread, and I realize I can help him out.
I'd have posted the offer there also... that's the most likely place Ben will be visiting next, likely the quickest response...
...and also hell, I'll take the free publicity, of course I'd like people to know I can be a nice guy.

They don't even need to know that I'd been looking for a way to get rid of those damn pistons that I wasn't going to use anyway... :lol:

But seriously... I had a conversation with David at RE that pretty much summed it up for my view on this situation (and possibly he was even thinking of it when he made the offer!):

I said to him "There's no reason why we should be competing with each other... there's plenty of mainstream competition out there... I don't want to steal your customers, I want RF's customers... if we worked together instead, we could pool our resources, and lure more mainstream customers away than if we were operating as individual, competing entities."

If the Better Audio's, RE's, Elementals, DD's, Stereo Integrity's (etc.) of the online world joined forces in some ways (such as all pooling resources to fund something otherwise prohibitively expensive like a custom basket, that we could all use not to gain competitive advantage over each other, but to gain competitive advantage over the mainstream guys - and offer more superior products than we could individually offer... everyone would benefit.

Possibly that was David's thinking in extending the offer...
...his original post wasn't exactly critical of eD at any rate.
Much "reading between the lines" I think.

I'm not just being "devil's advocate" on this one... I honestly can see it from this perspective, because if I were in David's shoes, I would have extended the same offer, and most likely on the same forum, in an honestly helpful spirit... because I'd love it if the small guys worked together, rather than against.

 

Very good post Geo!!

And I actually agree. I didn't see any ill intent in David's offer. And I think he handled himself very well.

 

i have some thought on this topic also, some of which i share with you chris, and some i don't

for one, i truely respect david and RE as a company, while i don't agree with mikeP's statements about RE, i do agree with his 'hiddeen agenda' theory...to me that was obvious from the get go

see...that offer was on the table a day ago, ben was very aware of it....there was no useful reason for it in the CAF thread

if david wanted to offer the help sincerely, he would simply offer it once...not push it...i believe he wanted it to be known that RE could help ED solve their 'problems'

some things just aren't meant for the general public

regardless, i think david is an awesome stand up guy, and it does not change my opinion of their company the slightest

i am actually curious what his 'fix' is...but i personaly wouldn't want it implemented....i would like the flat cones to take the next train out ..i have been telling my wife that since day one

as far as mr_singh, he is always like that, since i have first seen him post....remember the kaos at CA.com and SIN

the oynx/re ordeal....very unfair...we don't know exactly what went down with that...and RE has their hands tied...all they can say is defective....and i have sympathy for them when it comes to this topic...but, 'the proof is in the pudding'...my HC was an excellant driver...if it was made using defective parts, please,by all means david, build me another defective driver

on the CS tip...both ED and RE has some awesome customer service...i mean, lets be realistic, anyone of us can and have called up the owners of these companies...ask "whats on the agenda", "did you like that new movie?", "what did you eat for dinner?"....we can go over to their shop and play with everything....or get some help with our setups.....thats pretty freakin' awesome if you ask me B)

i don't support ED because they are ED, and i don't support RE because they are RE...i support them both because they make some great product and offer some great support...i am pretty positive when i say i will own more products from the both of them in the future...and also some Better Audio products as well

i think i touched on most of the issues and how i truely feel....i'll probably add some more later

 

it was not the offer that was suspect it was the MANNER in which the offer was made, more on this later

First you did not offer to the rolls they asked...

Next If you found out for what ever reason they ran out of rolls, and you wanted to help them, would you

a> call them up on the phone and offer the rolls
b> Launch a billboad in the middle of Town annoucing they ran out but you had some and would sell them to them...???


Option B is exactly what teampsi did, very unprofessional, but what else do you expect from RE??????

I would re think that, business should be conducted in PRIVATE not on open forums...

and it may or may not have been a shortage of cones that led to this, Maybe ben has grown tried of the problems, so yes he maybe can get 200 cones today, but what about tommorow, Ben probally feels the need to "cut his loses" and move on....

