tedbeard

There may once have been bears in the Highlands but for the last 150+ years the main source for the British has been Canada. *sweet*

Oi! The South Essex must be the slowest soldiers in the whole army! :-P But seriously, any progress or should you take it off your sig? *sweet*

I will say $87. $20 (+ $5 P&P)

Finding one on a day-to-day basis (like in the horror story that started this thread) I just toss them in the garbage. However, if I have just brought home a pile from a garage sale or the thrift store and am sorting, I pile it up and bag it. I label the bag clearly with: "MEGA BLOKS (NO LEGO)" and donate it to the thrift stores. I hope they leave the labels on 'cause I'd hate to buy a bag of pure MB thinking there might be some useful bricks.

Actually the day this was first announced (two weeks ago now?) was a happy day, not a sad day. It did two things that made me happy: 1) Sent a clear message to LEGO that corporations, not just AFOLs, are upset at their predatory pricing practices. 2) I am no longer tempted to enter the lair of the evil empire and support slavery, oppression and the destruction of life on this planet which hides behind the smiley face. A win-win situation in the end. *sweet*

Yeah...right...um, I guess you missed the whole concept. Will made 30 of these by hand using custom decals and accessories he produced using a hand abs injection system. He isn't going to make any more and he is not trying to rip anyone off. How exactly could they appear in a store? What store? I think you owe him an apology.

My mistake then. The words used to describe the images were "catalog images". Since copyright can only exist in TLC created catalogs that is what I assumed we were talking about. It would of course be impossible for TLC to claim copyright on images taken by AFOLs. :-$

You are confusing trademark law, patent law and copyright law. A photograph in and of itself is protected by copyright as intellectual property. Using a photograph someone else has taken is a violation of the photographers copyright over that image. It doesn't matter what the image is, just that it was created by the photographer or, in this case, the photographers employer, TLC. We are NOT talking about images created by AFOLs. You are kidding right? :-D Bricklink is a reseller of LEGO products. LEGO already got it's profit when the original brick was sold and in any case AFOLs represent no more than 3-5% of the annual sales of TLC. How would shutting down BL create ANY positive effect on TLC's bottom line? I would bet that if BL sellers stopped buying from LEGO it would NOT be made up in direct sales to BL buyers. they would actually sell less to AFOLs which benefits no one.

Circumstantial evidence supports the flop hypothesis. The large volume of HP sets that ended up in discount resellers and/or sat on the shelves for years (yes some of them sat for more than a year). There was also the single set for the last movie which was neither original nor supported by any significant marketing on the part of TLC. If the line was successful they would have had more sets to make a complete line rather than a contractually obligated single set. Yes it's circumstantial and speculative but in the absence of clear signs of success ... But back to vehicles. I think part of the problem is limited imaginations in the marketing department @ LEGO who want clearly focused, self-contained sets. It's easier to sell a vehicle as a self-contained "thing" that can be built out of a prescribed number of parts. What else goes swoosh at those piece counts? Ooooh a newspaper stand! Mom, mom can I get a bus stop? Dear Santa, please bring me a LEGO dumpster set for my stocking. :'-) (Yes, all stuff I'd love to buy but kids, not so much.)

Every new set in the "new" castle line just makes me pine for the classics. I buy very few at deep discounts as parts packs and yet still end up with lots of useless crap (giant bionicle axe-heads WTF!?!?). Even the best castle set in the last two years, Dwarf Mine, would not win for me in a head to head with Black Falcon's Fortress.

Have you checked with Velux? I bought one last year (or was it the year before) from the company. I emailed their promotions or marketing department in Canada and they shipped me one for a reasonable price.

Thanks for clearing that up. Since I get most of my so-called technical knowledge from Hornblower and the Aubreid it is far from complete. *sweet*

What a great ship! Positives: - I like the use of the wavy flags on the stern, they really give an impression of carved scrollwork. - The cathead and hanging anchor looks very realistic. - I have to echo the praise for the figurehead, very nicely done. - The large fighting tops (I think that's the right term) where you have stationed marine looks really good and provides for lots of room for more sharpshooters in battle. - Just dwarfs your old ship doesn't it? Questions: - Something looks odd about the gun ports though. Should they be offset rather than one above the other? - I also wonder if the cannons on the quarterdeck are are little too large? Perhaps MOC cannons or even swivel guns might be a better fit? - I may be counting wrong but I only see a broadside of 24 guns each side which would make it a 48-gun wouldn't it? I thought chasers did not count for rating? But those are minor quibbles. Overall this is fantastic.

These are fantastic! I especially love the "classic" style maps. The east and west that join together look great. I can hardly wait to see how they print. I may have to go buy some water-slide decal paper for my printer!

You might want to cruise around BrickWiki for a while. Definitions may not be formal but the wiki structure does give you a good idea of how lots of terms are used.

