Jeff For Fan Club President!

[Matt]

It's definitely a sad day for collectors and fans of the Star Wars franchise.  Like Jared mentioned, I'm embarrassed to be associated with this hobby right now, and will likely be cancelling my Hyperspace subscription as well.  There's just no way I feel morally right supporting anything that has to do with businessman extraordinaire, Phillip Wise, which obviously covers his mindless lapdog Dustin.

Josh, I think you're missing a number of key points with this thing, and it looks like you missed some very valid points while you were away today as well.  First and foremost now, is the fact that Dustin probably shouldn't have even been eligible for the contest based on the rules set forth (official affiliates of LFL, etc...).  Obviously we all know that he works for RS and TFn, which as Phillip himself pointed out today, are both affiliates of SWS.com, and other official SW licensees, but even moreso, Dustin has worked for Official Pix on at least several occasions, and they're pretty damned affiliated at this point, most folks think.  For Phillip to suggest that Dustin "only volunteers at RS/TFn and isn't even involved with Official Pix" is as much a joke as Phillip reiterating ad nauseum that the whole contest is "just for fun".  What a complete ******* liar that guy is, and it's sad to watch him bury himself deeper and deeper every time he repeats it (like he did a couple more times this afternoon).  Anyway, that was a very big point that the RS members were addressing, even moreso when Phillip flat-out admitted that they were affiliated, and that he was also getting a financial cut from all the subscriptions Dustin "sold" (like most of us already knew).

Obviously, the other huge question is WTF ever happend to USCwannabe?  Some type of official announcement would certainly help matters, and the lack thereof just adds fuel to the fire, in that everyone's assuming even moreso that Phillip started throwing his weight around when the election results didn't go his way (as we all knew he would).  Again, he's completely lied about not doing that either.  What a joke.

Hell, maybe USCwannabe did cheat somehow, or didn't pass one of the background/history checks.  Who knows?  We'll probably never know, though pretty much all of us knew this entire scenario was a foregone conclusion as soon as we realized the Final Results were never going to get posted.  Heck, I pretty much knew the moment that RS went tight-lipped on the whole matter, closing the various threads, and hiding most of the evidence of Dustin's running after he "lost".  Prior to that, they were all throwing total shitfits about how crooked the whole thing was (especially Myatt).  Then, all of the sudden, every last trace of Dustin's running disappeared.  I have a feeling they'd already arranged the outcome way back then, hence the sudden silence, and lack of further complaining and diatribes.  Yep, sure looks "un-crooked" now, no doubt.  Of course Phillip totally lied again, by saying that they were just as in the dark all along as everyone else was.  Heh.

Did Dustin run a better campaign?  Probably.  At least from what we could see publicly.  Obviously everyone's already pointed out that the enormous resources available to him made for a very unfair advantage over any other candidates.  Sure they did.  Not necessarily their fault though.  I concur that Dustin's devoted a fair amount of time, energy, and SW knowledge to get to where he is in the hobby today, so kudos to him for that.  But another big thing that I take issue with is that Dustin was probably going to be down at Comic Con anyway, working for Phillip at Official Pix (on Phillip's dime too, probably, like when he went down to Dallas).  Dustin's probably one of the last people who needs some freebie comped Star Wars collectibles as well.  So this all expenses paid trip, with free swag, is going to someone who was probably already going to get a free trip to SDCC, and already gets plenty of goodies as it is.  Instead, all this cool free stuff should've been going to someone who would REALLY appreciate it, and likely not get it otherwise, and not just take it all for granted.  It's kinda like a millionaire winning the lottery, instead of a poor family who needs it 1000x more.

