Visionnaire Fountain Pen

[daintydimsum]

Oh dear Lord. I have a bridge I want to sell those backers...

[stopher]

$1 pledge gives you the ability to comment on the project

[TheGreatRoe]

$1 pledge gives you the ability to comment on the project

 

And of course you can always cancel your pledge before the campaign ends.

[stopher]

 

And of course you can always cancel your pledge before the campaign ends.

http://i.qkme.me/3vfuuq.jpg

[vossad01]

Other than being associated with Visionnaire and the extremely empty campaign page, this project doesnt appear to be in an violation.

 

You may be right. Maybe it is just a a really poorly put together campaign. I think it depends a little about interpretation and I could be wrong. The line I took is that the notebook is being presented as a "product" not a "project" and everything on Kickstarter is supposed to be a project. It lacks many of the things that would be expected from a project.

 

 

Projects must be clear about their state of development, and cannot be presented as preorders of finished products. Projects must show details (photos, videos, sketches) of their progress so far, along with a prototype demonstrating the product's current functionality. Projects must explain how the final design is likely to differ from the prototype, and include a production plan (i.e., how you're going to make it) and an estimated timeline.

 

State of development seems to be a finished product from someone who is already selling the same type of product on etsy. There does not seem for this project to be any need for Kickstarter funds. Even with the kickstarters I seen from more established companies, they always tie it to a reason for using kickstarter (allowing for better quality, backer input, special tooling, new/unique/untested design, company expansion).

 

This one came across to me as, "here is a branded notebook I made for the Visionnaire line, you can order one and/or a Visionnaire pen"

 

Maybe I would not have bothered doing a write-up and just ignored if it was not for the controversy surrounding BHG's Pen project; but I do think I would have felt the same way about this not really belonging on Kickstarter.

[vossad01]

 

http://i.qkme.me/3vfuuq.jpg

 

In my defense, that wasn't posted when I starter writing my last reply

[stopher]

No Worries. This entire thread has been, for the most part, educational, and full of great jokes.

 

I saw Yancy, one of the KS founders speak and he really comes across as a straight shooter. A cool guy that wants to do some good in the world for creatives.

 

These two projects are lacking, IMHO, creativity to make it a truly unique offering. But the market will show what that creative line is.

[bleair]

 

These two projects are lacking, IMHO, creativity to make it a truly unique offering. But the market will show what that creative line is.

 

I feel the project is very "creative" as in it's a great example of creative marketing, though it's sly marketing and hype and how to manufacture buzz. The creativity is in finding a low cost item and reselling it at a higher price while convincing people of how it was "conceived" and how it "embodies soul and character".

 

I personally find his project disingenuous. There are a lot of very real differences in how fountain pens perform, and they can be a bit hard to describe, but the difference between his project and the majority of posts that I read online is in how people are trying to help each other identify aspects for things in the writing experience they do or don't like.

 

He clearly know how to work social media and create hype, and I'm sure that takes work, but from my point of view he's adding zero value (well, except his personal financial gain). Is he actually doing anything of value, like tuning the nibs or some other quality control? From what I've found online, his efforts are entirely on managing PR and creating good feelings around "his product".

[stopher]

 

 

I feel the project is very "creative" as in it's a great example of creative marketing, though it's sly marketing and hype and how to manufacture buzz. The creativity is in finding a low cost item and reselling it at a higher price while convincing people of how it was "conceived" and how it "embodies soul and character".

So true!!! I forgot about that aspect

[5370H55V]

So I visited my friend who backed the visionnaire today. He was buying a lamy safari from me and I also brought along a sheaffer prelude, so those two were used for a comparison.

 

The visionnaire is mostly constructed of metal and felt as solid as the prelude, but not as well finished. Running my fingers over the pen I could feel a protruding lip where the body of the pen screwed into the section, indicating it wasn't centered properly. The clip strength was much less than either the safari or prelude's, and it was made of thin folded metal with a rough inner edge. The safari has its wire clip with no edges while the prelude has a more robust and better polished folded metal clip.

The cap appears to be a friction fit with a plastic sleeve inside to hold it onto the pen. It required a lot of force to open or close, and I could certainly believe people's reports of the sleeve coming out of the cap. The force needed to open/close the cap makes me feel like it could wear out quickly with use, which does not seem to reflect the designer's supposed goal of "a pen that would last a lifetime". In contrast, both the safari and prelude's caps required much less force and both closed with a sharp click, which the visionnaire also lacked.

