The Facebook debacle & other issues

On 9/18/2022 at 8:39 PM, MaleficentMrsofEvil said:

I might also suggest creating a sort of meta-thread, separate from this one, with all of the wonderful summaries that others have done. I'm happy to help. I can copy and paste with the best of them.

For what it's worth, I like this idea.

This thread helped me. I started my hobby in late 2020 and, admittedly, with SmD. It makes a bit sad that I'm almost a bit embarrassed to admit this, like it's taboo. Like I explained quite a few pages back, CJ's website is more striking and easy to digest to newcomers than most other BJD (blanket term) vendor sites, especially considering those offering direct over-seas purchases are even less common.

This thread helped me understand the implications of starting my BJD hobby with Min and Thys (SmD Ruby and Moment). Min especially, as Ruby was the first doll I fell in love with. I'd look at her webpage every night for months and watch YouTubers who collect SmDs. I ordered them knowing what was going on at the time, and ultimately managed to disconnect my disappointment and confusion from enjoying the two girls I bonded with first. I don't want a questionable person's actions to affect a hobby that helps me cope with my anxiety and stress. (It also helped me order without any trouble and prepared me for the ridiculous amount of questions and vetting you're asked before sending a large sum of money; this is for better or for worse, I'm not justifying this process.)

I think if I hadn't know about everything before ordering, my connection to my girls would have been different to some extent.

As earlier discussed... Seems the "Smart" aspect is making a return.

1 hour ago, Yumeiro said:

As earlier discussed... Seems the "Smart" aspect is making a return.

The charging part is super interesting! I wonder if they’re going to lean more into phones if they do more “smart” aspects? 

21 hours ago, Yumeiro said:

As earlier discussed... Seems the "Smart" aspect is making a return.

Ooooo, interesting.

Can I post this photo in the news thread? I think that would be the best place to chat about it, as there's nothing controversial going on atm.

@monkeypizzasonic Go ahead. The text is cut off though. So maybe you could get a better shot from the two (currently) posts here.
Still think it fits, due to the recent discussion about linking Smartdolls to typical smart features seen in electronics.

47 minutes ago, Yumeiro said:

Still think it fits, due to the recent discussion about linking Smartdolls to typical smart features seen in electronics.

mm, well the main discussion was mainly about failure to deliver the initial promises made for the doll project, that warranted the use of smart in the name.

This is more of a new product introduction. which might warrant discussion elsewhere, for instance that is it worth the CJ tax compared to a 5€ (on sale price at the moment) cordless charging pad off Ikea...

Edited September 26, 2022 by finnleo

I recently bought 2 SmDs before I heard about any of this, and I'm wondering what people think about Danny/company now?

Specifically in regards to replacement parts. I'm worried if something broke and I asked to buy a replacement I may get banned.

Is he better with this now?

2 hours ago, Vampurrr said:

Is he better with this now?

As long as you aren't criticizing him or his products, or asking for anything that places any kind of demands in his staff, as long as you follow all of his umpteen million store rules, and never complain about a product flaw, you shouldn't have issues getting things from his store. 

There... think I hit all of the bullet points.

22 hours ago, BeyondTime said:

As long as you aren't criticizing him or his products, or asking for anything that places any kind of demands in his staff, as long as you follow all of his umpteen million store rules, and never complain about a product flaw, you shouldn't have issues getting things from his store. 

There... think I hit all of the bullet points.

Ahhh. That's really sad.
Especially when you can't buy replacement parts with SmD like you can with DD 😐

Right now in Chaos they're selling vinyl shells, but no frames. I don't get it.
It feels like pure luck when the frames go up. It shouldn't be so hard to get replacement parts!

