4DBrix ‘Modular Track Switch’ concept blatantly copied.

[Lowa]

Dear Eurobrickers,

With 4DBrix we have always tried to keep an open communication with the AFOL community. (Although I have to admit that for the last few months, due to our kickstarter campaign, I didn’t have enough time to do this as much as I would have liked). I really enjoy the conversions on this forum and appreciate your feedback and input which has had a significant impact on what we do.

Unfortunately, I have to revise the ‘openness’ on that level. A few months ago we introduced the concept of ‘modular track switches’ we developed for LEGO PF train track. It was brought to my attention that our concept has already been copied… in a rather shameless way, they didn’t even bother the find another name and also use the term ‘modular’. Developing a concept like the ‘modular track switch’ system takes a significant amount of time and effort, however, copying the final concept only takes a fraction of that. We have no problem with fair competition but stealing ideas straight out of kickstarter/forums is a serious issue for innovation… We have been working on other concepts to extend the track selection for LEGO trains and would have liked to discus them with you. Unfortunately, we’re no longer able to do that unless we’re willing to risk that our ideas are being stolen before we can even release the product.

We have to evaluate what the implications of this are long term. But for now, I truly regret we can no longer have these open, public discussions. You’re however very welcome to contact me directly at info@4dbrix.com.

As usual, all your feedback is welcome...

Edited July 25, 2017 by Lowa

[Toastie]

I have no clue, what is going on here, I am simply out of the loop. 

I do though have some experience with (serious) competition, with IP issues, with open access, with being non-responsive, with having to make money. With effort transformed into ideas, With others stealing it.

One way is to simply shut-up. An alternative route is being better than others, being ahead. You are ahead. You either need to proceed as fast as possible or you need to face other means of competition. Better service, more reliable products, all this - I am sorry - shit.

The moment you make ideas public without protection, chances are - (I am sorry again - and I am sure they'll moderate it and understand that!) a**holes will simply copy it.

3D Printers are all over the place - at a development pace that is unbelievable. (True) appreciation is not - anymore - or has never been. I had hoped that LEGO related ideas, efforts, small businesses are sort of - above this. Well, apparently they are not.

Reality is hitting hard again, I guess.

I do fully understand and heartily support your reasoning!

All the very best for your team,

Thorsten

 

Edited July 25, 2017 by Stash2Sixx
This is an adult forum, and if you need to use specific words to push your point, as long as it does not become derogatory, I'm fine with the language!

[Stash2Sixx]

Care to comment who the "thieves" are?  I would be curious to know.

 

[Toastie]

I heartily would like to thank you for your edit, Stash2ixx, as I feel it renders may perspective even stronger. I am utterly disappointed to what (ever it is) happened to Lowa. It is so against the idea of this forum and any place of publicly advertised activities, regardless of whether they are purely ideas or small business related. And the latter being in favor of so many dedicated and supporting users/buyers.

With very best regards,

Thorsten 

 

[Lowa]

34 minutes ago, Stash2Sixx said:

Care to comment who the "thieves" are?  I would be curious to know.

 

I would prefer not to give them additional media exposure in my threads.  I'll send you a private message...

35 minutes ago, Toastie said:

I heartily would like to thank you for your edit, Stash2ixx, as I feel it renders may perspective even stronger. I am utterly disappointed to what (ever it is) happened to Lowa. It is so against the idea of this forum and any place of publicly advertised activities, regardless of whether they are purely ideas or small business related. And the latter being in favor of so many dedicated and supporting users/buyers.

With very best regards,

Thorsten 

 

Thank you.  I appreciate the moral support...

[coaster]

As someone who has a compelling interest in these things, I keep tabs on everyone making track, so I know who you mean.  I'll respect your request for silence, but I would suggest letting everyone know who it is.  There aren't many of us, so it's not hard to figure out, and given there's no legal recourse you can take, public shaming goes a long way.  Call them out here, put them on the defensive.  

[Stash2Sixx]

1 hour ago, coaster said:

As someone who has a compelling interest in these things, I keep tabs on everyone making track, so I know who you mean.  I'll respect your request for silence, but I would suggest letting everyone know who it is.  There aren't many of us, so it's not hard to figure out, and given there's no legal recourse you can take, public shaming goes a long way.  Call them out here, put them on the defensive.  

And that is EXACTLY why I asked! Excellent point Coaster.

[Stefaneris]

I'm sorry to hear this. As @Toastie said, you are ahead and also known among AFOLs, I even saw flyers from your monorail track on an exhibition in Switzerland. Your tracks and bricks are known for the quality, I don't know if the "thieves" can achieve that.

[Younge]

8 hours ago, coaster said:

As someone who has a compelling interest in these things, I keep tabs on everyone making track, so I know who you mean.  I'll respect your request for silence, but I would suggest letting everyone know who it is.  There aren't many of us, so it's not hard to figure out, and given there's no legal recourse you can take, public shaming goes a long way.  Call them out here, put them on the defensive.  

Are they a member of this forum? It's one thing to steal someone else's IP, it's another thing to do it via a good-natured forum like this! (If that is what has happened).

