Gear Talk

I think a manufacturers or vendor, should stay above the fray when it comes to criticiziing competitors items.

Regardless of the other potential reasons , it really would just look …..bad.

I think discussing their positive attributes, in a complimentary way, would be well received.

Kind of like the way football coaches will answer questions about the opponents team or game.

Dan,
I apologize if you took my comment on the other thread personally. That was not my intention. It was only meant as an illustration about transparency. Just as Franco has been jumped on for recommending TarpTent because some may not know he seam seals them. Or Roger commenting on stoves or tents while not disclosing to those unfamiliar with him that he is in the business if making winter stoves and his own line of tents. If BPL wants there to be transparency when someone brings a new product to the forum, I just think they should make it a level playing field and require everybody who sells goods on BPL to have the same disclosure.

I enjoy reading about your stoves and your working with others to make them better. And I think you bring a lot of insights to the table because of your experience that new entrepreneurs could benefit from.

Again, my comment was not intended to single you out or imply that you shouldn't provide your insights. It was only intended to encourage others on BPL to think a bit before bashing new members for their "lack of disclosure", when hardly any of those members that are already selling gear on BPL as part of a business have to do the same.

"Just as Franco has been jumped on for recommending…"
The peculiar point here is that I don't think anyone has done that since I became part of that brand but yes a few used to "jump on" me BEFORE that, when in fact I was just a customer and a fan of the brand.

To add..
I have also been "jumped on" on other forums for apparently beign part of Thermarest and MSR (that I can remember…) simply for questioning certain comments about those brands.

Dan, did you notice point number seven at the bottom of the terms?

–B.G.–

Dan, did you see Shug using your Fancee Feest at -32F? :-)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CTuGJgka1qc&t=3m20s

Disclaimer: I love the Fancee Feest from Zelph's Stoveworks.

As a child of the digital age, BPL is not my only forum for discussion. I also run a blog, contribute often to Reddit.com, and I'm slightly, slightly involved in social media. The consequences of being a professional writer…

My point:

Reddit is a cool website (if you know how to use it, subscribing only to interesting stuff and ditching the chaff) and they have a section called "Ask me Anything" where celebrities, people of interest, and politicians come to be interviewed by the masses. Everyone from Barack Obama to Bill Gates has done an interview.

On BPL, we could format posts from gear manufacturers as an "Open Discussion" or something where people can come to direct questions. it allows manufacturers an opportunity to tout their wares, would be easily recognized by users looking to avoid advertising for personal reasons, and it'd kill the constant eggshells people have to walk on for "representation" or whatever.

Enlightened Equipment already does this to great success, as does Miles Gear.

I think an interesting point that Dan makes here is that there is a VERY fine line on BPL between who is a manufacturer and who is the "people".

How would you discriminate without effectively destroying the free exchange of ideas a forum like this depends upon?

We all make or modify our own gear. Some have sold one or two. I think we are all biased in our own way (some more than others) and it is ultimately up to the reader to fully research and educate himself/herself on a subject and the panoply of ideas and opinions regarding said subject before making up his/her mind. One positive point about BPL is you rarely find an individual opinion that stands alone and unchallenged for very long.

If you are immediately influenced by the first thing you read on a particular subject, then you probably do not belong on the internet.

I like getting input from someone who has some experience and has done research on a product. If they happen to make them for sale, so what?

There is a underlying philosophy that sales and making a profit is a negative, evil, greedy act. There is a difference between someone making a quality product and conducting themselves with personal integrity vs some greedy ripoff artist or damaging the environment, yet there are those who throw all business into the same pot like they were all sleazy car salesmen.

I could draw a line if someone includes a sales offer with each post, which would just be annoying rather than unscrupulous. If they are critical of other designs, I assume they would be pointing out the aspects, like it consumes more fuel, has x flame pattern, etc and continues my education on the subject.

In fact, there are people who share their experience on these forums rather than hide that information to protect their product. In the world of product development that is unheard of. Don't kill the golden goose!

On another (non-backpacking) forum I frequent, the mods ask that anyone affiliated with any products or brands say so in their sig. Might be one option for us here. It's there for for everyone to see, all the time. Honestly, it probably gets old having to explain affiliation with every related post.

Hi Dan

> Just because I sell stoves, why can't I or any other stove makers participate in a
> conversation about a competitors stove.
> Why can't someone come in here and announce a "kickstarter" project? It's gear, we
> are invited to talk about gear. Should a "kickstarter" item first be brought to the
> DIY forum for show and tell?

No reason why not for either of these. However, as I am sure you will agree, once the poster has a vested interest in the subject, there is a bit of a risk. It can be hard sometimes to discriminate between legitimate technical discussion and biased snarking. (Note: abstract generalisation, not aimed at anyone.)

So we try to handle this as best we can. We hardline a bit over disclosure, but I doubt anyone really objects to that. And of course there's a world of difference between saying 'XXX has a technical defect here' and 'XXX is not as good as my product'.

Technical discussion about XXX almost always belongs in Gear. Use common sense.
I think a Kickstarter project is a bit beyond the MYOG stage, so someone posting about their Kickstarter project should usually put it in Gear Deals AND disclose their interest in the matter.

Does this make sense?

Cheers

Sounds easy. If there was a commercial membership, it could show up in the panel with your name.

It's not like some issue with a legislative lobbyist, just backpacking gear. It would take a lot of work to be the Madoff of ultralight! It gets way too serious here sometimes.

>Dan, did you notice point number seven at the bottom of the terms?

–B.G.–

Yes Bob. Why wasn't the post eventually deleted? He had no "deal" to offer to members. He should have been asked to delete the link and invited to discuss his stove in "gear talk" He should not have been raked over the coals.

