LEGO Ideas Discussion

[Blondie-Wan]

21 minutes ago, MAB said:

If LEGO saw something like this going on, I'd hope that they shut down all the projects involved. 

What for? It’s not a rules violation. There’s an expectation that people will find creative ways to promote their projects to garner votes. If something like this helps with some portion of the total support count for a project (a portion you yourself observe will likely be relatively minute), what’s wrong with that?

___________________

Meanwhile, the latest 10K Club interview is up, featuring the creators of I Am Amelia Earhart.

[Laura Beinbrech]

2 hours ago, Bricked1980 said:

After some detailed research I have managed to isolate the key factor that will guarantee a successful and swift rise to 10,000 votes for any LEGO Ideas project. So I have therefore adapted my project to reflect these findings.

Ladies and Gentlemen, allow me to present "Elon Musks' Space X Traction Engine".

I'm expecting 10,000 votes by this tomorrow please guys!  https://ideas.lego.com/projects/2a2ec583-9836-4868-8dc7-6b3bb0a2fe80

Yess!  Then all you need to do is get someone who has a 3-d animation program to import your model, then use it to re-create the opening sequence from the 1981 cult-classic film, "Heavy Metal", complete with a LEGO spaceman rocking out to "Radar Rider" by Riggs on the way down to the planet's surface.

I guarantee you'd get 10K votes in less than a week that way!    Well I'd guarantee you'd get my vote at least, providing I'm ever able to actually log in to the gosh-darn LEGO Ideas site, that is....

[parsom]

2 hours ago, Laura Takayama said:

 providing I'm ever able to actually log in to the gosh-darn LEGO Ideas site, that is....

Does it still not working properly?

[Modeltrainman]

Quote

 

Hey, Bricked1980! Ideas just let me log in, weirdly, so I supported your Traction Engine. I LOVE Earth Green.

[Artanis I]

9 hours ago, Blondie-Wan said:

What for? It’s not a rules violation. There’s an expectation that people will find creative ways to promote their projects to garner votes. If something like this helps with some portion of the total support count for a project (a portion you yourself observe will likely be relatively minute), what’s wrong with that?

You're supposed to support a project on its merits, not because it belongs to the clan you're signed up to

It would defeat the purpose of raising support at all if garbage projects are voted up by people that don't actually care about it. So if it's a deliberate organised ploy to pool votes, the Ideas team should shut it down.

[Blondie-Wan]

On 9/10/2018 at 9:44 PM, Artanis I said:

You're supposed to support a project on its merits, not because it belongs to the clan you're signed up to

It would defeat the purpose of raising support at all if garbage projects are voted up by people that don't actually care about it. So if it's a deliberate organised ploy to pool votes, the Ideas team should shut it down.

Every project on the site is a “deliberate organised ploy” (gasp!) to garner votes. Shocking, I know. And submitters are expected to actively try to raise support for their projects. A mutually supportive group of submitters trying to raise one another up is to be celebrated, not frowned upon.

There are strategies that are off-limits - for example, one isn’t permitted to run contests pertaining to Ideas projects - but a mutual support group isn’t that.

(Frankly, I think it’s also somewhat unkind of you to haughtily dismiss fellow EBers’ efforts as “garbage”. I don’t think the people setting this up think their projects are garbage - but hey, since they’re right here, you can ask them yourself. And the merits of projects are in the eye of the beholder.)

Edited September 20, 2018 by Blondie-Wan
Toning down a needlessly brusque statement

[Laura Beinbrech]

8 hours ago, parsom said:

Does it still not working properly?

Nope!  I can get past the activation code screen, but when I click on the "I agree" button, it keeps telling me that my email address is already associated with a LEGO account, but when I try to log in with my Lego.com account & password, it makes me go through the activation like I'm setting up an account...  I'm just going to have to try wrangling with customer service again tomorrow & see if they can't pull their headquarters out of their hindquarters....

[MAB]

5 hours ago, Blondie-Wan said:

There are strategies that are off-limits - for example, one isn’t permitted to run contests pertaining to Ideas projects - but a mutual support group isn’t that.

 

 

This does not follow the rule as written. "While you may promote as you wish online, we do not allow independent contests and giveaways to be run or promoted on our website for legal and privacy reasons. Product Ideas engaged in the above activities will be removed without notice."

So you are allowed to run contents about your idea, just not on their website. For example, if a youtuber submits an idea then runs a competition on youtube to giveaway a smaller version if he gets to 5000 votes in a month, this does not appear to break the rule. The competition is run on youtube, not on LEGO's website.

There are other things that the rules do not appear to disallow. For example: vote for my idea and I will give you 5c (or donate 5c to charity) if I get X votes per month. I'd imagine most people would be against the buying of votes but the rules don't seem to explicitly stop it.