Tom, a lot of us have followed your progress on here and have been amazed at the ideas that you have brought to life (and resurrected!), and I hope a dodgy act like this doesn't dissuade you too much from your ultimate goal.

[Q3671]

sorry to hear that, succes.

[moustic]

Where Can we Buy your switch ?

on www.4dbrix.com they are not to sell.

I'm very interested by your product and I want to make sure to NOT buy a copy !

I'm still hoping a 3-way switch in the future...

regards

[Trekkie99]

13 hours ago, coaster said:

As someone who has a compelling interest in these things, I keep tabs on everyone making track, so I know who you mean.  I'll respect your request for silence, but I would suggest letting everyone know who it is.  There aren't many of us, so it's not hard to figure out, and given there's no legal recourse you can take, public shaming goes a long way.  Call them out here, put them on the defensive.  

 ^ This. ^

[Lowa]

12 hours ago, Stash2Sixx said:

And that is EXACTLY why I asked! Excellent point Coaster.

I'm not sure that I want to go that way as this can backfire and bring more damage than anything.  In private conversations, they already seems to start defending themselves by claiming they released their modular switches before us...  A claim that doesn't make any sense as on their own website they have an announcement of the release of their modular switches that was posted July 9, while our Kickstarter campaign was launched April 1st.  But who will take the effort to verify that...

6 hours ago, Stefaneris said:

I'm sorry to hear this. As @Toastie said, you are ahead and also known among AFOLs, I even saw flyers from your monorail track on an exhibition in Switzerland. Your tracks and bricks are known for the quality, I don't know if the "thieves" can achieve that.

I guess it's just a matter of time, they seems to be very active at approaching AFOLs with youtube channels to start promoting their products...

[Lowa]

5 hours ago, Younge said:

Are they a member of this forum? It's one thing to steal someone else's IP, it's another thing to do it via a good-natured forum like this! (If that is what has happened).

Tom, a lot of us have followed your progress on here and have been amazed at the ideas that you have brought to life (and resurrected!), and I hope a dodgy act like this doesn't dissuade you too much from your ultimate goal.

They made a few post on Eurobricks but don't seem very active here, however, I have no idea how closely the follow the conversations.  I guess they picked up the concept from the Kickstarter campaign; it seems to be a general problem with kickstarter campaigns at the moment...  The vast majority of Kickstarter campaigns are posted by start-ups; and typically they don't have to resource to patent their ideas.

Concerning the impact on our activities.  We're working on finalizing two types of track that are closely related to automation, the decoupler being one of them.  Automation was and still is our 'ultimate goal', and I assume that's harder to copy as well.  One of the issues with automation is that it appears to have a higher threshold for people to get involved with it than new types of track.  Any feedback on what that might be or on how we can overcome that would be very helpful!

2 hours ago, moustic said:

Where Can we Buy your switch ?

on www.4dbrix.com they are not to sell.

I'm very interested by your product and I want to make sure to NOT buy a copy !

I'm still hoping a 3-way switch in the future...

regards

Thank you!  We're currently fulfilling the pledges of our kickstarter backers, so we don't have them in our shop yet.  You can place a pre-order with the following web page:

https://www.4dbrix.com/contact/preorder.php

I agree, a 3-way switch would be cool...

[supertruper1988]

Hey @Lowa I did some googling to see if I can find these folks but all of my searches turn up either TLG or 4DBrix. 

I tried these searches:

• Lego Train Track
• Lego Train Switch Track
• Lego modular track
• Lego Modular switch track

I am interested in who is copying these as well if you wouldn't mind sharing in a PM.

[Lowa]

12 minutes ago, supertruper1988 said:

Hey @Lowa I did some googling to see if I can find these folks but all of my searches turn up either TLG or 4DBrix. 

I tried these searches:

• Lego Train Track
• Lego Train Switch Track
• Lego modular track
• Lego Modular switch track

I am interested in who is copying these as well if you wouldn't mind sharing in a PM.

Well, that's not too bad... but eventually they will start showing up in searches.  I sent you an PM...

 

Edited July 26, 2017 by Lowa

[davidzq]

I was able to find it quickly.

But looking at their products, there are some differences. In particular, the way they handle continuous curve vs parallel track. I get the impression that their system is a little more user friendly because of this, but 4DBrix has advantages as well, such as ballasting.

I've received my kickstarter rewards, and am very impressed! I have a few pieces that could use a light sanding, and two pieces that are slightly warped or misaligned (won't click together fully), but sanding should fix this as well.

In the future, it looks like I'll be sticking with Tom's fine products! Well... At least until Coaster has his injection molded large radius stuff ready! :p

[Stefaneris]

They are quite easy to find via Youtube but not (yet) with Google. I took a look at their shop and to me it seems, they "modified" their system with @Lowa 's system. They were offering some switches and a double crossover before but not with the same look (they look a bit "naked") and they weren't modular. I hope that you will find a solution with them.

[Lowa]

9 minutes ago, davidzq said:

I was able to find it quickly.

But looking at their products, there are some differences. In particular, the way they handle continuous curve vs parallel track. I get the impression that their system is a little more user friendly because of this, but 4DBrix has advantages as well, such as ballasting.