If you bought directly from the store, there IS a warranty you can use to get replacement parts....for a year. And you have to make another order to get them instead of just having them shipped to you... 😅

On 11/12/2022 at 12:31 AM, Oculae said:

If you bought directly from the store, there IS a warranty you can use to get replacement parts....for a year. And you have to make another order to get them instead of just having them shipped to you... 😅

Yeah, that's the silly part. If it's over a year, why can't I pay for the replacement directly? What if I didn't want to buy anything else, just the parts? It feels like it wasn't thought out, or he's deliberately made it harder than it should be 😕

On 11/11/2022 at 6:31 AM, Oculae said:

If you bought directly from the store, there IS a warranty you can use to get replacement parts....for a year. And you have to make another order to get them instead of just having them shipped to you... 😅

This is something I've been confused about since reading the "why you shouldn't buy this" thing on the shop and was part of the reason I hesitated and ended up not buying a Smart Doll. It said to make an order for something else in the store and they would ship out the part with it, but I was confused on if you still had to pay for the other item that was ordered, because if so that doesn't really seem like a warranty tbh...Normally warranty means that they'll cover the cost of repairs/replacements but that just sounds like you still have to indirectly pay for the parts.

I was also confused on what would happen if you needed replacements after the year warranty ended. Are you still able to buy parts?

2 hours ago, Roserolls said:

This is something I've been confused about since reading the "why you shouldn't buy this" thing on the shop and was part of the reason I hesitated and ended up not buying a Smart Doll. It said to make an order for something else in the store and they would ship out the part with it, but I was confused on if you still had to pay for the other item that was ordered, because if so that doesn't really seem like a warranty tbh...Normally warranty means that they'll cover the cost of repairs/replacements but that just sounds like you still have to indirectly pay for the parts.

I was also confused on what would happen if you needed replacements after the year warranty ended. Are you still able to buy parts?

It's honestly made me not want to get anymore SmDs.

I'm in Australia where we have great consumer laws, and warranties are big. I've never had to pay for something else to get something fixed during the warranty period.

Wow, this thread has gotten so many pages since I last visited it!

As of now, I have nothing to do with DC and his SmD products anymore. I still dislike all those annoying and long store disclaimers and polices, they’re very unfriendly. 

It’s not really easy getting replacement parts for the discontinued Smart Doll Cortex, which really turned me off at the time.

Looking back again and after finding about DC’s past dramas and his ego, I had to sell my former Smart Doll Cortex Mirai to a new owner and home for that. Since, Cortex Mirai got damaged and posing her arms carefully still damaged the seams on her arms!!

However, I still like SmD owners taking photos with their dolls at home and by travel. 
 

Volks and Dollfie Dream is much more niche than Danny’s Smart Doll brand. He influenced lots of new owners and current owner for the BJD hobby. I’m glad I went into the Dollfie Dream hobby. 

16 hours ago, ZandurFox said:

 

Looking back again and after finding about DC’s past dramas and his ego, I had to sell my former Smart Doll Cortex Mirai to a new owner and home for that. Since, Cortex Mirai got damaged and posing her arms carefully still damaged the seams on her arms!!

My Cortex broke too, and I was extra careful.

The worst part: it's almost impossible to find a tutorial or other information on how to repair it. I thought since is the most frigile part it would be easy to find something useful.

Now, I don't think this is anything 'controversial', but I know that the whole 'SmartDolls are meant for children' topic has been discussed in this thread and I just saw an Instagram Post by Danny that gave some insight into this and I thought it might be interesting as a piece of additional information!

Here's a screenshot for those who are blocked on Instagram. You can find the original post here. 

Essentially, Danny tells us that 95% of newbie Smart Doll orders leading up to/before Christmas are meant for children. He shows 10 emails to prove his point, although I do hope that he asked the people involved whether they were alright with him sharing that information, even if anything identifiable was blurred out. 

Because I was curious, I kind of looked at those mails a little more closely. 

 

So, first off! All these SmartDolls have been purchased for girls (she/her pronouns in every mail referring to the child), which I suppose isn't too surprising, considering the lack of 'male representation' in SmartDollLand. 

Ages were mentioned in seven mails and ranged from 6 (?! - although this refers to the age at which the child initially asked for a SmartDoll.) to 12 with a median age of ~9 (Actual age distribution was 6,7,9,10,10,11,12). Which is actually a fair bit younger than what I would have expected. I'd have thought they would be more interesting for children ages 12+. Naturally, this is just a tiny sample size, but apparently there are people buying these dolls for their 6-7 year olds. I do wonder, if there are any younger 'customers'. 

