Just what?s going on with DMCH?

[SonnyV]

As one of the people who just wants to talk shit in private comms, is it productive? On a grand scale, no. On a personal level? Sometimes you just have to vent about stuff that pisses you off before your head explodes, and after over a decade of new cars and new parts that have been promised but never delivered, I think a lot of us are just at that point with DMCH, especially with some of the stuff they've been doing lately that's come off as overtly hostile toward the community. When there's nothing you can constructively do to change a situation but it still sucks, sometimes you just want to screech to somebody who gets it.

Serenity now...

(insanity later lol)

Some things DMCH has done should not be forgotten.

[jamesrguk]

What you post on face book gets lost after a week or two and is very limited to search and even comments get buried in sub comments unless you keep updating and reading the whole thing over and over again. I still only post technical stuff on TALK. It's a shame a lot of owners don't access it.

This is so true, the number of times I've seen a really interesting post about a new product or DeLorean related trinket and I can never find it again especially as there are so many DeLorean FB groups.

I must confess that many of the new parts I design I launch/preview through FB, I really ought to post on here too but don't like to feel I'm just using the forum to sell stuff. Also most of my products are sold via DeLoreanGo so it could seem like I'm just a plant for them.


James

[DMCVegas]

As one of the people who just wants to talk shit in private comms, is it productive? On a grand scale, no. On a personal level? Sometimes you just have to vent about stuff that pisses you off before your head explodes, and after over a decade of new cars and new parts that have been promised but never delivered, I think a lot of us are just at that point with DMCH, especially with some of the stuff they've been doing lately that's come off as overtly hostile toward the community. When there's nothing you can constructively do to change a situation but it still sucks, sometimes you just want to screech to somebody who gets it.

Serenity now...

(insanity later lol)

It's true that commiseration can not just help in dealing with difficulty, but can be a team-building exercise to help build bonding between coworkers and friends. Likewise venting can be quite cathartic. In whichever form it takes such as the venting discussed or even dark humor. All are wonderful coping mechanisms.

However...

These are the byproducts of negative situations, and absolutely should remain as such. Let me put it this way: If you have a group of people who are either dealing with a shared group task, or are coincidentally dealing with a matching personal task on an individual basis and are facing the same challenge(s), you'll get that venting. And that is fine, because the end goal is to accomplish that instigating task. The blowing off of steam is completely secondary and the responsibility of completing your task regulates things to keep the individual(s) focused on the goal at hand. Then once the goal is achieved you have this sense of accomplishment that provides positivity that cancels out the negativity (if not at least most of it). Thus is keeps things positive, or at least not as negative.

On the flip side here, seeking out a group whose sole task is there to complain? Yeah, fuck that. When the goal of the group isn't simply to find closure in something in order to move on but to instead feed off of negativity, that that's just going to be an incubator of suffering that never helps anyone to heal because it feeds off of anger and pain and will constantly need to be replenished. Not to mention that like a junkie chasing a lost high thanks to simultaneously fighting a tolerance they've built up to the very narcotic they depend upon for their release, the group will simply keep on upping the negativity to satisfy that need. Everyone will simply find more and more things to complain about, becoming ever worse and/or outrageous in each resentment they post, breeding more and more discontent and hatred along the way.

Kind of like this:
https://youtu.be/ue7wM0QC5LE


Alas it will be nothing more than a party of grievances where the goal is discord rather than actual solutions. Because after all if whatever ails you is eliminated, and it was grievances that you substituted for the bonds of relationships instead of positive, truly beneficial shared interests, then where would you be? So it is negativity that you must foster to strengthen those bonds. How does anyone think that is going to benefit them? If you wallow in negativity and anger, do you not think that's going to warp you to some degree? That such negativity will carry over offline into the real world and affect your personal and professional relationships?

If that's your thing and makes you all happy, then do your thing. Who am I to stop you? Just be aware of those dangers lest "insanity later" becomes a self fulfilling prophecy.

1972197978-friedrich-nietzsche-philosopher-whoever-fights-monsters-should-see-to.jpg

Some things DMCH has done should not be forgotten.

Indeed those who cannot learn from history and doomed to repeat it. Just don't forget that's an all-encompassing fact that applies universally.