 

[Bricked1980]

8 hours ago, Modeltrainman said:

Hey, Bricked1980! Ideas just let me log in, weirdly, so I supported your Traction Engine. I LOVE Earth Green.

Thanks very much, and glad you've managed to sign back in. By the way, just to let you know the link in your signature is broken. I assume it should link to your Ideas project, but just brings up an error code when I click it.

[Modeltrainman]

Disregard.

Edited September 11, 2018 by Modeltrainman

[parsom]

Am I wrong or since few days the upper part of the Ideas main page is occupied by the same projects and nothing is changing there? With the expired one at 5th place.

[touthomme]

12 hours ago, Laura Takayama said:

Nope!  I can get past the activation code screen, but when I click on the "I agree" button, it keeps telling me that my email address is already associated with a LEGO account, but when I try to log in with my Lego.com account & password, it makes me go through the activation like I'm setting up an account...  I'm just going to have to try wrangling with customer service again tomorrow & see if they can't pull their headquarters out of their hindquarters....

One thing worth trying, if you haven't already, is to clear all the cookies in your browser for all lego.com sites. I was having this problem, and that seemed to work for me.

J

[Blondie-Wan]

10 hours ago, MAB said:

This does not follow the rule as written. "While you may promote as you wish online, we do not allow independent contests and giveaways to be run or promoted on our website for legal and privacy reasons. Product Ideas engaged in the above activities will be removed without notice."

So you are allowed to run contents about your idea, just not on their website. For example, if a youtuber submits an idea then runs a competition on youtube to giveaway a smaller version if he gets to 5000 votes in a month, this does not appear to break the rule. The competition is run on youtube, not on LEGO's website.

There are other things that the rules do not appear to disallow. For example: vote for my idea and I will give you 5c (or donate 5c to charity) if I get X votes per month. I'd imagine most people would be against the buying of votes but the rules don't seem to explicitly stop it.

 

Thanks for the distinction; I clearly needed three additional words for 100% accuracy. My point stands, though.

Re: the implications of your final paragraph, while I see what you’re getting at, I think there’s a clear difference between putting out a general offer to reward supports (votes) with some form of compensation, and a shared effort among Ideas submitters to help one another out, especially if there’s an underlying agreement among this small group of project creators that they all have projects that deserve support.

You should bear in mind that many folks here and on Ideas aren’t intent on keeping one another down; they want to help others succeed. I haven’t submitted a single project yet of my own, despite longstanding plans to do so, but I’ve supported 2,600 different projects (or product ideas, as we call them now) since the CUUSOO days. People offer one another feedback and advice on how to garner more votes. Lots of Ideas users seem to want to treat it as a community, and regard it as a victory for the whole community whenever some user-submitted idea makes it through to become a set, even regardless of whether or not that particular idea targets our own specific personal interests.

[Blondie-Wan]

Some of you may remember reading that the LEGO House in Billund is going to have a special Ideas exhibit soon, featuring many projects from over the years that had accrued full support and made it to review but were not selected for production as sets. The latest blog post offers a little preview of the exhibit, as they receive models from Ideas submitters, while also assembling physical versions of other projects that were previously LDD-only. It’s a fun post.

[Bricked1980]

I've created a miniature version of my LEGO Ideas project made up from just 82 bricks, and called it "The Little Workhorse" 

 

You can read more about it here.

If anyone is interested in building this then you can find the instructions on my LEGO Ideas page. Only thing I ask in return is if you'd be kind enough to support my model whilst you're there. 

[Digger of Bricks]

Well, it looks like Bricklink (in collaboration with The Lego Group) will be hosting an Ideas-like opportunity in a few days from now...

Bricklink - Your design can become a limited edition 60 Years Anniversary set!

Quote

After we posted a teaser about the AFOL Designer Program, we closely monitored the conversation surrounding it. It was fun to read what you all thought this program would be. So what is it exactly? In case you missed it, BrickLink and the LEGO Group are celebrating 60 years of the LEGO® brick with the AFOL community by realizing unique designs with truly original themes. Through this program, your design can become a limited edition 60 Years Anniversary set!

How does the AFOL Designer Program work?

The program will have three main phases: 

1. Accepting entries - To give you some time to think about what you’d like to design, we will begin accepting entries on September 18th until November 18th. Your designs will not be displayed publicly during this time. The LEGO design team will review your submissions made with Studio 2.0, and up to 20 finalists will be selected.
2. Crowdfunding - Selected designs will be announced and displayed for crowdfunding beginning February 2019. You will be able to pre-order designs at this time.
3. Release - Successfully crowdfunded designs will become a limited edition 60 Years Anniversary set exclusively available on BrickLink. We will begin shipping orders April 2019.

Why should I submit my designs?

Besides being able to share your designs with the AFOL community, designs that are selected for realization will also be reviewed and produced as limited edition box sets. On top of that, BrickLink will pay 10% of total sales revenue to designers for all successfully crowdfunded AFOL designs including pre-order. You will retain full IP rights for non-selected designs, meaning you can freely use your original designs for any other purpose after the event.

