LEGO Ideas Discussion

[Vorkosigan]

Here is my personal Ideas gripe. This is not LEGO's fault, but media coverage of Ideas is frequently idiotic. Of course there is the ubiquitous "such and such could be the next LEGO set" type headlines, which is a bit like a headline "man could become millionaire" and a story about someone who bought a lottery ticket. The language in this story is a whole nother level of absurdity though: http://www.techtimes...ce-lego-set.htm It starts out with the line "In honor of Ada Lovelace's 200th birthday, LEGO has revealed a Lovelace-centric LEGO kit" which bears no resemblance to reality. Is it really that hard for a journalist to spend 5 minutes understanding what LEGO Ideas is?

[xboxtravis7992]

Isn't it fixed now, anyway? It certainly seemed so to me, when I made my last post, and still does now. Are others still having issues?

Its working again for me now.

[fred67]

The security is working for me, but the search still causes an error. The only thing I've changed is downgrading my Ubuntu install back to 14.04 and from 64 bit to 32 bit. I get "sorry, an error occurred while searching" when I click on "discover."

Works on firefox, not chrome.

[CM4Sci]

Site's fixed. For me, at least. Time to render some stuff for a project.

[Blondie-Wan]

Here is my personal Ideas gripe. This is not LEGO's fault, but media coverage of Ideas is frequently idiotic. Of course there is the ubiquitous "such and such could be the next LEGO set" type headlines, which is a bit like a headline "man could become millionaire" and a story about someone who bought a lottery ticket. The language in this story is a whole nother level of absurdity though: http://www.techtimes...ce-lego-set.htm It starts out with the line "In honor of Ada Lovelace's 200th birthday, LEGO has revealed a Lovelace-centric LEGO kit" which bears no resemblance to reality. Is it really that hard for a journalist to spend 5 minutes understanding what LEGO Ideas is?

Unfortunately, that's true of a lot of journalism in general.

[Robert8]

Is it just me or there is less activity on LEGO Ideas now?

[CM4Sci]

Maybe Ideas is dying because they didn't recently accept anything making people give up? I still have s project to finish and submit, that is if they accept "horror" games extremely popular with kids...

[Robert8]

Well... it's the Holiday season afterall.... maybe people is busy

Anyway, it seems there will be 6 projects for the next review (deadline is Jan 4).... and I think we could get 0 projects approved again.

Things are not looking good for LEGO Ideas

[CM4Sci]

I know for a fact we're getting Adventure Time Dimensions packs so I'm assuming that will be the next set.

[Robert8]

I know for a fact we're getting Adventure Time Dimensions packs so I'm assuming that will be the next set.

I meant this batch

https://ideas.lego.c...rted&scroll=278

The projects that will enter in review phase in a couple of weeks

All of them are unlikely to pass, IMO

Edited December 24, 2015 by Robert8

[Tariq j]

I meant this batch

https://ideas.lego.c...rted&scroll=278

The projects that will enter in review phase in a couple of weeks

All of them are unlikely to pass, IMO

The problem at hand here is that alot of members are voting for sets because of the quality of the set or the Licence - not because they would actually buy the set.

This is why we have 4 massive sets in the current review stage, as MoC's their phenomenal, but as proposed sets for a company with a limited production capacity they're not.

If there is no project approved at the next review round, i don't see the point to keep Ideas alive.

I think that's... debatable. Just because Lego don't choose, doesn't mean they need to shut the Ideas program entirely.

I mean, I would much rather Lego take ages choose a set that's realistic and can be developed into a good quality model rather than Lego picking some random proposal in order to keep everyone interested in the site. Just my thoughts though.

[dr_spock]

I think another way to gauge buying demand on an Idea is to charge the voters a deposit to vote. Make it like buying a car or house whether the deposit is a commitment to buy and reserve a copy. The size of the deposit can be relative to the size of the project. Deposit can be returned if Idea deal falls through.

[Blondie-Wan]

I mean, I would much rather Lego take ages choose a set that's realistic and can be developed into a good quality model rather than Lego picking some random proposal in order to keep everyone interested in the site. Just my thoughts though.

Indeed. Remember, the first few years of this program we'd get a couple years between sets. Next to that, getting "only" a couple sets a year is still a step up from those humble beginnings. We're just a bit spoiled by having had two years back-to-back with four sets apiece (something that happened in part because they had multiple review periods in which multiple projects were approved).

