Pete from BotCon answering questions

[Deonasis]

If he doesn't like negative comments about the stories he writes or edits, I don't think he'll answer my questions now, after saying that I found this year's BotCon comic to be too confusing for the first half, and the worst so far (because I had to read it a second time just to understand most of it). Too many obscure elements that should be in the background, and it attempts to tie in too many continuities and past characters.
Logically one comic has to be the worst... for me, I just felt that this was it, and I even gave a reason so that it wasn't just an "I hate it" complaint.

I doubt he will address all your points (as he likes to cherry pick questions he can spin to hype next years offerings) but your shipping charges point is so clear and unavoidable i do believe he will announce *something* because of it. That post forced him to respond and i think it will force further action from FP. I doubt he will say "we f'd up and sorry no reimbursements BUT we will do it no more!" which i would love but i am betting they will announce "a new thing that will still rip you off but not so much!"

[BigTransformerTrev]

A great response, Trev. (Although in terms of Question 2, I actually prefer their second-rate comic to their ninth-rate journalism. )

Cheers mate , I am trying to take the high road when expressing my displeasure, that way he cant get narky at me and find some tiny wee excuse to avoid answering all the questions.

So much for any questions regarding important things like overcharging internationally. The whole transparency thing is completely backfiring here.

You struck out and i believe i will be in the same boat. It almost appears he finds a reason not to reply to the sticky questions. Being upfront is clearly many peoples preference but it is not his and/or FunPub's. It all really does his PR guru image no good.

The best answer on international shipping charges so far is "I'll look into it" in response to griffin's irrefutable fact-o-mountain a few days ago.

I doubt he will address all your points (as he likes to cherry pick questions he can spin to hype next years offerings) but your shipping charges point is so clear and unavoidable i do believe he will announce *something* because of it. That post forced him to respond and i think it will force further action from FP. I doubt he will say "we f'd up and sorry no reimbursements BUT we will do it no more!" which i would love but i am betting they will announce "a new thing that will still rip you off but not so much!"

(the current sale) could just be their way of distracting people from any current negativity being raised... a bit like politicians using the media to focus on something like raising the terror threat level despite admitting that there are no new threats, just to take the focus off them trying to push the budget through the senate.

Throw out some treats, and hopefully the fandom forgets about the last of many issues being raised - or at least, too focused on the exiting short-lived event to be able to care about what else is going on at the moment.
(a bit like magician's slight of hand - focus on the pretty assistant to not see the setting up of the trick)

I must say I am very surprised at the attidue this Pete is displaying in the TFW thread. One would have thought the threads purpose was to placate people, instead he is just angering folk by being evasive, not answering questions outright and resorting to immaturity when everything else has failed.

I have worked in sales/customer service very little, but when I did as a teen I tried to work by the mantra "Treat every customer like they were your boss and could fire you". This way you wouldn't put a foot wrong or be rude. I doubt if the CEO of Hasbro went to FubPub staff and asked the same 4 questions I did, that they would respond with "Well you said you don't like our writing so we are not answering any of your questions at all". And would this Pete be ignoring the situation if the Hasbro chief came to him with the same detailed evidence Griffin has? I think not.

So far a very dissapointing overall response from this FunPub rep, we can only hope it improves.

[griffin]

Yay... two questions finally answered. Although, they were the easiest two (I ordered the questions from easy/flattering to hard/critical so that he might be more willing to answer the critical ones by not putting them first and putting him off the entire post).

I'm surprised, and somewhat happy, to hear about one of the BotCon collector cards this year being a nod to Glen Hallit as well as one being a nod to J & K Hartman.

Would have been better for him to say from the outset that he was definitely going to work through my questions, instead of just acknowledging that I had made a "novel" post... to prevent people from re-asking or reposting my questions, thinking that they had been ignored.
His official role at FunPub is "Marketing", but the key to marketing is customer perceptions and relations. Both of which need work.

[griffin]

I guess that topic and the outstanding questions have been abandoned now.

I'm disappointed, but it seems most people weren't surprised.

[Sinnertwin]

Did anyone expect anything to the contrary?

Oh, crap, what do we do? The international fans are onto our Clubs fraudulent ways... hey guys, who wants a $30 Legends figure with a new head for Botcon? Phew, that ought to distract them...

[Bidoofdude]

Their attempt to look more professional has blown up in their face. This makes them look pretty bad, at least to the people not entirely distracted by the whole "Legends in next year's Botcon sets for $30!" thing. That's a little victory, I guess...

[griffin]

That only distracted people for a couple days... so they did that Archive sale for another distraction.
Then we had the Subscription figure reveals, and a FREE online comic...

What were we complaining about again?

[BigTransformerTrev]

Well, afer 5 goes finally got acknowledgement of my questions, if no real answers of substance.

1. Why was my personal email address used for non-TFCC agendas by Funpub staff?
2. Why is the magazine now far more a comic book than an actual magazine?
3. Why can you only click on the TFSS button when a TFCC member, as this then does not inform non-members that even if they join they will not be able to access the TFSS once the time limit has finished? The only other option being to scroll through page upon page of back notifications on the home page.
4. Why does shipping to Australia cost so much and why can we not have more transparency with this issue? (know it has been asked a lot but haven't really seen an answer specific to this particular issue).

1. On rare occasions, certain issues have been spotlighted. It is a very rare thing though if our terms and conditions do not specifically acknowledge that, I will look in to making sure it is clarified.

2. It's not. We spotlight fiction more some issues than others, but the format has been pretty consistent for the last 6 years.

3. I will also look in to making sure this is updated.

4. I will personally look in to this.

I may follow up with Q2 when I get the next issue of the mag if the number of pages used for each format does not add up, but for now I'll just watch the thread to see if any of this is expanded upon due to further questioning from others. At least after over a month of asking the questions he has acknowledged the issues exist, even if right now it is simply the lip-service of 'I'll look into it'.

[griffin]

He is mostly right about the percentage of pages being about the same over the ten years, with 6 of the 16 pages being comic story. Probably once a year, they've had an extra page or two to promote something else (like a recent issue having a BotCon comic preview).

Since they lost a page to be a cover several years ago, the format has been pretty consistent.

Standard contents to equal 11 pages...
2 pages - cover & intro page
6 pages - comic
2 pages - bios
1 page - back cover "funnies"

Then the variables to equal the remaining 5 pages...
3-4 pages - articles and info (including BotCon review once a year)
2-1 pages - advertising of their toys or conventions (including preview comics)

Sometimes the comic is a decent story, so becomes an interesting element (but only worth reading after you wait 12 months for the entire story), while the 3-4 pages of articles are sometimes the interesting element.
But the articles would be more interesting if they could get more input from Hasbro on future toy reveals. What's the point of paying a license to promote the Brand, if the Brand doesn't give them products to promote, as that's what readers most want - future toy products to get excited about.

[BigTransformerTrev]

Standard contents to equal 11 pages...
2 pages - cover & intro page
6 pages - comic
2 pages - bios
1 page - back cover "funnies"

Then the variables to equal the remaining 5 pages...
3-4 pages - articles and info (including BotCon review once a year)
2-1 pages - advertising of their toys or conventions (including preview comics)

See, I'd count the bios as part of the comic since they are always about the characters that appear in the comic. The funnies on the back page and the odd preview comics I'd also count as comic-like content. But will check out the next issue anyway to see how it all stacks up.