[DaraSue]

When the goal of the group isn't simply to find closure in something in order to move on but to instead feed off of negativity, that that's just going to be an incubator of suffering that never helps anyone to heal because it feeds off of anger and pain and will constantly need to be replenished. Not to mention that like a junkie chasing a lost high thanks to simultaneously fighting a tolerance they've built up to the very narcotic they depend upon for their release, the group will simply keep on upping the negativity to satisfy that need. Everyone will simply find more and more things to complain about, becoming ever worse and/or outrageous in each resentment they post, breeding more and more discontent and hatred along the way.

That's one possible outcome, but it's not necessarily the foregone conclusion you're assuming it is. I've seen an anonymous fandom community that was started to complain about snowflakes and SJWs evolve into one of the central places for fandom discussion and creative writing and personal support. There are still 200-comment threads of people arguing over salad dressing or whatever but along with the wank there's a lot of worthwhile stuff there. And all because 10 years ago some people wanted to bitch about other people bringing crying babies to fanvid shows at conventions. Who's to say the people bitching about DMCH now won't form a consortium that produces some new binnacles and idle speed motors that don't fail right out of the box? If people care enough to complain, sometimes they care enough to actually do something. It's rare, but it does happen.

[DMCVegas]

That's one possible outcome, but it's not necessarily the foregone conclusion you're assuming it is. I've seen an anonymous fandom community that was started to complain about snowflakes and SJWs evolve into one of the central places for fandom discussion and creative writing and personal support. There are still 200-comment threads of people arguing over salad dressing or whatever but along with the wank there's a lot of worthwhile stuff there. And all because 10 years ago some people wanted to bitch about other people bringing crying babies to fanvid shows at conventions. Who's to say the people bitching about DMCH now won't form a consortium that produces some new binnacles and idle speed motors that don't fail right out of the box? If people care enough to complain, sometimes they care enough to actually do something. It's rare, but it does happen.

Welp, moving the goalposts in a debate isn't going to strengthen that particular side.

As I said, it's all in your goals. If your goal is to simply have a place to complain and feed off of other complaints, as you indicated initially, then yes I would say you will be negatively affected. One needs only look around both online and in real life to see that very outcome from social and mass media. Once of the most memorable scenes, if not lessons on dealing with media I've ever seen:

https://youtu.be/9G6xu-J_Dmc

Hate watching media, let alone hate participation online via social media will indeed change you. Lest you are some tribesman living in the bush, you know you've experienced this first hand in the way people have changed in the past 15 years. Which, again is a change in yourself you risk and essentially cannot detect if you choose to only stay isolated within an echo chamber.

But let's get back to that whole moving goalposts thing there. Your new post has changed the reasoning for wanting participation. Whereas you previously said you wanted likeminded people to become angry within a *therapeutically* perpetual Two Minutes Hate session, now you state is it to try and initiate some sort of change with DMCH. Ok then, indulge me here:

1. Have any of you directly enquired to DMCH through an official channel as to what the status of binnacles, or whatever other things you feel they have failed to deliver, why they have not brought those products to market?
2. If any of you have asked, were you actually polite and professional?
3. If these products you want actually became available, would you actually purchase them? Or just refuse to as some sort of continuing protest?
4. Have you considered working with them on these products? Such as a deposit with a timetable to deliver said products with a refund if they fail to provide them?
5. Do you, or especially anyone else in the group you mentioned as the example we're speaking of, actually want DMCH to come through? I mean, with the entire purpose as previously mentioned being having something to complain about, that would eliminate the purpose of your bonding and potentially erase at least part of the identifies of some people. Is that something you're really willing to risk?

Otherwise citing your singular example of a group of grievances which became a central hub of communication, what's the point? Is that the counter to my argument? Or do you feel that we need yet ANOTHER DeLorean-centric communications platform? Is this once again someone trying to lay claim to the DeLorean marque? Because believe me it will fail.

[DaraSue]

Welp, moving the goalposts in a debate isn't going to strengthen that particular side.

As I said, it's all in your goals. If your goal is to simply have a place to complain and feed off of other complaints, as you indicated initially, then yes I would say you will be negatively affected. One needs only look around both online and in real life to see that very outcome from social and mass media. Once of the most memorable scenes, if not lessons on dealing with media I've ever seen:

https://youtu.be/9G6xu-J_Dmc

Hate watching media, let alone hate participation online via social media will indeed change you. Lest you are some tribesman living in the bush, you know you've experienced this first hand in the way people have changed in the past 15 years. Which, again is a change in yourself you risk and essentially cannot detect if you choose to only stay isolated within an echo chamber.