Furthermore, and another huge point that most people seem to be missing, is the INTENTIONS that Phillip has for his (Dustin's) Fan Club Presidency.  Do you honestly think they're just going to roll over and accept the several token freebies, and honorary title and one-time Insider column, and that's it?  HELL NO!!!  Phillip was going to milk this thing for everything it was worth.  Anyone who's saying "well, it's not like Dustin/Phillip are even getting much out of this meaningless title anyway" sure doesn't know Phillip Wise too well.  He's had big plans on what he was going to do with Dustin's presidency since the day they (he) decided to run for it, no doubt at all.  Anyone who suggests otherwise is absolutely kidding themselves.  Hell, they were essentially bribing people with "free" $40 posters for an Insider subscription, or free front page advertising on RS just for pimping Dustin's campaign anywhere else on the net.  They practically stopped posting news altogether at RS for a couple months, just to focus primarily on winning the campaign.  This is big business for Phillip, and he's wanted nothing more than to have that "Fan Club President" title attached to his websites.

Which brings us to the most problematic issue of all:  That an arrogant, hypocritical, demeaning, greedy, pompous businessman is taking more and more control of our hobby, when he's one of the last people who deserves it.  Hell, if he hadn't completely swindled the forums away from Mike, he'd never be anywhere remotely close to where he is now to begin with!  The guy's a liar, a cheat, and a completely deceitful man who has no business turning Star Wars into his business.  That should be left for George Lucas.  What sucks is that there's not a whole lot that the average fan or collector can do about it, aside from staying away from his sites, and goods.  Of course, if you state any objections about anything over there, or about Phillip (or Dustin), he'll quickly point out that it's "his way, or the highway", and if you're lucky, he'll even throw in a nice little "get a life" comment as he boots you the hell out the door.

As for Dustin, I know some people think he's an ok, upstanding guy.  Hell, I even used to think he was up until a little over a year ago.  But for some of us, namely anyone associated with JediDefender, we now know otherwise.  This is a guy who summarily, and inexplicably (at Phillip's request, no doubt) starting banning from RS anyone who had anything to do with this site - staff members, forum members, or otherwise.  Phillip started seeing JD as a threat, so he laid down the law over there, and had Dustin personally impose it for him.  Phillp's very own version of Rick McCallum, if you will.  Dustin may only be the puppet, but he shares equally in much of the blame for their idiocy over there.  There used to be one, large, relatively happy online collecting community, but thanks to Phillip's sterling and greedy efforts, it's now been essentially fragmented into 3 seperate pieces.

Who the hell wants a Fan Club president who doesn't allow members of another (competing) site at their own?  As far as I know, Phillip and Dustin are the only ones who have ever imposed such a sanction at any collecting site online.  So I'm half expecting Dustin to start banning any and all fans of Star Trek, Battlestar Galactica, or any other Sci-Fi franchise or movie property from the Star Wars Fan Club membership.  He (and Phillip) are just petty and stupid enough to pull some nonsense like that.  Speaking of petty, ever heard of someone closing a feedback thread with 100 posts in it since "the member was banned"?  I thought not.  That's the kind of special treatment I get from Dustin, who has still refused to ever provide any reasoning for our bannings over there (though we're all well aware of why).  Funny, but no other banned members have ever had their feedback threads closed over there.  Go figure.

Anyway, the issues here are far more in depth than just "Dustin (Phillip) seems to have stolen away the victory".  They probably shouldn't have ever been in the running in the first place, not to mention that they don't deserve it, don't need it, and don't represent true Star Wars fans, or the leadership thereof.  This is nothing more than an arrogant, greedy businessman throwing his weight around, and his pathetically mindless puppet performing all the actions.  Nothing more.

But hey, "it's all in good fun", right? 

- Matt

I'm just happy his true colors were shown to all of us once and for all and I hope the SW community remembers it for a long, long time....

Actually, Phillip has shown his true colors a number of times in the past few years, but most people at RS are too new to have known of most of his prior transgressions.  My favorite of all time was when he spammed his entire RS membership via e-mail with some unwanted TRU midnight madness advertisement, then told everyone to shut the hell up, get a life, and move along, when they all got upset about it, and then HE proceeded to throw an equally large shitfit when one of the other collecting sites administrators sent HIM an e-mail that he felt was worthless and wasted his time.  The guy is as big a hypocrite and liar as they come, no doubt.

BTW, welcome aboard to the new guys.  I'm sure you'll enjoy it here (assuming you're not a fan of post-padding, spamming, trolling, immaturity, and any other number of RS attributes).