The guy want's to sell cheap stoves made in Asia, The tooling is complete as you can see in his photos and video. Ready for market, just needs some advertising funds I suspect. He's not selling cheap shoes, just cheap stoves. Does that get in someones nostril?

We could have had a good discussion with him if he were left to stay in "gear talk"

So many are quick to play "roger" let him do his thing. Wait till roger gets home.

I don't think any of you can say you've heard me say my product is better than your product.

Dan, I have no idea why things happen the way they do here. There is a lot of inconsistency. That gets complicated when they think they have all of the rules listed, but then they hide parts of the rules and forget the other parts. Once the camel's nose is under the tent, you don't know how it will all blow up.

However, I am certainly not the person to ask about these postings. I don't give a hoot about any of the gear rummage sales that go on every day. Somebody always seems to be wanting to get rid of the crap that they've accumulated. The commercial postings just go a bit beyond that.

–B.G.–

It's obvious to me that it is all a stove people problem. They're a tribe of ne'er do wells if I ever saw one. We should call in the UN. :)

You made me spit my morning coffee. And… I think you're right! A scary lot.

It's methanol poisoning, I'm sure. They've been huffing fuel fumes for so long it's turned them into trailer park troglodytes. What a sad waste of humanity.

Some of you old timers might remember John Austin. a while back he came here to introduce one of his pieces of gear. He met up with some resistance just like the guy that has the kickstarter program going. John had his own blog at the time that I was actively watching. He told a little story about how he was met with resistance here. Seems someone got their nostrils filled with something. He gave the backpackinglight.com address and that is how I was introduced to BPL. I eventually came here and started sharing in the DIY forum.

>And of course there's a world of difference between saying 'XXX has a technical defect here' and 'XXX is not as good as my product'.

Think about this:

Roger has a good amount of knowledge on how canister stoves are made and perform.

I have a good amount of knowledge on how DIY alcohol stoves are made and perform.

Roger makes an educated statement based on his experience with canister stoves…all is ok

I make an educated statement on a DIY alcohol stove and I'm met with resentment. Why is that?

I can only hope the year 2014 will be a better one with fewer "snivelers"

> There is a underlying philosophy that sales and making a profit is a negative, evil, greedy act. There is a difference between someone making a quality product and conducting themselves with personal integrity vs some greedy ripoff artist or damaging the environment, yet there are those who throw all business into the same pot like they were all sleazy car salesmen.

Well said.

I'll admit I've frequently been amused at the self-contradictory tenor of BPL:

On the one hand, we're obsessed with gear–with things, with objects, with owning material goods–you could call it 'greed,' I suppose, once you have more than the bare necessities you need for an outing, once you're hooked into constantly improving your gear by fractional amounts. The Gear and Gear Swap forums are the most active and popular by a LARGE margin, just look at the thread counts and posts. Some folks have entire closets devoted to their gear and could outfit an entire troop!

On the other hand, there is an ongoing undercurrent demonizing consumerism, greed, capitalism, marketing, advertising, and corporatism…which is the mechanism, in many cases, that brings us all those material goods that we love to own and discuss and compare.

"I love to drink milk, but the cow is evil."

What is this thread about can someone summarize it?

It's about 9 PM here, how about there ?

2:52

"It's obvious to me that it is all a stove people problem. They're a tribe of ne'er do wells if I ever saw one. We should call in the UN. :)"

Figures you'd want the UN involved, Dale! Pffffffff! Go ahead and secede all of our BPL sovereignty to them! I'll continue to defend the stovie's rights to post just like the rest of us, even though I am not one of them. You can have their stove when you pry it from their cold dead hands!

M

Backpacking gear is getting boring

Nick,

I read your blog post and had a few questions/comments in relation to this thread. Considering there are many backpacking sites out there, and they deal with all kinds of subjects (a fraction are gear-centric), why have you chosen to post on the gear subject so often as you say? You kind of made it sound like because you are up at 30,000 feet in a plane you necessarily have to write about backpacking gear; why not write a trip report or reflect on your time in the wilderness, etc.?). That doesn't make much sense to me.

With that said, I think a possible motive is because you actually enjoy it. I enjoy it. Lot's of people on the forum seem to enjoy it. Some of us are more/ less insecure about the time/money/effort we've spent on these objects. We joke around about it because we see that in ourselves and in others on BPL. It's ridiculous… but it's also fun and enjoyable. Honestly, your statement that gear talk is getting boring comes across to me as one of those bait posts (that seem to be ever so seasonal) because you are essentially challenging everyone's decision to spend their time here reading what everyone else has posted about gear. I find it all fascinating and fully support your honest reflection but I can imagine such posts annoying others (particularly here on BPL). Are you not in a way saying, "BPLers, what you do here in the Gear Talk section is a complete waste of time. Only insecure, materialistic, shallow, egoists would do what you are doing."?

Lot's of people who participate in the Gear Talk section are seeking advice from people who have experience with a diverse range of products in order to make wise purchases. To me it is well worth my time and effort to research with that kept in mind. In the long run I spend more time out enjoying the wilderness and have spent less money in doing so. I say thank you all for your financial sacrifice and also for your desire to spend your time here sharing about it all for free (actually we all pay money to post). Of course I also appreciate your posts/participation in that vain.

I don't think everything we do in life has to have some virtue behind it as justification. Frankly, there's a lot of stuff I do that is probably detrimental to myself (I might even agree with you that a good portion of my time here fits in that category lol). Personally, in order to maintain sanity I have learned to step away from that thought process from time to time, and just try to be somewhere for no reason at all, just a leap of faith and see what happens. In the mean time I spend some time here.