But let's get back to that whole moving goalposts thing there. Your new post has changed the reasoning for wanting participation. Whereas you previously said you wanted likeminded people to become angry within a *therapeutically* perpetual Two Minutes Hate session, now you state is it to try and initiate some sort of change with DMCH. Ok then, indulge me here:

1. Have any of you directly enquired to DMCH through an official channel as to what the status of binnacles, or whatever other things you feel they have failed to deliver, why they have not brought those products to market?
2. If any of you have asked, were you actually polite and professional?
3. If these products you want actually became available, would you actually purchase them? Or just refuse to as some sort of continuing protest?
4. Have you considered working with them on these products? Such as a deposit with a timetable to deliver said products with a refund if they fail to provide them?
5. Do you, or especially anyone else in the group you mentioned as the example we're speaking of, actually want DMCH to come through? I mean, with the entire purpose as previously mentioned being having something to complain about, that would eliminate the purpose of your bonding and potentially erase at least part of the identifies of some people. Is that something you're really willing to risk?

Otherwise citing your singular example of a group of grievances which became a central hub of communication, what's the point? Is that the counter to my argument? Or do you feel that we need yet ANOTHER DeLorean-centric communications platform? Is this once again someone trying to lay claim to the DeLorean marque? Because believe me it will fail.

Providing a counterexample to something you state as if it were indisputable fact isn't "moving the goalposts", it's just providing an example from my own personal experience as a counterpoint to your apparent assertion that venting can only result in a positive outcome when the people involved are already working on a shared goal. Sometimes the shared goal actually arises from a bunch of people finding common ground in being pissed off about the current state of things. Will that be the case here? I don't know. I'm not actually one of the cool kids in that chat group.

As far as your questions, I don't know what every single other person in the community has offered or done. I personally don't need a binnacle right now but I would be happy to purchase a quality ISM in the event that I needed to replace the rebuilt Bosch Mike McElhatten found for me (after two of DMCH's failed right out of the box). If DMCH or any other vendor is crowdfunding wheel hubs or taillights or any of the other out-of-production parts that people have mentioned being a future issue, I would potentially be interested in getting in on that, as I assume many others would as well. Some of us (including me) might be hesitant to front money to DMCH given our experiences and observations in the not-too-distant past but if there's a reasonable assurance that we'd get what we paid for and not some cockamamie NFT then it's not out of the question.

I don't speak for any of the other complainers, but I for one am not trying to "lay claim to the DeLorean marque" because if you've been paying attention to all the bitching about DMCH lately, THAT'S WHAT MOST OF US ARE PISSED OFF ABOUT. And no, bitching about DMCH isn't a big part of my identity or something I want to spend 24/7 doing, it's just something that I occasionally find enjoyable because occasionally DMCH PISSES ME OFF. You assuming that's the case based on a couple of posts here is a pretty big leap. Sorry but not everybody takes hours formulating their entire worldview/manifesto into a forum post. Some of us just shitpost in the moment, and in the moments that I was posting in this thread I was pretty annoyed with the latest of several annoying decisions by DMCH.

I eagerly await your next treatise on why I'm wrong, wrong, wrong, brimming over with wrongability.

[DMCVegas]

Providing a counterexample to something you state as if it were indisputable fact isn't "moving the goalposts", it's just providing an example from my own personal experience as a counterpoint to your apparent assertion that venting can only result in a positive outcome when the people involved are already working on a shared goal. Sometimes the shared goal actually arises from a bunch of people finding common ground in being pissed off about the current state of things. Will that be the case here? I don't know. I'm not actually one of the cool kids in that chat group.

As far as your questions, I don't know what every single other person in the community has offered or done. I personally don't need a binnacle right now but I would be happy to purchase a quality ISM in the event that I needed to replace the rebuilt Bosch Mike McElhatten found for me (after two of DMCH's failed right out of the box). If DMCH or any other vendor is crowdfunding wheel hubs or taillights or any of the other out-of-production parts that people have mentioned being a future issue, I would potentially be interested in getting in on that, as I assume many others would as well. Some of us (including me) might be hesitant to front money to DMCH given our experiences and observations in the not-too-distant past but if there's a reasonable assurance that we'd get what we paid for and not some cockamamie NFT then it's not out of the question.