 

Somehow it seems like this picture was taken more in the interest of irony than of anything genuine. . .

[ruiner]

Anyway, I hope I'm welcome here and if so I'll probably be chatting with many of you on the Sideshow 12" forum.
 

Hope to see you there! 

You'll find the crowd here is pretty cool (and the staff is down to earth).

It's a lot easier to keep up on threads too because we don't get all the newbies starting non-essential (countless) threads on remedial topics.

[Qui-Gon Jim]

It's too bad the discussion wasn't allowed to continue as people were bringing up good points on both sides.

It's Phil's website and he can do as he pleases I guess but it seems it was all too much for him.

This incident sums up in a tidy package why I don't consider RS to be worht my time. 

When do we ever see a thread deleted here or at GH?  Threads may be locked, but the topics are still there for everyone to read.

RS is run like a communist nation where any dissent is squashed.  Ridiculous.

[Angry Ewok]

This was the final tally, as of May 15th...

Rank Screen Name Bounties
1. uscwannabe - 287
2. dustin@rebelscum.com - 183
3. mkDCSWCC - 11
4. fanostarwars - 3
5. BobSkywalker81 - 2

[S_A_Longhorn]

Funny how the thread ended AFTER the talk of money came up (and the discrepancy between RS actions and the contest rules).

 

Thank you, thank you very much!   

I have been on RS for over a year now.  And while I agree that Mr. Wise is very rude whenever he speaks to his fellow Scummers, his deleteing old threads is really annoying.  It's just "damage control".  If a thread is out-of-hand, then lock it down.  There is absolutely no reason to delete a thread unless you don't want people to see what you wrote or how you acted.  I'm proud that I got him to admit he is getting a monetary kickback from SWS.com.  And I am sure he regrets posting it.  Good thing we got a pic of his posting on here for everybody to see.

The few times I have actually seen him post on the forums, he is always rude and condescending.  Does he not get the simple fact that he is being a jackass to the very people that have made RS what it is today?  You simply do not bite the hand that feeds you......unless you can delete your "track record".

[Nirvana]

JediMAC, you speak the truth...I agree 100% with you. While I'm relatively new to the community, I have a greater understanding about what an ass Phillip Wise is and a thorn in the side of a great hobby.

[BillCable]

Hey JediMAC, don't let anybody sour you on a hobby you enjoy.  There will always be people you run into that you can't stand who weild power and influence you think they don't deserve.  But you can't allow them to ruin your fun.  Fight through that ****.  I myself have dealt with some real pricks in various aspects of this and other hobbies, but I've never felt that they somehow reflect badly on me, or felt motivated to abandon something just because they were associated with it.  I just do my best to just make sure the things I own and control reflect well on me and enhance my own enjoyment and the enjoyment of people I care about.

Remember that the best revenge is living well.

[CHEWIE]

Don't get down on the hobby guys... enjoy it for all it's worth and all the good people that are still out there.  I don't worry about these type of things, I just brush them off my shoulder and have fun with this hobby.

 

[Rob]

Remember that the best revenge is living well.

Dave Quackenbush says that failure... is the best revenge.

[Poggle the Greater]

I think JediMAC summed up what most of us posted and the general attitude over there very nicely.

I don't know if there's any conspiracy elements involved (although I never had the picture of Phillip that I do now) but more so just that Dustin or anyone involved with ANY business affiliations with LFL should not have been elligible to run.

All I asked Phillip to do was simply admit that Dustin had a tremendously unfair advantage over the "regular" fan who doesn't have the luxury of having rebelscum and TFN cram his campaign down our throats for months on end and you saw the condescending spin doctoring I got thrown back my way.

He so laughably claimed it was "all in fun" but the whole thing was just used by Phillip to be another feather in his hat. I'm dissapointed SW.com did not disqualify anyone with present or past ties to LFL licensed companies.

Oh well, I just hope when Dustin is introduced at SDCC like some conquering hero, he is met with jeers and boos. I could care less about the "presidency" title but I am sad that some fan who could have had the opportunity of a lifetime had it snatched away by someone who has already had more cool experiences as a SW fan than most of us will ever get.