I would agree with this, if you leave out RE's name....

When I heard their name I just want to scream Bloody Murder, and Geo given your history with them I can believe you want anything do to with them, but that is your progitive...

Like it says under his name at CAF, David is a RETARD

 

To me, if you want to help someone, honestly, you don't tell everyone about it. If I help someone, or try to, and feel the need to let everyone know, to me, that's just rubbing it in their face. Someone who honestly just wants to help someone doesn't want/need recognition.
Although Geo had some good points. I always encourage cooperation over competition, almost always yields better results.
But, the fact that he offered the help in such a public fashion tells me he Wasn't wanting to help out of the kindness of his heart, he wanted the publicity.

 

Honestly, I didn't share MichaelP's impression...
Although a great many people obviously did.
So who's to say who is right?

I don't share his impression, because I was browsing the forums the same way that TeamPSI was...

I learned of this new Elemental "turn of events" (the announcement of the discontinuing of the flat pistons) the same way that TeamPSI did.

If I had a pallate of flat piston cones that I wasn't going to be using, I'd absolutely make exactly the same offer to Ben, in a truly well-intentioned spirit.
It generally pays to treat people nicely... maybe your competitors most of all!
If I scratch his back, possibly he'll scratch mine someday, right?
Worst case, at least I can sleep a little more soundly knowing I helped someone out.

I used to work at a pizzeria in college.
Every great while, we'd get a call from a competitor in town, another pizzeria.
"Hey man, we ran out of sub rolls. Can we borrow some of yours? We'll replace them as soon as our delivery comes tomorrow morning."
No problem, we drove several bags over to them, always.
Why?
Think about it... if we scratch their backs, they might scratch ours. They certainly wouldn't address any aggressive competitive tactics at us. Keeps the sailing smooth. B)


And there's no reason, if I were wishing to extend the offer, that I wouldn't just post it there...

Like I said, there I was on the forum, reading the thread, and I realize I can help him out.
I'd have posted the offer there also... that's the most likely place Ben will be visiting next, likely the quickest response...
...and also hell, I'll take the free publicity, of course I'd like people to know I can be a nice guy.

They don't even need to know that I'd been looking for a way to get rid of those damn pistons that I wasn't going to use anyway... :lol:

But seriously... I had a conversation with David at RE that pretty much summed it up for my view on this situation (and possibly he was even thinking of it when he made the offer!):

I said to him "There's no reason why we should be competing with each other... there's plenty of mainstream competition out there... I don't want to steal your customers, I want RF's customers... if we worked together instead, we could pool our resources, and lure more mainstream customers away than if we were operating as individual, competing entities."

If the Better Audio's, RE's, Elementals, DD's, Stereo Integrity's (etc.) of the online world joined forces in some ways (such as all pooling resources to fund something otherwise prohibitively expensive like a custom basket, that we could all use not to gain competitive advantage over each other, but to gain competitive advantage over the mainstream guys - and offer more superior products than we could individually offer... everyone would benefit.

Possibly that was David's thinking in extending the offer...
...his original post wasn't exactly critical of eD at any rate.
Much "reading between the lines" I think.

I'm not just being "devil's advocate" on this one... I honestly can see it from this perspective, because if I were in David's shoes, I would have extended the same offer, and most likely on the same forum, in an honestly helpful spirit... because I'd love it if the small guys worked together, rather than against. [/b][/quote]
Great post. Couldnt agree more.

I do see him publicly announcing it on two forums(that i saw) a bit of an RE plug. Oh well. Competition is a bitch huh?

It would be nice to see a collaboration of some of the "underground" companies that we all love. A custom basket would be awesome. XBL^2 for all? Maybe not but that would be cool too. It seems that the BIG 3 (ED, RE, Adire) are all patenting stuff or working with a limitted patent that can give them an edge over the competition.