I don't speak for any of the other complainers, but I for one am not trying to "lay claim to the DeLorean marque" because if you've been paying attention to all the bitching about DMCH lately, THAT'S WHAT MOST OF US ARE PISSED OFF ABOUT. And no, bitching about DMCH isn't a big part of my identity or something I want to spend 24/7 doing, it's just something that I occasionally find enjoyable because occasionally DMCH PISSES ME OFF. You assuming that's the case based on a couple of posts here is a pretty big leap. Sorry but not everybody takes hours formulating their entire worldview/manifesto into a forum post. Some of us just shitpost in the moment, and in the moments that I was posting in this thread I was pretty annoyed with the latest of several annoying decisions by DMCH.

I eagerly await your next treatise on why I'm wrong, wrong, wrong, brimming over with wrongability.

No, that wasn't a counter example. It was a completely different scenario, if not a strawman argument. Likely to again continue to ignore what I've written and avoid engaging it head-on. But hey, I'll play Devil's Advocate here.

In this alternative scenario in which you cite as an example with your personal experience, then please tell me what went right in that scenario. What are the lessons learned that you can apply within a new group to try and get the same results? Better yet, what are the results you would hope to achieve there that you seemingly cannot find here?

If you're not going to actually purchase a binnacle, then what in the world do you have to complain about? If you have absolutely no intention of purchasing a binnacle, not even as a spare nor for the purpose of crowdfunding replacements for others, then you have no argument. Although that is a prime example of that negativity spreading about. You know, being upset about something that has no bearing on you and coopting the emotions and discontent of others. That is not what you want to build relationships on, let alone something you want to purposefully invite into your life. Yet if you want to take that path, it awaits.

Perhaps it's just a sign of the times where people chose their opinions and political agendas not simply based upon what aligns with their own values, but rather what lets them fit-in since they're afraid of being an outsider with an different school of thought. This may not be the case with you, of course, but perhaps that's the appeal of these kinds of groups. Myself, I've no desire to be a "cool kid". I'm an adult and left school many years ago. But like my wife says: Some people never grow up, they just grow old.

But please, if you think that others would go for that idea of placing fully refundable deposits, then go ahead and round up a group and approach DMCH instead of complaining.

Guy Kawasaki once gave a fantastic answer to what he looks for in terms of innovation when he issues VC funding: He doesn't want things that merely stay ahead of the curve; he wants things that jump the curve entirely. Like ice. Used to be that to procure ice we'd have to wait for lakes to freeze over in the winter and cut out slabs of ice. Then we'd store them in icehouses over the course of the next year to keep ice available. The next phase were actual ice plants that thanks to commercial refrigeration could make ice on demand. Much like the past there was still the task of delivering ice to consumers. The final phase was when consumer refrigeration became available to the masses. Now we could make our own ice at home. Now in each of these scenarios you see the industry jumping the curve. You can have efforts to stay ahead of it such as better insulation for those primitive icehouses, but the ice plants negated that. Who cares about melting when you can make more whenever you life? Or perhaps switching from horse-drawn carriages to motorized trucks for faster & cheaper delivery. But who cares about that when you now can make ice at home?

Such is what I've witnessed with the DeLorean community. We went from a quarterly magazine answering submitted questions months later to USENET where people could reply directly. Then we saw a more efficient mailing list in the form of the DML arise that reached more people faster. Now we had instant emails or daily digests. Then here now we have TALK. A place where we've gone from waiting months for an answer, to hours, to relative minutes. Plus instead of a singular archive everything is organized into threads. That is jumping the curve. Yet I have also witnessed many people over the years try and either sabotage these community hubs outright, or simply try and construct alternatives because of disagreements or whatever. Trying to stay ahead of the curve with various Yahoo! Groups, TODAY, and now Facebook groups. Everyone trying to create the next thing to become the center of the entire community. So while you yourself are not planning to try and corner the entire community (and my apologies for inferring as much), that just seems to be the same old goal with these new groups as history repeats itself yet again.

Are you wrong? Having a different opinion doesn't automatically make you wrong. It's just that I'm not seeing a counter argument. And perhaps that may be due to us not simplistically being on opposing sides, but because we're chasing two completely different ideas here.