During writing tests, the M nib on the visionnaire was on par with or a bit below the F nib of the safari in smoothness, with the M nib of the prelude being smoother than both. My friend also mentioned that he experienced ink skipping while writing although I did not experience it in the short time I tried the pen. Interestingly enough the line width of the visionnaire was the same as the M nib of the prelude, meaning that the M nib of the chinese made visionnaire is actually a western medium, even though most eastern nibs are usually a grade narrower.

 

For those who don't know I'm also into headphones and audio equipment, and my overall thoughts on this pen is that its a lot like an audio enthusiast's attitude towards the Beats headphones. They both look refined and have a quality (bass/smoothness) that will typically wow consumers with no reference point on first use. However, their shoddy construction and questionable business practices makes experienced enthusiasts disapprove of the product, because they know there are better choices available at the prices people are willing to pay for Beats/Visionnaires.

[pesco]

Hi all,

 

I was a backer of this project and I can say one good thing came out of it: The reviews I found on FPN led me to buy, at a local store, a Lamy cp 1 which I immediately fell in love with. Thanks!

 

Anyway, I noticed someone linking to Alibaba again in the Kickstarter comments a few days ago. I followed the breadcrumbs and it looks like the company called Leyica is in fact Morgan's mysterious manufacturer. I can't read Chinese but it took only a few clicks to find their product page for the "LY120". From there:

 

http://www.leyica.com/upload/editorfiles/2013.2.26_16.38.40_9390.jpg

 

Check out the EXIF metadata on that photo. It indicates it was taken in 2008. I have some more notes that I will happily share with anyone interested, but that is the point which closed the case for me.

[stopher]

Nice find!

Great to hear you have been brought into the world of the FP!

Tread lightly as it is a fantastic hobby/way of life that others will never understand

[cyranodb]

5370H55V, Beats headphones are not that bad that they warrant a comparison to the Visionnaire (although I get your point).

I've been lurking on the FPN forums for months now. I was bitten by the fountain pen bug round about the same time that Visionnaire appeared on Kickstarter (which I backed). In that time I've got together a decent collection of fountain pens in quite a range of prices/quality (TWSBI, Pelikan, Franklin-Christoph, Conway Stewart, Sailor, Platinum, Namiki, Lamy, Noodler's etc, yeah, it's difficult to stop once you start! ).

Therefore I feel strongly about how this project has turned out. You see, the time I was following the regular updates of Visionnaire (until the recent damning evidence from Alibaba), I felt that this guy was genuine. I even thought of upping my pledge to 2 pens (before deciding against it).

The last round of revelations, and the images on Alibaba basically ended all of that. The insights Matthew posted, and the opinions Brad aired on Penaddict left a real nasty feeling about how I was duped. I thought at least I'd wait until I got the pen, perhaps it wouldn't be that bad... every pen I bought has been fantastic - there were things I didn't like (e.g. line width of a Pelikan 405 "Fine" nib which was too broad for my liking - fixed by swapping out the nib to an EF), but none of those things had anything to do with the pen itself, but rather the options I chose. Some pens had issues, but in every instance I got a replacement part which fixed the problem (and I had a great pen in hand).

So finally when I received the visionnaire... it was not a pleasant experience finally holding this "last a lifetime" pen. There is no doubt that this pen wouldn't last a few weeks of use, although it's unlikely it'll ever get used for a week!

The sad thing is, I seriously doubt if I want a "replacement" for the problems I see (blemishes, feed misalignment etc), because what I would get is another sample of the same cheap pen (with perhaps a different set of problems).

It is clear there is no serious QC that has gone into this (how else would some backers receive the old converters?! If each pen is checked, the white convertor is easy to spot, compared to the "new & updated" green one. So would be the multiple glaring quality issues being reported).

It also seems obvious that Morgan has not "designed" this pen (the Alibaba revelation, EXIF data of images, among other factors). And the nail on the metaphorical coffin has been his eagerness to squeeze the last bit of the duped lot on Kickstarter - by starting his new project! I hope all this ends in a fair outcome for everyone, but seeing how things are going, that seems unlikely.

