The Facebook debacle & other issues

On 8/27/2023 at 12:13 AM, RozenGermain said:

I honestly have no idea what CJ's beef is with hybrid dolls. Hybrids are a staple of the doll hobby and Danny needs to accept that. Heck, even I, who was initially too intimidated to create hybrids (fear of dying dolls for color matching and all that) ultimately decided to make hybrids myself. I have a floating artist's head that I pre-ordered a body for and I mentioned on DoA that I wanted to hybridize a Kumako head with an MDD body. This weird hatred of hybriders makes non sense anyway, considering that CJ is actively driving away a potential customer base this way.

The very first ones even came with neck parts that facilitated hybridization, iirc. He stopped making it and then stopped making the entire color that people were most likely to hybridize.
 

I think the decision is part of his (futile) wish for SmD collecting to be seen as unrelated in its hobbyist makeup to DD collecting and full of people who have no ideas DD exists, which seeing hybrids around would mess with— and this wish IS futile, people in the know about anime dolls are not going to stop knowing Dollfie Dreams exist. Idk maybe that’s part of why he’s leaned into the child market in this weird way, parents looking for “American Girl but even more luxury/with breasts for some reason” are not going to have any idea about DDs. It’s all part of Danny wanting to leave no trace that he ever loved Dollfie Dreams in the past even though he adored them and had many.

If he speaks at an event and asks for audience questions I perversely want someone to ask him “just wondering, what did you do with all your DDs and why did you delete all pictures of them from the internet?” and see how he takes it and if he pretends to not know what they’re talking about. >_>

Edited November 22, 2023 by ebil

1 hour ago, ebil said:

The very first ones even came with neck parts that facilitated hybridization, iirc. He stopped making it and then stopped making the entire color that people were most likely to hybridize.

The milk skin, right? It is very similar to DD's semi-white and I bet people loved hybridizing DDs with it! Luckily, someone did manage to hybrid a tea skin SMD head with the Imomo doll Miko body and it is a borderline match! Danny's gonna have to try harder to get rid of hybridizers like me lol! Again, I'm very okay with hybrids, and I wanna do a DDH + Imomodoll body one myself, so I know that it is a market that will be there, no matter Danny's dislike of them, I think he should just embrace them at this point.... Even if it means DD hybrids..... Besides, a lot of SmD fans love DDs and Volks, He shouldn't just drive them away like that. Just because I adore DDs does not mean I'm uninterested in SmDs, quite the opposite! I've heard of SmDs first and was very interested in them, even before I got an MDD. Heck, I like both doll brands equally! Though I confess that I prefer Volks' DDs due to offering smaller sizes in the form of MDDs.... and I like Obitsu too for similar reasons... Vinyl minis and tinys man, I'm not very huge on 1/3 scale dolls what can I say?

1 hour ago, ebil said:

If he speaks at an event and asks for audience questions I perversely want someone to ask him “just wondering, what did you do with all your DDs and why did you delete all pictures of them from the internet?” and see how he takes it and if he pretends to not know what they’re talking about. >_>

I sure hope this happens too, btw!

On 11/22/2023 at 9:47 PM, ebil said:

why did you delete all pictures of them from the internet?

decided to break lurking manouvers for this, since Interestingly enough there is still one little vestige left of these ... although for how long after posting this remains a mystery...

the subject matters flickr account still has pretty much everything from the tokyo storm trooper days since flickr actually never went through with their threat of pruning every non-pro users photos to the last 1000.. so there's a good 80k pictures of a certain kind of nostalgia to be found there.

for the most relevant items page 695 is where he got saber, in 688 are pics of the the seifuku Chun made.

EDIT:

I strongly suggest viewing the older bits as part of something else (part of a blog about life in tokyo), not specificly what the person actually likes to browse or do.

 

... and back to lurking.