I beg your pardon?!? If it was NOT rare or limited in numbers it would not be $3. Your comment makes no sense. *wacko*

Hat: a little brasso and the stars are gone. Torso: Why does every torso need to be printed? Blank is more versatile than ANY printing. I don't intend to build an army of the soldiers so I am more likely to pick up a few wizards. Hmmm, if no one likes them I can pick some up cheap when they go on clearance... ignore the above, the wizard is no good. ;-)

I am finding your analysis somewhat confusing. I was under the impression that Mr. Bannerman was employed as a LEGO Designer when he designed Market Street. He was influenced in style by having been an AFOL but there was never a direct contribution to this set by anyone outside of the LEGO design team.I also wonder what you mean by "in catalogues"? The ONLY fan-contributed (which is what I think you are meaning by "open-sourced") sets were the original winners of the LEGO Factory contest and the Hobby Train set. The most recent catalogue I saw had nothing in it that could be described as "open-sourced". I have no inside information but that would be a stupid business idea. Why would you throw away so much control? It would still require a lot of work to turn an LDD MOC into a viable set within a theme. The basic design of a set, to me, seems like the easy part. Testing, negotiating with the production side and refining are where the hard work happens and using LDD MOCs as a starting point does not really change those tasks nor who will have to do them.Since LEGO Factory is already running and could be expanded why would they try to turn it into something else? As it is LEGO gets to profit from people's designs when they are sold via the website. I think there might be more reluctance to letting LEGO take designs and turn them into sets to be sold in stores. Unless they started giving "designers" a percentage like on CafePress I cannot see quality designers giving their creativity away like that.

Wow, I have not been called a "youg man" (by which I assume you mean "young") for a while. As a forty year old with three kids that's unusual. *sweet* I tried very hard to remain positive in my critique and complimented her on those things she had done well. I felt that given the somewhat juvenile "OMG, BEST...REVIEW...EVER" tone that was creeping in amongst the replys, that it needed to be tempered with some thoughtful suggestions as to how a good review could be made great. Your ad hominem approach is offensive and far more negative than I was and to suggest I should do my own review is ridiculous. I live in Canada and we do not even have the set available here yet thus I am interested in seeing reviews of this set. If I already had the set I would not be so interested. And next time you propose to critique a critique perhaps you should actually read what I wrote. I said she wrote a good review for a specific audience. I did NOT say it was awful or whatever you seem to have assumed I meant. Saying something is good but could be improved can hardly be characterized as "bitching". :-|

I got one of those for Xmas last year from my sister. She found it in a thrift store in the box for $8. Yes, eight dollars! One axle was broken on the wagon and it was missing two or three pieces but the rest was perfect! When I told her what she might have gotten for it online she felt very generous. *sweet*

I enjoyed seeing this review. Nice to get some different angles on the components. Sorry to disagree with anyone however, but this was not a great review. I appreciate the effort Sandra made but a great review would include more details such as what are stickers and what are printed pieces. A great review points out flaws or limitations as well as what works or is really neat. A great review would have analyzed the price per piece and compared that to other sets/themes. One might look at the recent reviews of the Indy sets or the new Spongebob sets as examples of really good reviews. The pictures are good but a great review, above all, should provide the reader with some new information, perhaps even answer questions posed in the pre-release discussion thread. I learned nothing new about the set from this review. That said, it was a good review for someone who had not seen the pre-release discussion and she did a good job of showing said person what they could expect in the set.

We're goin' to the closet, we're gonna take a trip! We're headin' to the closet, to grab our stuff and split! Sorry, got three young kids so I have seen a few episodes. :-D

Odd, it seems to me that I have read nothing but complaints for the last five years about how SW sets killed off SPACE! until the recent introduction of Mars Mission. Different perceptions I guess.

My son's 10th birthday was earlier this month and rather than loot bags I bought this set and gave each kid one of the poly bags. They seemed to enjoy them and it kept them quiet for the last 20 minutes of the party as they built like mad. *sweet* And, for the record, the small models are really good. The Hummer was my favorite but the others (well, except maybe the boat) were all excellent for their size.

I attended a talk at BrickCon in Seattle in October given by one of those who had attended the first "workshop" (I hope he was at the most recent one) and it seemed pretty clear they spoke their minds and gave lots of ideas for how AFOLs would like the system to work.They apparently talked about different kinds of batteries, wireless recharging, different control systems (IR vs other possibilities) and other items. It sounded like they got to be fairly frank but they had to recognize that they were making suggestions, not providing specifications. The first announcement about the death of 9V came out in the days before BrickCon and I went down prepared to buy as much 9V as I could afford. After the talk I am happy to wait and invest in the new system (as someone who has very little 9V right now - those with large 9V layouts may wish to get what they can now.)