 

well legally they can not,

if you want to press the issue contact the card compnay

under Federal Credit laws a Business must Ship the goods 7 Business Days afer getting payment or Refund the money......

they can however "PREAUTHORIZE" which inesense holds the money in limbo

 

well, if they claim the sub is IN STOCK, then this is deceptive marketing and far cry from preauthorization and/or preorder... BTW, judging after the crap that has happened with first e15a, preordering of a new model of a sub seems pretty dumb... hate to be the guinea pig to iron out all the bugs... Neither one of the practices I find either ethical or good business... :angry:

 

hmmm.... I do not think it is very cool of you to single out CAF as a place harbouring forum jerks... it just happened that someone touched a sensitive subject with a few on this forum... But jerks and clueless members are present on all forums... and in abundance... LOL... I like CAF because in spite of the jerks and post whores, there are many valuable and knowledgeable guys there... many actually I look up to and seek advice from... And it seems to me that the best way to kill off stupid threads is to ignore them... otherwise you just comound the pointless situation and become a guilty party yourself... And BTW, it is amazing to me that this thread continues to grow as well and it is starting to amount to no less than character assasination of certain people... LOL...

It takes a great mind and character to separate the smart from the ignorant ones and show your superiority by simply walking away from a pointless thread instead of attempting to prove your point to someone who refuses to acknowledge any kind of reasoning, regardless of how right you may be... Think about it...

 

Link?

 

I didn't single out CAF for anything. It just happens that the person who started this thread is making reference to a thread at CAF. I can name 20 jerks on any forum, car audio or otherwise. If you've been there a few years (I lurked for a good year before registering), you can't deny that the ratio of buffoons to helpful people is at an all time low. I merely pointed it out at CAF because that's the forum the thread starter is talking about. I just think too many topics get way off topic way too fast. I'll occasionaly add fuel to the fire when it's way out of hand, so as to "force" War to close the joke of a thread...usually the thread has gone on for days, however (sometimes going 10...20+ pages). I like CAF and a lot of my online friends/audio gurus/advisors call CAF home.

 

Like I said on that thread..

The only person who can comment on the rationale behind why he doesn't wish to accept the offer, is Ben.
We don't know any possibly unmentioned factors at play.

So, I could speculate either side of the coin.
Both sides seem to have potenetial merit.
But we definitely don't have enough info to know which actually does have merit.

I didn't know that the offer existed a day prior to that thread... how does anyone for that matter?

The accusations about "trying to make Elemental look bad" aren't my place to judge, that's for sure.

But I do look at it like this:
If RE was extending the offer - even if it was true, in part to make Elemental look bad - they would need to be able to back up that offer. If their intent was truly to make Elemental just look bad, would they be pleased when Elemental said "OK, we'll bite... help us out"?

On the other hand, if they extended the offer... RE had sure better be able to back up what they say, in terms of honoring their offer, right?
Otherwise, who's going to be the one looking bad?

So, would RE go through all the trouble of positioning themselves in such a way that they could extend this offer to Elemental, "just to make them look bad", anticipating that Elemental would not accept the offer?
That seems extreme.

But then again, we still don't have nearly enough information.
We don't know why

It does beg the question though, why RE can get their hands on these cones so easily (and again, re-read what I said about "being able to back up what they say"), and Ben has had such problems.
Hey... maybe Ben can get his hands on them just as easily... now.

I actually wish Ben could shed some light on this, because he's the least heard person here, and he also happens to be the person with most likely the majority of the answers.
Is he even a member here? I think I remember him posting before...

But... does it really matter in the end?
As long as Ben gets his subs out in a timely manner... than RE's points will be proven irrelevant anyway, right?
If Ben really could benefit from RE's help, then he may have taken advantage of the offer - PR hit to the company or not... his interest is in getting products out... ...no, let me change that:
His interest is in creating happy customers.
He's got to weigh the PR hit to the company that taking advantage of David's offer he thinks would create, against the PR hit the company would take if he fails to deliver subs in a timely manner because he can't get his hands on cones... and turned down an offer to obtain some. Tricky, and a judgement call.
Are you qualified to make that prediction?

Actions DO speak louder than words.
So, it'll just be interesting to see what all happens in the end.