Edited November 24, 2023 by finnleo

 

On 11/22/2023 at 3:21 PM, finnleo said:

decided to break lurking manouvers for this, since Interestingly enough there is still one little vestige left of these ... although for how long after posting this remains a mystery...

the subject matters flickr account still has pretty much everything from the tokyo storm trooper days since flickr actually never went through with their threat of pruning every non-pro users photos to the last 1000.. so there's a good 80k pictures of a certain kind of nostalgia to be found there.

for the most relevant items page 695 is where he got saber, in 688 are pics of the the seifuku Chun made.

 

... and back to lurking.

The fact that he has uncensored h****i on there makes me feel an ick about him I didn't know I could feel toward a person...

Edit: OH AND ADULT MAGAZINES THAT PROMINANTLY SHOW MODELS IN SCHOOL GIRL AND YOUNG GIRL ATTIRE, THAT'S GREAT WOW...

Edited November 24, 2023 by cinnabunroll

31 minutes ago, cinnabunroll said:

The fact that he has uncensored h****i on there makes me feel an ick about him I didn't know I could feel toward a person...

Edit: OH AND ADULT MAGAZINES THAT PROMINANTLY SHOW MODELS IN SCHOOL GIRL AND YOUNG GIRL ATTIRE, THAT'S GREAT WOW...

I feel there is a need to clarify a few things, since that photo library is very much disconnected from its original context, which is the blog he used to make back in the early days before anything, which if I am not mistaken has ceased to exist.

the articles did vary from the mundane to the more questionable subjects, but it was all about what kind of stuff you could stumble across while going around tokyo.

obviously some stuff is more deliberate (the topless figure shoots are an amusing retrospect, also the promotion stuff with company "T").

So I strongly suggest viewing the older bits as part of something else, not specificly what the person actually likes to browse or do.

 

anyways, with that late disclaimer ... lurking... lurking is better.

 

I'm sorry, but I don't believe for a second that Danny's old blog wasn't about his personal interests. 😅 He's a massive weeb (I say this as a massive weeb myself) and just looking at his early dolls being sexualised with gigantic spine-breaking boobs and skimpy outfits, before he started this "Smartdolls are for children" thing, makes it pretty obvious where his interests lie. He also used to say stuff like "I like the girls best in their birthday suit" and one of his reasons for not being interested in making male dolls was because their "birthday suit" wasn't appealing to him ('cause obvs he's not into naked dudes). Sounds quite absurd to me that Danny of all people would've been going around Tokyo looking at all this stuff out of purely professional interest like an actual journalist, instead of a weeb living his Japan dream and writing about stuff that he's personally into.

I guess nowadays he's pretty much cleaned up his act when it comes to being pervy, although he's still problematic in other ways like the whole 'entitled customers' and gatekeeping thing for starters. It's like dude; if you don't want certain people to buy your dolls, then don't make them into a commercial product. 🙃

Haven't check here a year and I only missing like 10 pages here LOL.

Seems Not much happen and outside this place I only heard how it's super difficult to get spare parts and how it's near impossible to get the Licensed limited dolls and a friend mention it's way harder to buy, than volks limited models DD during their prime popularity like 8-12 years ago

If He don't want people to hybrid Smartdolls, he need to make new Body variants in size,and I mean different height and they need to be accessible

I believe the current Smartdoll body still the same as 10 years ago ? , even the failed cortex also basically the same thing since they share the exact same frame

-------------------

Can't comment much about his blog days, once he start advertising weird stuff unrelated, I start to walks away, not to mention the toxic boards.

But worth a mention until before he nuke his main blog, everytime you search volks or dollfie dream a lot of articles/photos from search engine still redirect to his site as one of top searches, so some pal joking he nuke his blog to erase his history with Volks and DD lol

Edited November 26, 2023 by AyaToyBox

Interestingly, he seems to be at least claiming to be open to hybrids these days, at least using the 3d printer files.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CzncadnB-iG/?igshid=NTc4MTIwNjQ2YQ==

"And if your Smart Dolls have other branded siblings, feel free to use these files to create unique hybrids by resizing them."

 

This is from November 14th, and it surprised me and made me wonder if he's changed his outlook on hybrids with Dollfie Dreams as well. Milk is probably not coming back or anything major like that but it's something at least?

