Ethical question.... What would you do

[megozilla13]

Say you paid a customizer $300 to make you a custom figure and they never delivered. Months turn into years and there is no hope you will ever get the figure or your money back because the guy has disappeared. Is it okay to recast other head sculpts he's done, give him credit as the sculptor, and sell them until you get your money back. Was wondering what thoughts on this would be.

mikej

[B-Lister]

If he has disappeared, with $300 of your hard earned money, he shouldn't be worried about credit, and neither should you.

The way I see it, you bought his permission when he failed to deliver.

Maybe him getting a taste of his own medicine will get him to come out of hiding and make things right.

[Random Axe]

I don't know about the recasting. I don't make heads, so I have no idea where that line is crossed, even if he owes you. It's an artistic thing I guess. However, I would totally out the person on a public forum. If it's truth then the public at large needs to be aware. Just because he's not doing it here doesn't mean he's not taking someone on another forum. The more we know about this the better, but do what you feel is right.

[thunderbolt]

agreed, you need to hang him/her out to dry. That way no one else gets burned here.

[HumanWolfman]

Tough question Mike. It is easy for me to toss out advice when I am not the one being ripped off, but, 2 wrongs don't make a right, even in custom figure land. Once that line has been crossed, where will it end? After you recoup your 300, if 10 more people are in line, what will you do?

[MIB41]

That kind of scenario leaves more questions than answers. The first question being, how long were you in contact with him before he dropped off the radar? Was it just a few months? I can't fathom a situation where I'm on the hook for years. What kind of reputation did he have before you did business with him? Or did you just pull his name somewhere off the net without any references? Hopefully he was part of a community where others did business with him so you could gauge some degree of reliability like we do here. If this situation is the latter, have you asked others who might know him personally? Was his communication reliable and then one day he just wasn't there? It could be something happen to him. If it was the former and you went in with blinders on without any references (and he made excuses for an absorbent amount of time) then I would have filed charges against him. So I guess the real problem here is I don't know enough about the situation to truly advise. But on the surface, it does sound like some due diligence on your part to resolve this matter should have come into play before this stretched out into years. It would be hard to make a legal case against someone if you've been literally sitting there for years. And casting his heads without really knowing the facts doesn't sound like my first choice. I would be proactive to find out what happen to that guy and my $300.00.

[The Toyroom]

Just throwing it out there...Are we talking Flatt?

[Relic]

Is it posible the guy just died and thats why you cannot contact him. Not trying to cause trouble, just exploring a posability. People like us who remember Megos when they were new are not getting any younger. Being middle aged he could have had a heart atack etc.

[Gorn Captain]

Seems to me you were patient beyond words.
How long was is between your payment and the guy disappearing?

I'm not a big fan of recasting a sculptor's work, it's the old "two wrongs don't make a right" thing.

Sorry to hear you got ripped off...

[EMCE Hammer]

There are only a handful of people who can command that kind of money for a custom. If you have proof that you paid them, it would be nice to know just who it is for a variety of reasons. If you don't have any proof, I'm not so sure it's in your best interests to out the person publicly. By "disappeared" do you mean they can't be found by anyone, or they just won't respond to you?

Either way, if you recast this guy's heads not everyone is going to agree that it's OK and you risk tarnishing your rep over $300. Not to mention that casting and selling $300 worth of heads is a pain in the ___ and you'll probably also be guilty of peddling unlicensed merchandise on top of everything else.

[CrimsonGhost]

I think the short answer based on only the details you provided is "no."

The problem is the custom heads you intend to repro. Were they private commissions? Or, assuming it's Flatt, something that wouldn't otherwise be available?

And where would you sell the heads if you did repro them? Here? Ebay?

I wouldn't bother if I was in your position. I know it sucks to lose money, but I think your best move is to expose who it is and explain what happened.

[hedrap]

Cast it and offer it here before Ebay. This way, it's not going into the wild by your hands.

[Lord Mongo]

....and you'll probably also be guilty of peddling unlicensed merchandise on top of everything else.

99.999% of the customs ARE unlicensed. Hell, there are people on EVILBAY selling thier own hand drawn ORIGINAL ART, copies of famous covers, or Splash pages.

Back 8 - 10 years ago, I was into our hobby, and packed up and put it away for a while. my customs and finished figures alike. Since coming back, I have been following links to sites that were among the greatest places for information and pieces.. and most are broken. Of the ones that still work, information and pictures havent been updated in years. Hell, there are links here on the Museum that dont work, pages not found ECT

I'm not a fan of exacting a pound of flesh, by re casting other peoples work. BUT, I do believe that the information regarding WHO it is, should be put out there.

[megozilla13]

Maybe my question was too general here's the whole story and its alot more involved. It actually happened over ten years ago (time goes by so quickly). I used to collect Flatt figures and through this met Charlee Flatt and became friendly with him. We met in person and talked on the phone many times.

At this time I was really into molding and casting and he told me he hated doing that part of customizing. We worked out an agreement where I would mold and cast for him in exchange for credit towards his figures. He sent me, upper arms, boot feet, heads, pelvis, hands and even an entire venom body to mold and cast. I sent him hundreds of pieces and all on my dime and time. I know he used them on figures he sold. I also prepaid $1000 for two figures because he needed money and I wanted to help him out. I never got credit toward any figures, for all the work I did, and never received the two figures I paid for. Around this time he stopped doing customs because he said he was burnt out. Maybe a year or two went by and I spoke to him a few times. Each time he said he still remembered he owed me two figures. The last time I spoke to him, he offered to finish and deliver the two figures he owed me if I prepaid for a third figure. He was moving and needed money. He wanted $1500 for this third figure. I thought that was pure douchbaggery and I said no thanks.

It's been years since my last contact with him. It burns me, that he did that to me, if I think about it, but the truth is I don't think about it, it was a long time ago.

This past weekend I was cleaning out my storage space and found a ton of stuff I cast and never sent him along with all the parts he sent me for casting. Most of it, I think has no value or very little value. There are some heads and hands some people might want for customs. I thought how cool it would be to sell these copies and get some of my money back. But I also didn't feel right about it for the reasons EMCE Hammer stated. I just wanted to know what people's feeling were about a situation like this.

[EMCE Hammer]

99.999% of the customs ARE unlicensed. Hell, there are people on EVILBAY selling thier own hand drawn ORIGINAL ART, copies of famous covers, or Splash pages.

It's still something to consider. Without knowing who he's dealing with, or which property, there's always risk of a C&D.

If you get a chance, please point me to the broken links. I thought we zapped them all.

Edited to add, now that I see Mike's post and the whole story, I personally wouldn't have any issue with you selling all that stuff to someone to help recoup your losses. Casting additional items is a gray area, but I don't see how he could hold it against you if you sold what you still have. He's the one who flaked on you; it's the ethical equivalent of selling off the contents of a storage shed for past due rent IMO.