Even if you aren’t a designer, we’d still love everyone to get involved! You can share your ideas with the AFOL community in the Studio 2.0 forum. 

Ready to get started?

The AFOL Designer Program requires that your designs are submitted with Studio 2.0, which has improved functionality and new features for this program (new features will be available Sep 18th). A building palette made specifically for the AFOL Designer Program will be included so that you are able to focus more on the design itself. Next, check if your design is stable with the all-new stability check because we want to fall for designs, not have them fall apart. Then you can export breathtaking images and even create building instructions for your designs!

 

[Bricked1980]

Absolutely chuffed about this and still can't quite believe it. I've been lucky enough to have my model featured in today's copy of the Leicester Mercury newspaper. Here's my model splashed across the front page (shame about the terrible article below it).

Then on page 3 there was a full page article all about me and my project for Lego Ideas. Warning!!! Face reveal below.

If anyone wants to read the full article you can find it here. https://www.leicestermercury.co.uk/news/local-news/train-enthusiasts-lego-model-design-2002147

[Digger of Bricks]

1 hour ago, Bricked1980 said:

Absolutely chuffed about this and still can't quite believe it. I've been lucky enough to have my model featured in today's copy of the Leicester Mercury newspaper. Here's my model splashed across the front page (shame about the terrible article below it).

Oh my...  ...and they even headlined its portrait right below the paper's name on the front page!  

[Bricked1980]

1 hour ago, Digger of Bricks said:

Oh my...  ...and they even headlined its portrait right below the paper's name on the front page!  

Well the journalist who wrote the article had told me it would be live on the Web version of the newspaper today but also said there was no guarantee it would definitely make it in to the printed copy. So I hadn't set my hopes too high when I called in at the store earlier this morning. But then when I saw all the copies on the shelf with my picture on the front page, I was pretty damn pleased to say the least. 

[Blondie-Wan]

Outstanding! Congratulations, Bricked1980! That’s an amazing bit of publicity, and a nice article, to boot.

[parsom]

OK, it's not funny. I get info from further potential supporters that they can't log in. What the f...? Is one of the biggest toy companies of the world unable to make theirs web page work properly?

I contacted with Lego Ideas. And they answered:

"I'm sorry to hear some of your potential supporters are having trouble logging in. Please ask them to write to us at support.ideas@lego.com so that we can look into the issue that's affecting them."

This is getting ridiculous. They ask me to convince strangers to me to write to Lego and explain issues caused by theirs last "improvements". Those unsuccessful supporters are people outside the Lego community. They try to do something connected with Lego and if this doesn't work, they just quit it and don't care. And I guess that I know only about a small fraction of such cases.

And since yesterday I have no new supporters, but I know that some people were trying to vote.

Edited September 16, 2018 by parsom

[jonwil]

Nice one getting your Ideas project on the front page of what (as far as I can tell) is a reasonably well-read paper in that town.

 

[Venefic]

What a tremendous effort! It looks especially eye catching on the front page.

[Bricked1980]

On 9/16/2018 at 4:36 AM, Blondie-Wan said:

Outstanding! Congratulations, Bricked1980! That’s an amazing bit of publicity, and a nice article, to boot.

Thanks very much. It was complete stroke of luck that this came about. As part of my promotional efforts I decided to try an old fashioned method and produced a small batch of printed flyers advertising my model. I left a batch of these at my local heritage railway in the hope that they might catch the attention of steam enthusiasts. This was several weeks ago and to be honest I don't think I gained many votes at all from doing this and had written it off as being a waste of time. As it turns out though it was these leaflets that had been spotted by the journalist, so if I hadn't of made those then chances are the newspaper article would never of happened.

8 hours ago, jonwil said:

Nice one getting your Ideas project on the front page of what (as far as I can tell) is a reasonably well-read paper in that town.

Thank you. Yes it's a well known paper here in Leicester. I have been reading it for years so it was pretty surreal seeing my Lego design on the front cover. 

51 minutes ago, Venefic said:

What a tremendous effort! It looks especially eye catching on the front page.

Thanks a lot. Was only expecting a short article buried in the paper but to get a full page write up on page 3 and the model itself featured on the front page was more than I'd ever expected. 

[MAB]

On 9/11/2018 at 7:30 PM, Blondie-Wan said:

You should bear in mind that many folks here and on Ideas aren’t intent on keeping one another down; they want to help others succeed.

 

I don't see any problem with that at all. If the other person (B) designs a project they (A) like, then they (A) should support it. However, A supporting something that they don't like just because B supported their entry seems wrong.

 

It also seems a logistical nightmare. Someone has to keep the list of projects that everyone has to support up to date, and contact the members whenever a new one is added to ensure they vote and keep their end of the bargain.