The Facebook debacle & other issues

Agreed for keeping this thread open and somehow summarizing the main points over the years such as the beginning of this thread, the mismatched shoes, the bad quality wig...etc. I admit I've made a few one liners over the course of this thread; I in all honesty, never imagined it would continue this far. The comments I made in jest were to just bring a bit of levity, because I feel it is better to laugh and smile than get mad.

One question I would raise to Danny, whom I know reads this thread on a more regular basis than he'd ever confess to: If you've banned all the entitled people from your shop, how is it possible for anyone other than your clique to purchase from you? The bad people simply keep buying Smart Doll goodies so you say. How? Going through TSA with a bunch of questionable items would be far easier than attempting to purchase from Danny's shop now. He has no right to say people cannot buy his goods second hand, and I'm only talking directly (or through Fabric Friends & Dolls).

I've said it before and I'll repeat my sentiments again. I have absolutely nothing wrong with anyone who owns a Smart Doll regardless of how it was obtained. What I do have a problem with is the people who keep continuing to support this guy knowing and seeing all the crap his gives to us who no longer patronize Culture Japan. That would make some of these people that are diehard fans just as bad as Danny in my book. Clarifying this: the people who side with Danny and continue to side with him without questioning anything

It kind of killed me at the time when I felt like I had to make a decision on whether I could still keep my Smart Dolls and separate them from Danny. Sadly, I could not. But I will never look at someone's photos of them and judge that person for owning them.

 

I know this will get buried eventually, but to anyone looking to get into the vinyl bjd and thinking about a Smart Doll...please, please, please do your research. Do your research on any company you plan to purchase from.

If not for this thread I don't think I would have been able to read all the discussion and chronicle of events in the past couple years. Forums serve as a longer record of dialogue than something like Instagram and other social media pages.

Both people who previously knew DC or are only learning about him now could benefit to read the experiences of others here to decide whether they want to support his business.

 

@Monty that's an excellent point about this thread being a great resource to show people, especially those who may want specific named instances and hard evidence (direct links and screencaps) of the obnoxious or insensitive things Danny has done. It's not easy to direct people to them piecewise, but here, if they're interested, they'll see an extensive collection firsthand accounts often with sources and links, from the beginning of the thread onwards.

It's handy that you can link to people to it to comprehensively go "this is why I'm not eager to praise the guy". Although an r/HobbyDrama post might give a quick primer (I'm not sure I linked the right one, I think there have been a couple), it's out of date and missing a lot of incidents that are painstakingly, and painfully, documented here by the affected parties.

Edited August 10, 2022 by ebil

3 hours ago, ebil said:

@Monty that's an excellent point about this thread being a great resource to show people, especially those who may want specific named instances and hard evidence (direct links and screencaps) of the obnoxious or insensitive things Danny has done. It's not easy to direct people to them piecewise, but here, if they're interested, they'll see an extensive collection firsthand accounts often with sources and links, from the beginning of the thread onwards.

It's handy that you can link to people to it to comprehensively go "this is why I'm not eager to praise the guy". Although an r/HobbyDrama post might give a quick primer (I'm not sure I linked the right one, I think there have been a couple), it's out of date and missing a lot of incidents that are painstakingly, and painfully, documented here by the affected parties.

This is also one of the few places where you can speak your criticisms/poor experiences freely without getting piled-on by his supporters. I've been keeping tabs on the development of things on Instagram and it's bringing some truly nasty characters out of the woodwork, trying to defend him by downplaying or outright denying historical fact. That doesn't happen here, thanks to our incredible mods. Restricting access to this thread runs the risk of newbies getting dogpiled for vocalizing their grievances elsewhere.

I'll have some spare time over the next few weeks. If anyone wishes, I can start compiling a Google Doc with all the major happenings + associated bits of info on a burner email for easy referencing.

20 hours ago, Monty said:

I think this is a good idea, although I’m not sure who is up to the task. Maybe it would be good to have a separate thread for the timeline of issues without commentary, just completely neutral and unbiased list of things that have happened, without commentary (with the commentary continuing here). Maybe each issue could have a link to the relevant page of this thread too.

 

That was exactly what I had in mind: a summary of each event and a link to the relevant page of this thread. That way people can read into more detail if they want by coming to this thread or they can just read the summary. 