Again, seven mails mentioned where the children had heard of SmartDoll, although one of them was worded as a speculation (It's the mail in the screenshot. 'I believe she found out about smart dolls [..]'). Youtube was specifically mentioned 5/7 times, others only said 'online'. One mail in particular said that the child '[..] discovered Smart Doll on the internet while searching for anime characters to draw/photograph.' - which sounds less like YouTube to me and more like something akin to Pinterest, perhaps. The aforementioned 'speculative' mail also included 'friends at school' to have been a possible influence, but it didn't occur in the other mails. So, seems like YouTube really is the biggest influence here.

My baseless assumption would be that the children start out with watching toy/doll reviews in general (I do it too, sometimes, they can be a lot of fun haha) and the algorithm sort of eventually leads them to bigger more expensive dolls. It might start out with Rainbow High, then Pullip Dolls, then perhaps a traditional BJD before it eventually ends with SmartDoll or perhaps even Dollfie Dream. Looking at my girls, I do think that the 'anime aesthetic' itself might be more appealing to children as compared to traditional BJDs? They look more similar to cartoons or, well, anime and I think there is more of an 'aesthetic overlap' between, for example, Rainbow High/LOL Dolls and our big vinyl ladies than there is with traditional BJD. 

Yes, I would love to do more research on this topic, how did you know? XD 

It's also interesting to see that in at least 5 cases, the purchase was not an immediate decision. 4/5 children were said to have been wanting a SmartDoll for about a year, one child has been wanting one for 2 years. 

There are also two cases in which the parents demanded the child to save up money themselves (both ages unknown), although one of them is worded a little less decisively ('[..] I told her to save her money up thinking she would eventually not want the doll anymore.... Yet here we are lol.' - I'm not perfectly sure if we can deduct from this that child paid off the entirety of the doll, or if the saving was more of a 'test' of determination of sorts.)

There was also one mail talking about how they bought an 'entry level BJD' for their daughter (age unknown), but that said daughter's interest in SmartDoll persisted.

 

Now, I didn't write all of this up to judge people on what they do with their money/how they raise their kids. I just thought that this was an interesting thing to dissect for fun! 

However, I have to say that one of the mails.. uhh.. caught me off guard, I would say? 

So this is what one parent had to say about their purchase for their 10 year old daughter: 

'It's true that it's very expensive for a child. I tried to talk her out of it but she believes in Santa Claus and was not swayed.'

I suppose not every family is financially able to 'keep the magic alive'. However, it does seem to me like most parents are really trying to make an informed purchase here. A SmartDoll is definitely a luxury item, but if the money is there and the interest in the dolls persists for well over a year, I feel like, depending on the.. 'temperament' of the child, a SmartDoll could work out to be a good 'investment'. We all know how dolls can tie into many different hobbies - sewing, knitting, painting, photography, even woodworking! - and while, yes, one could technically achieve all of these with far less expensive dolls, there is a reason why the big chunks of vinyl appeal to us and 'settling for something less' is usually seen as counterproductive in the doll collecting hobby. 

With that said, I wish everyone who receives a SmartDoll as a present this year a very merry Christmas! (Or other holiday!) I'm sure it will be a very special day for them! Just please make sure no small parts are inhaled/swallowed and that proper safety precautions are taken when attempting to dabble with faceups!

Adding to that, we can see that all of those customer order confirmation mails he showed were from different dates entirely, most of them from last year. I'm just saying, when 95% of the customers are currently ordering for their children, why do you have to go so far back to scrounge up some confirmation mails to show some proof? Why not show some of the 20+ order mails you must surely get over the course of a week?

Edited December 1, 2022 by Collie

Very good point! I had made a mental note to check the dates, but it was promptly forgotten. That's a good question though - if all new customers have to answer the 'newbie email' and 95% of purchases are made for children, it should have been far easier to just use the more recent ones.

Another note: For those scared of the aforementioned 'newbie email' and whether they can 'pass the test', I guess this Instagram post will give you a good base line on how to respond. 

MyFroggyStuff/Toya on YouTube seems to be a popular channel for anything doll related and she does have a collection of Smart Dolls. That being said I suppose I'm not surprised that some younger kids might be watching her channel (or others) and finding they want them. She use to make crafts for American Girl dolls until her daughter lost interest and she primarily focuses on 1/6/Barbies. Still I have watched her channel for crafts that could potentially be used for BJDs and her channel is generally family friendly. Up until now I had a hard time believing his lines about kids being a large market but I had forgotten about channels like MyFroggyStuff. 