I think another way to gauge buying demand on an Idea is to charge the voters a deposit to vote. Make it like buying a car or house whether the deposit is a commitment to buy and reserve a copy. The size of the deposit can be relative to the size of the project. Deposit can be returned if Idea deal falls through.

I think that would have a devastating, even catastrophic effect on the whole enterprise. Hardly anybody would vote for anything. Even the most popular ideas would take years to reach 10,000 votes. It would slow support activity to a crawl.

[Fritzy]

I think another way to gauge buying demand on an Idea is to charge the voters a deposit to vote. Make it like buying a car or house whether the deposit is a commitment to buy and reserve a copy. The size of the deposit can be relative to the size of the project. Deposit can be returned if Idea deal falls through.

In other words, turn LEGO Ideas into LEGO Kickstarter.

[jfbat]

Is it really that hard for a journalist to spend 5 minutes understanding what LEGO Ideas is?

Yes, it is. It's quantity that counts regarding the content these days. So as a "journalist", you want to spend as little time on an article as possible. Pick up everything that flies by, if you want to feel good about yourself spend a few minutes on Google to be able to tell yourself you at least did some research and then post it, so there's one more piece of clickbait to sell advertising.

But that's a whole other mather...

[ejred]

Ive been surprised at the strength of the consensus that Beagle is not approveable. I suppose it's true, but I feel like lego could jigger with the design to small it up (and drop the silly brick sails) and it could be a very appealing mix of aesthetics, history and science; while complementing, not overlapping, pirates... but I'm biased I suppose...

Edited December 25, 2015 by ejred

[Sven F]

What happened to that marble maze game which unfortunately doesn't look too promising sale-wise to me.

There are 4 ideas sets on the shelves currently, and at least 3 of them are bound to stay for a while, maybe it's for the best we have a break rather than hacinv one of them retire.

Edited December 25, 2015 by Sven F

[x105Black]

I know for a fact we're getting Adventure Time Dimensions packs so I'm assuming that will be the next set.

This is the most exciting LEGO news I've heard in a while!

[Robert8]

What happened to that marble maze game which unfortunately doesn't look too promising sale-wise to me.

There are 4 ideas sets on the shelves currently, and at least 3 of them are bound to stay for a while, maybe it's for the best we have a break rather than hacinv one of them retire.

Oh...

I forgot about that set...

I assume it will be revealed soon. The results of the latest review should be up in less than a month

[Blondie-Wan]

What happened to that marble maze game which unfortunately doesn't look too promising sale-wise to me.

It's still in development, one presumes, though I'd guess that's mostly done by now. I expect the final version to be revealed soon.

I don't pretend to know what its sales will be like, but I'm sure LEGO has a good idea, and they've obviously decided it will likely sell at least well enough to warrant doing it.

There are 4 ideas sets on the shelves currently, and at least 3 of them are bound to stay for a while, maybe it's for the best we have a break rather than hacinv one of them retire.

There are five currently readily available, actually - Ghostbusters, Birds, The Big Bang Theory, WALL•E, and Doctor Who.

[Kaanere]

Looks like they are aslo noting a disminution of activity in Lego Ideas, they are spamming this GIF everywhere:

[AndyC]

I notice that with that gif they also seem to be pushing "original" ideas, so I think TLG are all too aware that the license heavy skew is causing some issues.

[Robert8]

I saw that gif on facebook

I don't recall them promoting the line in this way before

At least it means LEGO Ideas is not going anywhere

[BirdOPrey5]

But they aren't looking for Ideas, are they? They are looking for people to guerilla market their website for them. If they were looking for ideas a panel from Lego would decide every project, there would be no need for 10,000 votes.

[Blondie-Wan]

But they aren't looking for Ideas, are they? They are looking for people to guerilla market their website for them. If they were looking for ideas a panel from Lego would decide every project, there would be no need for 10,000 votes.

All of the thousands of projects? It takes them a good while to evaluate each of the handful of projects that do make it to 10k votes each period. There's no way they could fully evaluate each and every single thing that gets submitted. They'd have to have a dedicated team of hundreds of people just for LEGO Ideas.