EDIT: I'd be happy to help out with this. 

Edited August 10, 2022 by Eiko82

Looks like somebody got even more upset, as the webstore has a new page about his superior business philosophy and why you shouldn't buy his products.

13 hours ago, Katsudon said:

I've started considering whether to go through this thread and do a series of posts on somewhere like tumblr (or somewhere better if people have thoughts) summarising the controversies. That way anyone can just get the highlights, and it can contain screenshots of sources etc.

It would be a big task, but probably needs doing.

Look what I found!!

 

https://the-bjd-community-confess.tumblr.com/post/666146019254403072/lol-kinda-funny-seeing-people-completely

 

May help with the list. 

Edited August 10, 2022 by Sebby

https://info.smartdoll.jp/en/posts/smartdoll-business-ethics

Does really someone complain because he's making too much cocoa SmD? 

This is ridiculous.

Edited August 10, 2022 by 3lysa

21 minutes ago, 3lysa said:

https://info.smartdoll.jp/en/posts/smartdoll-business-ethics

Does really someone complain because he's making too much cocoa SmD? 

This is ridiculous.

I'd take the "quotes" there with a grain of salt. No one said the quote about the uniform like that. No one said the n*zi thing about the hand. The hearing aid thing was about the cochlear implant and was a legit concern which was explained in detail. Again, not said like that. 

And honestly, when you have a business that has a lot of customers, you're bound to have a person complaining. That is unavoidable.

1 hour ago, Sebby said:

And honestly, when you have a business that has a lot of customers, you're bound to have a person complaining. That is unavoidable.

And true character shows in the way you handle things.

5 hours ago, Sebby said:

Look what I found!!

 

https://the-bjd-community-confess.tumblr.com/post/666146019254403072/lol-kinda-funny-seeing-people-completely

 

May help with the list. 

That blog isn't really worth much. It lacks evidence. 

6 minutes ago, Suiseiseki said:

6 hours ago, Sebby said:

Look what I found!!

 

https://the-bjd-community-confess.tumblr.com/post/666146019254403072/lol-kinda-funny-seeing-people-completely

 

May help with the list. 

That blog isn't really worth much. It lacks evidence. 

Well, however you want to look at it, it is the contents of this thread in a nutshell more or less, up untill 2021 ... other than we here we might have gone into the backgrounds of the doll project every now and then.

It is a bit... much when its condenced onto one page though.

10 minutes ago, Suiseiseki said:

That blog isn't really worth much. It lacks evidence. 

I know, I know. It's more a venting blog rather than evidence. But it could be a helpful list for making a good well-informed list / database with evidence of all the things that happened. Rather as a checklist to help not forget anything (after checking if it truly happened ofcourse). Because this thread is a lot of info and whoever wishes to work on it may just start missing things due to an info-overkill. But anyway it was just something I found and we were talking about making a big list thing of all the things that happened so far. 

1. "Complaining about there being too many dark skinned dolls*" and "being upset about a product/post with heavy Nazi-inspired imagery" are NOT EQULIVANT in terms of racism, so that post makes no sense.

*which I still don't think happens nearly to the extent they claim it does

2. We need a public thread of some sort discussing these things; yes there might be DC spies reporting everything we say, but there's also a lot of people new to vinyl BJD in general who come here wanting to learn more about the different companies or to know why there's controversy surrounding these products. I've seen many people show up in this thread saying they liked SmD or DC until they read everything that was going on and realized how toxic he actually is.

3. Maybe we make a separate thread that's pure "venting about DC" or "being able to say things about SmD without fear of getting stalked by non-members who are just here to spy", but I think the general debacle thread should stay.

 

In one of my discord groups, we have a thread called "void" that's just for people who want to vent about upsetting or stressful things in a safe space, and the posts get deleted after like a week. Maybe something like that?    

2 hours ago, 3lysa said:

https://info.smartdoll.jp/en/posts/smartdoll-business-ethics

Does really someone complain because he's making too much cocoa SmD? 

This is ridiculous.

Thanks for the link, I needed the laugh.

I'm not in favor of locking or privating the thread.