I think the popularity of doll customizing videos on YouTube has definitely brought SmD to a younger audience. I've noticed a lot of big doll custom channels that previously worked mostly on fashion dolls have been moving into more expensive bases to work with, and SmD seems to be a very popular choice for that.

5 minutes ago, Phaio said:

I think the popularity of doll customizing videos on YouTube has definitely brought SmD to a younger audience. I've noticed a lot of big doll custom channels that previously worked mostly on fashion dolls have been moving into more expensive bases to work with, and SmD seems to be a very popular choice for that.

You're right. While I have no interest in telling parents what to do with their money or that young kids can't be mature enough to handle such expensive dolls, my concern is how DC will react when potentially a child does damage a Smart Doll or lose one of it's parts and wants to have a replacement or ask for the best way to repair it. I've seen what happens when you give American Girl dolls to younger kids. They scribble crayon and markers on their faces, their hair gets gunked up and American Girl actually has a service where they repair the dolls. AG dolls are pricey on their own. So I'm wondering how parents will react to DC seemingly have issues around customers not perceiving his products as PERFECT. Even the wording in the IG post already feels like he's putting the responsibility on the parents (which yeah buyer beware) but still. 

45 minutes ago, Collie said:

Why not show some of the 20+ order mails you must surely get over the course of a week?

At its core, it seems a lot more like his post is really about vindicating his "newbie email" process and presenting it as a form of customer service.

2 hours ago, RetroKanojo said:

Now, I don't think this is anything 'controversial', but I know that the whole 'SmartDolls are meant for children' topic has been discussed in this thread and I just saw an Instagram Post by Danny that gave some insight into this and I thought it might be interesting as a piece of additional information!

Here's a screenshot for those who are blocked on Instagram. You can find the original post here. 

Essentially, Danny tells us that 95% of newbie Smart Doll orders leading up to/before Christmas are meant for children. He shows 10 emails to prove his point, although I do hope that he asked the people involved whether they were alright with him sharing that information, even if anything identifiable was blurred out. 

Because I was curious, I kind of looked at those mails a little more closely. 

 

So, first off! All these SmartDolls have been purchased for girls (she/her pronouns in every mail referring to the child), which I suppose isn't too surprising, considering the lack of 'male representation' in SmartDollLand. 

Ages were mentioned in seven mails and ranged from 6 (?! - although this refers to the age at which the child initially asked for a SmartDoll.) to 12 with a median age of ~9 (Actual age distribution was 6,7,9,10,10,11,12). Which is actually a fair bit younger than what I would have expected. I'd have thought they would be more interesting for children ages 12+. Naturally, this is just a tiny sample size, but apparently there are people buying these dolls for their 6-7 year olds. I do wonder, if there are any younger 'customers'. 

Again, seven mails mentioned where the children had heard of SmartDoll, although one of them was worded as a speculation (It's the mail in the screenshot. 'I believe she found out about smart dolls [..]'). Youtube was specifically mentioned 5/7 times, others only said 'online'. One mail in particular said that the child '[..] discovered Smart Doll on the internet while searching for anime characters to draw/photograph.' - which sounds less like YouTube to me and more like something akin to Pinterest, perhaps. The aforementioned 'speculative' mail also included 'friends at school' to have been a possible influence, but it didn't occur in the other mails. So, seems like YouTube really is the biggest influence here.

My baseless assumption would be that the children start out with watching toy/doll reviews in general (I do it too, sometimes, they can be a lot of fun haha) and the algorithm sort of eventually leads them to bigger more expensive dolls. It might start out with Rainbow High, then Pullip Dolls, then perhaps a traditional BJD before it eventually ends with SmartDoll or perhaps even Dollfie Dream. Looking at my girls, I do think that the 'anime aesthetic' itself might be more appealing to children as compared to traditional BJDs? They look more similar to cartoons or, well, anime and I think there is more of an 'aesthetic overlap' between, for example, Rainbow High/LOL Dolls and our big vinyl ladies than there is with traditional BJD. 

Yes, I would love to do more research on this topic, how did you know? XD 

It's also interesting to see that in at least 5 cases, the purchase was not an immediate decision. 4/5 children were said to have been wanting a SmartDoll for about a year, one child has been wanting one for 2 years. 