 

(also I saw a comparison on tumblr showing SMD cinnamon matches Dollfie Dream tan, lemme see if I can find the post again)

It's not letting me edit for some reason, but here's the tumblr link https://www.tumblr.com/attlebridge/734109058728181760/vinyl-mjd-color-swatches-for-hybrid-and-custom

2 hours ago, Starwaia said:

Interestingly, he seems to be at least claiming to be open to hybrids these days, at least using the 3d printer files.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CzncadnB-iG/?igshid=NTc4MTIwNjQ2YQ==

"And if your Smart Dolls have other branded siblings, feel free to use these files to create unique hybrids by resizing them."

 

This is from November 14th, and it surprised me and made me wonder if he's changed his outlook on hybrids with Dollfie Dreams as well. Milk is probably not coming back or anything major like that but it's something at least?

 

(also I saw a comparison on tumblr showing SMD cinnamon matches Dollfie Dream tan, lemme see if I can find the post again)

I think he meant creating hybrids with the patterns and not the actual dolls. (And sometimes I don't know what to think because he has a toxic case of sarcasm.)

On 11/26/2023 at 1:56 AM, AyaToyBox said:

Haven't check here a year and I only missing like 10 pages here LOL.

Seems Not much happen and outside this place I only heard how it's super difficult to get spare parts and how it's near impossible to get the Licensed limited dolls and a friend mention it's way harder to buy, than volks limited models DD during their prime popularity like 8-12 years ago

If He don't want people to hybrid Smartdolls, he need to make new Body variants in size,and I mean different height and they need to be accessible

I believe the current Smartdoll body still the same as 10 years ago ? , even the failed cortex also basically the same thing since they share the exact same frame

-------------------

Can't comment much about his blog days, once he start advertising weird stuff unrelated, I start to walks away, not to mention the toxic boards.

But worth a mention until before he nuke his main blog, everytime you search volks or dollfie dream a lot of articles/photos from search engine still redirect to his site as one of top searches, so some pal joking he nuke his blog to erase his history with Volks and DD lol

Don’t get me started on Smart Doll Cortex! It was my first BJD at the time. When Mirai Cortex’s arm seams on the wrists broke on both of the arms due to tweaking and posing, I was actually disappointed when DC’s shop discontinued them and same for the skin tone. So they can’t offer me replacement parts on the same skintone! 

It turned me off on Smart Doll collecting.

Also, his erasure and censoring the past love of DD shows that he couldn’t forgive Volks for not creating his Mirai at the time. He didn’t take it well, but he could at least be accepting Dollfie Dream. Which Smart Doll is based on…

At least Smart Dolls are more stable when it comes to holding items and doing poses thanks to the telescope stand.

I hope the SmD creator is treating his customers better, if not then he never truly changed.

Edited November 27, 2023 by ZandurFox

@RozenGermain The milk skin, right? It is very similar to DD's semi-white and I bet people loved hybridizing DDs with it!

The milk skin matches DD’s normal flesh color. The semi-white is lighter. 
 

Im not sure what to think with everything Danny is doing, but I just hope he follows through with a frontline pear girl. Also, I hope he actually reworks the guy and does better about crediting the designers who actually made the sculpts and also the people that come up with the face-up designs, because he constantly makes it seem like it’s all his idea.

seems my last comment was deleted. I wasn't bullying.   I just started why would lil kids want big chested dollies for 500$usd. sorry if my context was poor. also please send me asap a link to delete my account or i'll contact the site owner. thank you

If Danny thinks a simple skintone mismatch is gonna stop the hardcore hybridizers, he's very wrong.

The recent introduction of pear means my girl Sinclair will finally be able to SIT! I will blush her expensive DD head to match cinnamon if I gotta, nothing is keeping me from this one. 😂

He's moved away from the marketing to children shtick lately, which I'm very grateful for. These days it feels like his focus is on marketing Smartdoll an inclusive high-end fashion doll brand, which....I guess is at least something you can kinda see, if you squint? The kid-friendly angle never did make sense to me, but at least you can have both big sexy boobs AND disability rep, without it being weird and creepy right from the get-go. There's even space for his cyberpunk stories if he wants em.