However, I would be in favor of creating a pinned post on the first page of the thread (or editing the OP) with a timeline of the most important events and "scandals" complete with dates, citations, screenshots and quotes from the involved parties (posted on other sites and within the comments of this thread) in order to provide a factual list of events without any significant bias so that the information is more accessible without reading through the entire thread (and also so that people are getting the information without any of the things that would lead people to think this is just a bullying thread of Entitled Danny Haters out to get him).

We could upload all of the sources and screenshots to one place in order to make sure they don't suffer from link rot or deletion over time, and also archive the original links to these sources through the Wayback machine just in case there are accusations of fake screenshots.

5 hours ago, 3lysa said:

https://info.smartdoll.jp/en/posts/smartdoll-business-ethics

Does really someone complain because he's making too much cocoa SmD? 

This is ridiculous.

I am so incredibly happy that I sold my second hand Smartdoll away. 

6 hours ago, 3lysa said:

https://info.smartdoll.jp/en/posts/smartdoll-business-ethics

Does really someone complain because he's making too much cocoa SmD? 

This is ridiculous.

Woooow. How very extra...not very appealing to seethe so hard until you turn inside out.

But, I don't know. Maybe this page needed to be created and put front and center so that people who are visiting will know first hand what it's like if you decide you're going to buy from this company. Better than finding out the hard way. His own post may end up tripping him up. 

A little note about keeping the thread public:

Keeping it hidden would make it seem like there's something to hide when I don't feel that to be the case and would only create more of an "us vs them" mentality. To my knowledge, no one here is trying to plot the downfall of Smart Doll/CJ or DC or to dogpile on him for the sake of it! Frankly I don't wish ill on the brand. I want the brand to be successful and welcoming to customers. But I do wish it was a good brand run by anyone with a backbone for constructive criticism and some modicum of forethought and restraint. DC will always have his hardcore fans and followers. That's fine. I'm more concerned with people who are here to enjoy dolls and aren't following some influencer trying to get in his good graces. Whoever is "spying" in this thread (be in one of his employees or DC himself) can do whatever they want. No one is hiding anything. It's far more concerning that DC is the one who is getting access to people's information, banning them and choosing to make his business practices based on his fragile ego taking it hit because of whatever the people in this thread on this forum say. 

To me the thread is about educating people with the history behind what has happened.

Danny’s own post sort of explains what you should expect when dealing with his company, but twisted in a way to make it sound like any criticism of his products is unfounded. There is definite hyperbole in the examples he provided, and they conveniently leave out legitimate issues that have been posted in this thread.

What is apparent though, in his words is that:

1. He considers his business employee focused. That means he doesn’t care what the customer’s opinion is. For some reason these two things can’t coexist (false dichotomy).

2. Smartdoll is created not for the end user, but created for Danny himself. So again, customer concerns are not considered.

3. If you accept the above and will gladly take what he has chosen for his product, then you can have the “privilege” of purchasing from him.

 

While I don’t agree with this business philosophy, at the same time he is laying it out plain and simple. It still doesn’t warrant unprofessional conduct with customers though. Potential customers can decide for themselves if they want to deal with this company in the event that things don’t work out properly.

In the same way that nobody should listen to the salesperson when buying a car: do your research and look for third party evidence, concerns, and comments.

9 hours ago, 3lysa said:

https://info.smartdoll.jp/en/posts/smartdoll-business-ethics

The every definition of straw man argument.

22 hours ago, Eighteafive said:

What I do have a problem with is the people who keep continuing to support this guy knowing and seeing all the crap his gives to us who no longer patronize Culture Japan. That would make some of these people that are diehard fans just as bad as Danny in my book. Clarifying this: the people who side with Danny and continue to side with him without questioning anything

I've also seen some of the people in the smart doll community commenting on the nazi-inspired post, who genuinely seemed to be afraid to be commenting on it out of fear of being banned themselves.

Like seriously. If you have to choose your words carefully because you worry that the other person might take your comments in negative light and punish you for it, that situation/relationship/arrangement is not healthy.

10 hours ago, 3lysa said:

https://info.smartdoll.jp/en/posts/smartdoll-business-ethics

Does really someone complain because he's making too much cocoa SmD? 

This is ridiculous.

Not even gonna comment on how utterly insulting it is to everyone involved to put trolls complaining about dark skinned dolls existing and Jewish people offended by nazi imagery on the same level. That speaks for itself.