There are also two cases in which the parents demanded the child to save up money themselves (both ages unknown), although one of them is worded a little less decisively ('[..] I told her to save her money up thinking she would eventually not want the doll anymore.... Yet here we are lol.' - I'm not perfectly sure if we can deduct from this that child paid off the entirety of the doll, or if the saving was more of a 'test' of determination of sorts.)

There was also one mail talking about how they bought an 'entry level BJD' for their daughter (age unknown), but that said daughter's interest in SmartDoll persisted.

 

Now, I didn't write all of this up to judge people on what they do with their money/how they raise their kids. I just thought that this was an interesting thing to dissect for fun! 

However, I have to say that one of the mails.. uhh.. caught me off guard, I would say? 

So this is what one parent had to say about their purchase for their 10 year old daughter: 

'It's true that it's very expensive for a child. I tried to talk her out of it but she believes in Santa Claus and was not swayed.'

I suppose not every family is financially able to 'keep the magic alive'. However, it does seem to me like most parents are really trying to make an informed purchase here. A SmartDoll is definitely a luxury item, but if the money is there and the interest in the dolls persists for well over a year, I feel like, depending on the.. 'temperament' of the child, a SmartDoll could work out to be a good 'investment'. We all know how dolls can tie into many different hobbies - sewing, knitting, painting, photography, even woodworking! - and while, yes, one could technically achieve all of these with far less expensive dolls, there is a reason why the big chunks of vinyl appeal to us and 'settling for something less' is usually seen as counterproductive in the doll collecting hobby. 

With that said, I wish everyone who receives a SmartDoll as a present this year a very merry Christmas! (Or other holiday!) I'm sure it will be a very special day for them! Just please make sure no small parts are inhaled/swallowed and that proper safety precautions are taken when attempting to dabble with faceups!

What surprises me was the writing style the mails. There are no noticeable spelling mistakes except for the words done on purpose. 

Adding to the discussion, but I wonder if Danny Choo wants to extend his customer base to even younger kids? I believe that most of the kids buying Smartdolls are 6-12, but weirdly enough, I saw a picture of a toddler on his website once? I don't know it just feels off to me, I already don't think Smartdolls are a suitable toy for kids. I hope no one thinks its a good idea to give a toddler one of these. 

53 minutes ago, ladyandlion said:

I've seen what happens when you give American Girl dolls to younger kids. They scribble crayon and markers on their faces, their hair gets gunked up and American Girl actually has a service where they repair the dolls. AG dolls are pricey on their own.

This is 100% true. Kids are pretty ruthless to toys. American Girl dolls are meant for kids so they can handle the rough treatment better but Smartdolls are designed the same way as other vinyl "adult" collector dolls. I doubt a Smartdoll can withstand the wear and tear a kid is capable of. I notice for most of these dolls there will be a disclaimer that the doll is not a toy for children and is only recommended for people 15 and older. 

Edited December 1, 2022 by chantelle

30 minutes ago, chantelle said:

Adding to the discussion, but I wonder if Danny Choo wants to extend his customer base to even younger kids? I believe that most of the kids buying Smartdolls are 6-12, but weirdly enough, I saw a picture of a toddler on his website once? I don't know it just feels off to me, I already don't think Smartdolls are a suitable toy for kids. I hope no one thinks its a good idea to give a toddler one of these. 

This is 100% true. Kids are pretty ruthless to toys. American Girl dolls are meant for kids so they can handle the rough treatment better but Smartdolls are designed the same way as other vinyl "adult" collector dolls. I doubt a Smartdoll can withstand the wear and tear a kid is capable of. I notice for most of these dolls there will be a disclaimer that the doll is not a toy for children and is only recommended for people 15 and older. 

It's also kind of wild that the site recommends an extra pair of hands in the screenshot, which adds an extra ~$100 hand pack to the already expensive purchase for a small child. If they really wanted these to be "for kids" in any capacity, and the open hands are the deal breaker for some reason, the fist hands should come as a standard addition for orders--or at least be thrown in as a courtesy when the buyer responds they're purchasing for a young child. (For the benefit of the doubt, it's possible they already do include them for the second case, but I just haven't seen any mention of it).