I've received my kickstarter rewards, and am very impressed! I have a few pieces that could use a light sanding, and two pieces that are slightly warped or misaligned (won't click together fully), but sanding should fix this as well.

In the future, it looks like I'll be sticking with Tom's fine products! Well... At least until Coaster has his injection molded large radius stuff ready! :p

I happy to hear you like our switches.  I'm not sure what the 'sanding' is about; the track should connect just fine.  We do sometimes have like grains of plastic that get stuck in the connect.  We remove those but I cannot guarantee we never miss one... but they should be easy to remove.

[Lowa]

1 minute ago, Stefaneris said:

They are quite easy to find via Youtube but not (yet) with Google. I took a look at their shop and to me it seems, they "modified" their system with @Lowa 's system. They were offering some switches and a double crossover before but not with the same look (they look a bit "naked") and they weren't modular. I hope that you will find a solution with them.

Indeed, I'm glad you agree that they upgraded their system using our modular concept.  They could have upgraded their system without making it modular; I would have been totally fine with that.  But I guess the advantage of the modular concept was too tempting not to copy it.  We're in contact with them but so far it hasn't brought anything.  I only got fuzzy attempts to justify why 'they didn't copy us'...  their main mantra seems to be "their switches are similar because there is no other way to do this".  I don't think not knowing how to solve a problem justifies taking the solution from someone who does.  They claim they needed the modularity to be able to add studs to their naked switches.  But if the modularity is not a design feature, only a means to add studs, then why do you market them as modular switches and not studed switches ?  I certainly doesn't sound credible to me...

 

[M_slug357]

Wow, this is terribly disheartening news!!

I recently purchased some elements from this particular vendor a few months back, and now feel a bit guilty that my purchases have gone to support this!!

:(

While I wouldn't mind supporting collaboration and idea sharing between the various 3rd party retailers out there, this clear theft of such ip should not go unpunished!!

 

i guess what irks me the most (slightly more than the idea theft) is that there are SO MANY other switch types, turnout radii, and narrow gauge options that could've been researched and developed before any idea theft had to occur. The whole point (at least to me) of 3rd party Lego-compatible retailers should be to produce elements that have either been discontinued by TLG, or never produced by them in the first place.

[Lowa]

Just now, M_slug357 said:

Wow, this is terribly disheartening news!!

I recently purchased some elements from this particular vendor a few months back, and now feel a bit guilty that my purchases have gone to support this!!

:(

While I wouldn't mind supporting collaboration and idea sharing between the various 3rd party retailers out there, this clear theft of such ip should not go unpunished!!

 

i guess what irks me the most (slightly more than the idea theft) is that there are SO MANY other switch types, turnout radii, and narrow gauge options that could've been researched and developed before any idea theft had to occur. The whole point (at least to me) of 3rd party Lego-compatible retailers should be to produce elements that have either been discontinued by TLG, or never produced by them in the first place.

I couldn't agree more!  We indeed have a virtually endless list of things we could still develop, why start copying what others have done or you know they are working on ?  It's one of the reasons I started this post; I cannot find any decent reason for what they did so I wonder if they plan on making this a company strategy: copying successful innovative concepts of others.  If so, this could be detrimental to innovation with our community.  It certainly makes it impossible to share ideas on what we're working on.  

Well, as you are a (former?) customer maybe you should let them know what you think of this.  Maybe that will make them reflect on their actions.  

[LEGO Train 12 Volts]

It's sad to see someone treated unfairly ...if I ever need to buy modular switches will be 4dbrix.com

I hope to see the three-way switch one day!

[Capparezza]

Ah yes... I have found that specific vendor as well. One for my blacklist, it seems. However, I'm not into buying PF tracks as I have gone full 9V because of looks. But if I ever plan to buy something, this will definitely be a vendor I will avoid.

Such a shame that it's always the copycats that ruin our hobby. First, it's MOCs and instructions getting shamelessly copied, and now this.

[BrickMusher]

Hej Lowa,

 

 sad to hear that this happend to you. But please remember, they only copied one of your easier projects now.

I ordered some of your Monorail-Tracks and other stuff, that is really great and gives us a lot of playabillity we have waitet for at least 20 years or so. And your Train and Monorail controlling systems is also outstanding.

I think I know why they only copied one of your easier projects while the more ambitious products are furthermore unique.

And I think I also know where the real knowhow is located. So please dont take it to serious.

 

Anyway, I have to announce that I am also be willing to copy some of your and other developments. This will be in a matter of self-defense since I am highly related to old 9V Tracks and there is nothing available so far from 3rd party resellers. So I am always looking for interesting new track-geometry I can copie in 9V.

I allready have some more Ideas concerning 9V track and other train related stuff. At the moment I am busy with house-moving, but within a couple of weeks I would like to write you (again) to share my suggestions with you. Maybe its You with your abilities that can bring things to a final stage (I am neither good in programming, nor have I any Idea about 3D-Printing).

 

Keep your Head upright, I allready know where to buy my next custom monorails ;-)

 

With the best wishes and regards

 

BrickMusher