I do wanna speak about the body bag thing cos that was a while back and I was kind amused that he is -still- salty about it. If you’re familiar with the other incidents he mentions there you probably already know that his version of what happened has the truth intentionally bent, but here’s a run down.

Basically a few years back he wanted to make carry bags for smartdolls and was calling them ‘body bags’. I don’t remember if these were actually for sale at any point or just a potential product tease. Body Bag is a fun phrase in English, because ‘body’ means so many different things. Sure it’s literally a bag you can put a smartdoll body in but it also sounds kinda funny, right? Besides that, a body can be living or dead, or it can be the body of an essay or even the body of a camera. Lots of meanings, pun potential, whatever.

But for the Japanese tweet he didn’t call it a ‘bodi baggu’ in katakana, he called if a shitaibukuro, literally ‘corpse bag’, the actual term for the thing you put a dead body in. It can’t mean anything else. 死体(shitai) can only mean corpse, a body that is -dead-. The kanji that spell it are literally ‘death’ and ‘body’. So what happened next was, rather than jp fans finding this funny, they just found it weird. They asked why a bag to put a doll in was called a ‘corpse bag’, because it sounds morbid, and matters of death tend to be treated delicately unless you’re being intentionally edgey. 
Danny got extremely defensive of this and made a bunch of scoffing posts in both English and Japanese (mostly English) about how isn’t intercultural communication WEIRD because can you BELIEVE Japanese people interpret ‘body bag’ as ‘corpse bag’ only, without bothering to explain to anyone who can’t read Japanese that it’s because  *it’s literally written as ‘corpse bag’* 

Japanese fans weren’t angry because ‘my doll isn’t dead!’, they were angry because a non native Japanese speaker (who was already drawing some ire due to how much he pretended he and his whole product philosophy was Japanese with his appropriation of ‘wabisabi’ etc) was scoffing at their language and making out that they were the stupid ones for thinking of dead bodies. 

Edited August 10, 2022 by Monty

From time to time we end up attracting some rather unsavory entitled consumers who will do and say anything to get what they want. For such elitist and entitled consumers, I created the Hammer Time Club, which has the following perks.

• Free lifetime membership
• Not having to deal with price points they deemed unreasonable
• Not having to deal with products they didn't ask for
• Instant savings due to the automatic refund and cancelation of orders
• Free automated email outlining the cancelation details
• Free use of the #HammerTimeClub hashtag
• Continued elite and entitled privileges.

I would rather starve than accept money from entitled consumers - which is why we created the Hammer Time Club.

 

================

This is exceedingly unprofessional, and dishonest as well.  It's NOT just customers saying anything to "get what they want," as Danny suggests here.  For any reason at all the Danny decides he doesn't like you then you can find yourself banned for life from the store.  This is part of the way in which he creates his cult following.  People feel like they are on the inside of a special club, and everyone else is just entitled and horrible.

I can say anything, literally anything I want about my Dollfie Dream.  If she has QC issues, posing problems, took too long to ship, came damaged on arrival, anything.  It's not going to mean that I can no longer buy dollfies.  I can buy clothes from the Volks store without buying a doll.  All normal things.  But Danny does lay it out here; he's not really trying to make a doll lineup that people will enjoy; it's all about him from beginning to end.  He's more interested in his cult following than anything else, and it shows.  He can call me "entitled," but entitled to what, exactly?  I'm not asking for anything from him, and I pay a pretty penny for expensive BJDs from other companies.  I'm not entitled to anything.  I just don't respect his attitude nor his bans, so I will no longer finance him.  If that's entitled, then that's truly a unique use of the word.

Edited August 10, 2022 by That_Dollfie_Dude

2 hours ago, That_Dollfie_Dude said:

I can buy clothes from the Volks store without buying a doll.

If you have the cash it's easier to buy a Rolls Royce than a SmartDoll at this point, and that's some exclusive $#!+.

This company is endless entertainment.

Imagine being DC for a day: never able to focus on the worth while things, never being able to manage your actions with maturity, never able to stop seething at nobodies on the internet along with the other children. 

Also funny how he displays and re-enforces his childish behaviors again and again. Apparently adults never taught him how to self-regulate.