[DaraSue]

No, that wasn't a counter example. It was a completely different scenario, if not a strawman argument. Likely to again continue to ignore what I've written and avoid engaging it head-on. But hey, I'll play Devil's Advocate here.

Dude, how have I ignored what you've written? You literally wrote an entire essay about how nothing good can ever come of joining a group that's specifically for venting. I responded with an example of an instance in which it did. Sorry if it wasn't the "OMG you're right, thank you for enlightening me! I can only hope to ascend to your level of Zen clarity!" response you were maybe hoping for.

In this alternative scenario in which you cite as an example with your personal experience, then please tell me what went right in that scenario. What are the lessons learned that you can apply within a new group to try and get the same results? Better yet, what are the results you would hope to achieve there that you seemingly cannot find here?

As I already said, some of the things that went right in that scenario were that people actually ended up having informative and helpful discussions about both fandom and personal issues and producing a lot of creative writing. It wouldn't necessarily be an identical scenario in a DeLorean comm because that was an anonymous posting comm and presumably in a car group people actually want to know who they're talking to. But the people in that community, even though they were initially just a bunch of anonymous wankers, were still able to find they had common interests and have fun that wasn't solely related to bitching about fandom bullshit. That's the lesson, if there is one. As for results in some hypothetical other group? Honestly at the time I just wanted to bitch about DMCH's shenanigans without getting blacklisted. Not everything has to be some epic moral crusade.

If you're not going to actually purchase a binnacle, then what in the world do you have to complain about? If you have absolutely no intention of purchasing a binnacle, not even as a spare nor for the purpose of crowdfunding replacements for others, then you have no argument. Although that is a prime example of that negativity spreading about. You know, being upset about something that has no bearing on you and coopting the emotions and discontent of others. That is not what you want to build relationships on, let alone something you want to purposefully invite into your life. Yet if you want to take that path, it awaits.

It's not about whether or not I personally need a binnacle this instant. It's about a larger pattern of DMCH not delivering on stuff they announce (or delivering on it in absurd Monkey's Paw form, as in the case of the Alpha 5) and selling cheaply made replacement parts, all while C&Ding people for using the word "DeLorean" on their products and blacklisting owners for making fun of them on Facebook. If DMCH wants to be the second coming of DeLorean One, that does affect me as an owner and when I'm debating whether or not to sell my car, it's a tick in the "sell" column.

Such is what I've witnessed with the DeLorean community. We went from a quarterly magazine answering submitted questions months later to USENET where people could reply directly. Then we saw a more efficient mailing list in the form of the DML arise that reached more people faster. Now we had instant emails or daily digests. Then here now we have TALK. A place where we've gone from waiting months for an answer, to hours, to relative minutes. Plus instead of a singular archive everything is organized into threads. That is jumping the curve. Yet I have also witnessed many people over the years try and either sabotage these community hubs outright, or simply try and construct alternatives because of disagreements or whatever. Trying to stay ahead of the curve with various Yahoo! Groups, TODAY, and now Facebook groups. Everyone trying to create the next thing to become the center of the entire community. So while you yourself are not planning to try and corner the entire community (and my apologies for inferring as much), that just seems to be the same old goal with these new groups as history repeats itself yet again.

By "sabotage" do you mean actively trying to delete/hack/troll a comm into unusability or just starting a new comm that's more in line with what they want? If it's the former then that's obviously a bad thing but I don't necessarily think the latter always is. I'm not a particular fan of Facebook for technical discussions either but there's obviously something about it that many people find enjoyable or at least easy to use. I also don't necessarily agree that everyone is trying to become the center of the community. If anything, it may be the opposite: people just trying to make their own corners without the people they don't want to deal with. Which is good and bad.

Are you wrong? Having a different opinion doesn't automatically make you wrong. It's just that I'm not seeing a counter argument. And perhaps that may be due to us not simplistically being on opposing sides, but because we're chasing two completely different ideas here.

It does kind of seem like we're talking past each other here. It's been a reminder about the futility of arguing on the internet so thanks for that I guess?

[JBaker4981]

Bickering aside.... I think that we can all agree that everything that DMCH has done with the franchise has been counter-productive to the most basic desire that everyone in the DeLorean community has, which is quality parts availability at an affordable cost.

[Michael]

All we did was make a place where we could cut up with each other and have laid back conversations about what we see going on in the DeLorean community, (and the world) without being censored and silenced and you guys are over here writing novels about it.