Just really, really sad and shameful in my opinion.

[name]

But another big thing that I take issue with is that Dustin was probably going to be down at Comic Con anyway, working for Phillip at Official Pix (on Phillip's dime too, probably, like when he went down to Dallas).  Dustin's probably one of the last people who needs some freebie comped Star Wars collectibles as well.  So this all expenses paid trip, with free swag, is going to someone who was probably already going to get a free trip to SDCC, and already gets plenty of goodies as it is.  Instead, all this cool free stuff should've been going to someone who would REALLY appreciate it, and likely not get it otherwise, and not just take it all for granted.  It's kinda like a millionaire winning the lottery, instead of a poor family who needs it 1000x more.

Everyone keeps missing an even larger point on this item.  Yes, there were probably fans with a bigger need for the trip than Dustin, but to me - and to Dustin - it doesn't matter one iota who is paying for his trip...it was free to him anyway.  The true beneficiary of the cost savings on the trip is Phillip Wise.  He can scoff and say that he gets nothing but a good time out of all of this, but lets do some quickie math:

180ish subs at a $2 spiff apiece = $360
waiver of airfare that he would have paid for D anyway = $500ish
waiver of hotel that he would have paid for D anyway = $600ish
waiver of con pass that he would have paid for D anyway = $65

I'm not sure if the prize covers meals, so lets leave that out...we're already up to $1525ish kicked right back into Uncle Phil's pocket just by having Dustin win.  Rumor is, too, that some of the prize swag will be given away as prizes on Scum...don't be fooled into thinking of that as some kind of benevolence.  Prize giveaways = traffic and traffic = dollars.

As for Dustin, I know some people think he's an ok, upstanding guy.  Hell, I even used to think he was up until a little over a year ago.  But for some of us, namely anyone associated with JediDefender, we now know otherwise.  This is a guy who summarily, and inexplicably (at Phillip's request, no doubt) starting banning from RS anyone who had anything to do with this site - staff members, forum members, or otherwise.  Phillip started seeing JD as a threat, so he laid down the law over there, and had Dustin personally impose it for him.  Phillp's very own version of Rick McCallum, if you will.  Dustin may only be the puppet, but he shares equally in much of the blame for their idiocy over there.  There used to be one, large, relatively happy online collecting community, but thanks to Phillip's sterling and greedy efforts, it's now been essentially fragmented into 3 seperate pieces.

He's been an assbag on any dealings I've had with him too.  I pmed him a question after a thread of mine had been deleted right after the TRU spamfest and the best answer I could get was "because I said so."  Dustin is the prime reason for me pulling out of Scum long ago.

[Jeff]

So, wait.  If uscwannabe was officially DQ'ed by the Fan Club, then does that mean that I really finished 3rd?

And if I finished third, does that mean I get to be Treasurer of Hyperspace: The Official Star Wars Fan Club or something?

If something should happen to those other two guys, I will gladly be prepared to perform my duties as second runner-up and take the helm as President.   

[Sallah]

As to why USC hasn't said anything.....all I'm gonna say is sometimes, when you are going into legal action, your lawyers advise you not to speak about the case ANYWHERE. That's not to say he is bringing a suit against them, I'm just saying that's what happens when you file a suit...

And I'm wondering when Dustin's gonna start running the giveaways for the prizes, as he promised to do if he won. Comic con is week after next, so if he's giving that trip away, it's going to have to be soon....If he doesn't, I'm sure alot of people are going to throw a fit over that.....

Sallah

[name]

The rules were pretty clear on that...the prize package is non-transferrable.

Now there's nothing they can really do to keep him from giving away the collectibles, but he wouldn't be able to transfer the travel package.

[ruiner]

I know I'm beating a dead horse here but it really irks me that USC was DQ'd for whatever reason, yet an offical licensee of LFL (or employee of in Dustin's case) can be eligible!

If you're going to single one person out then show due diligence and enforce the rules on everyone!