This is a much better direction imo, even if it does mean some of the frontline girls' descriptions read as trying a little too hard sometimes.

I feel conflicted on this topic because I'm essentially Danny's ideal customer - I like SmDs more than the average DD, I want a doll that comes out of box with face up/eyes/wig, and I don't plan on heavy modification. 

My other reason for supporting SmD is the true dark skin tones they offer. No other companies offer Cocoa and not many offer Tea - even Volks doesn't. I'm still waiting for a tea anime girl to drop, and I love my cinnamon girl.

Edit: For me those outweigh Danny's lack of professionalism & issues with products being discontinued, but I understand why those are a big issue for others. 

Edited January 13 by meteorite

5 hours ago, meteorite said:

Edit: For me those outweigh Danny's lack of professionalism & issues with products being discontinued, but I understand why those are a big issue for others. 

There is nothing wrong with liking SmartDolls, but walk in with open eyes with regards to how the company handles things.  

I have been wanting to dabble into smarties, but for me I want to be conscious of who I am supporting by purchasing items from. But I feel like purchasing 2nd hand would be a better option?

I was seeing on twitter as of late (maybe within the past year) more of encouragement for the creative side of the community, possibly because of content creators showing support to him on youtube. I really like the creators page & artists he’s been featuring. Quite possibly why he’s making diy files available

to circle to the topic. for years I reserved from following DC on IG because of his focus on negative customers.

Today I went to the site to see if they had new clothes, but nothing, they have the same ones as 8 months ago.

But I noticed one thing, they removed the optional heads, had people started making hybrids?! Ahahahah 

10 hours ago, Morilec said:

But I noticed one thing, they removed the optional heads, had people started making hybrids?! Ahahahah 

I wouldn't be surprised if it was both for hybrid and also price reasons, 39000¥ for just a head with a stock faceup is asinine.

Also, I found  this...gem while trying to figure out when they stopped selling option heads. If I wrote down all my thoughts on this it'd turn into an essay real quick.

Official announcement was that they were discontinued because people were buying the heads and then getting mad because there was no body included.

I'd call nonsense on that, but having modded a Discord server and seen some of the stuff people post abt on bad transaction FB groups, I am unfortunately not at ALL surprised. Some folks seem completely incapable of reading disclaimers. I do wish Danny would quit punishing the collective over the actions of the few, but it is what it is.

(Also, I highly doubt it's a hybrid thing even if that explanation IS bull. Milk was the only color that matched anything readily available from other brands without MASSIVE amounts of blushing at the time. These were gone before people discovered Imomodoll's tan matched Tea.)

I'm gonna mention a thing, so hopefully this is on topic enough. but he was @animenyc, he seem to be against hybrids or dolls wearing other brand clothes and not to display on the table at,his booth and then changed his mind for some reason an asked they put them near the back.

On 1/13/2024 at 7:50 PM, Evy said:

I was seeing on twitter as of late (maybe within the past year) more of encouragement for the creative side of the community, possibly because of content creators showing support to him on youtube. I really like the creators page & artists he’s been featuring. Quite possibly why he’s making diy files available

And to think that when I customized my girl back in 2018 I got told to k*** myself by half of the community (not by Danny thankfully). Now customization is a big thing and he's featuring creators. And even takes advice from people regarding the boy look. It's great. I just sometimes wish I could still order from him xD

On 12/1/2022 at 3:16 PM, RetroKanojo said:

Now, I'm not a parent and my sister definitely wasn't one of them when she was younger, but I don't want to rule out that even younger children, maybe 6-9, can be mature and responsible enough to handle a SmartDoll, but toddlers? That's just asking for a disaster to happen. 

I'm not a parent either, but I care about my generation, I think the suitable age for owning one of these dolls should be once somebody reaches like 15-20's, or once you KNOW you are ready to own one.

young kids shouldn't have adult figures anyway.

Edited Tuesday at 08:50 PM by SonataAvalon
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