PS: Matthew, you could have waited for your pen. I had a feeling he was sourcing a super clean and sturdy sample for you (which was taking time) because you were going to review it!

[Inkysloth]

Cyranodb, I encourage you to send that post to Kickstarter via the reporting button - if people have had no joy through complaining this far it makes it *more* important people complain, so it becomes clear it's a genuine issue not just one crabby person.

 

I'm sorry it has borne disappointing fruit, but I'm glad you've got into fountain pens generally

[AnnieB123]

I'm thankful for all the people who've been led to the hobby, whatever the reason. I am, however, disappointed over the moral bankruptcy of the originator of the kickstart grant/crowdfunding and the lack of responsiveness of the kickstart administration. You'd think they'd be a lot more proactive (I hate that word, but it fits) in protecting their brand/name if nothing else.

 

I hadn't weighed in in this thread before now because I was holding out hope (however slim) that the Leyica manufacturing partner was copying the Visionnaire pen and not just someone offloading third party manufactured goods at a (fairly hefty) markup.

 

Pesco's post puts paid to that possibility.

 

My family gently tease me about being very naive, and I don't (really) think that's true.. but I do seem to find myself saddened and exasperated by the moral delinquincy (and rudeness and impatience) I see more often lately. I don't think it's just due to me getting older, is it?

[stopher]

This thread started as a concern on the quality of the offering. Great topic and subjective. No issues with someone trying to launch a product and then delivering something that didn't meet expectations. This happens to established companies all the time. It is part of R&D and then chasing the issues after launch.

 

Now the thread has real meat. As AnnieB123 mentioned, Pesco put the final nail in the coffin with the 2008 cache he found. KickStarter should at the very least pull the pen offering from the new campaign, and if they really stood behind or on their moral grounds, cancel the campaign all together as he is nothing more than a snake oil salesman.

[vossad01]

Pesco put the final nail in the coffin with the 2008 cache he found.

 

The thing is EXIF Metadata is easily wrong. I can guarantee you the the data pictures I take with my camera is wrong because I often to not bother the set the clock. I cannot consider EXIF conclusive evidence. If Kickstarter did take it as conclusive evidence, someone knowledgeable could easily contest it.

 

 

I hadn't weighed in in this thread before now because I was holding out hope (however slim) that the Leyica manufacturing partner was copying the Visionnaire pen and not just someone offloading third party manufactured goods at a (fairly hefty) markup.

 

I do not doubt that Leyica was the manufacture. If Morgan did design the pen and sent the design, it would not be at all surprising that after having developed the tooling, the manufacture would make use of it themselves.

 

To me it has been his reluctance to speak on the issues that does not sit right on me. It seems a lot of the concern could be cleared up with some transparency. While silence may be damning to some backers, I do not see how it is something KS can act on.

 

The one piece that does not fit to me, is why did he go to the factory? I do not recall campaign pressure that would have necessitate that. If he designed it the trip makes sense. If he didn't did he just want a trip to China or was there a feeling it was needed for the campaign?

[stopher]

Mr. Combes is a graphic designer. You do not design products in Illustrator. You use a real parametric design program. Not a graphics program.

 

Blaming the Chinese manufacturer is an easy out. I deal overseas with manufacturing companies for mold making and part manufacturing. I have been in the business for only ten years and have yet to see this happen first hand. Does it happen? Absolutely. Is Leyica selling the pen for $45? No. It is selling them in bulk for less than a dollar.

[stopher]

Morgan is a professional KS campaign man. He has been working on several projects with his friends over the past years and discovered a niche to market into. In my mind there is <1% that he designed this pen. His prototype evidence is BS.

[pesco]

The thing is EXIF Metadata is easily wrong. I can guarantee you the the data pictures I take with my camera is wrong because I often to not bother the set the clock. I cannot consider EXIF conclusive evidence. If Kickstarter did take it as conclusive evidence, someone knowledgeable could easily contest it.

It is true that this is circumstantial. However, together with all the other things, it convinced me (personally) that the alternative* was not the more plausible scenario.

(*i.e. that Morgan designed the pen as he claims (look, screenshots of Photoshop!!) and Leyica went on to reuse his design for their own catalog)

 

The one piece that does not fit to me, is why did he go to the factory? I do not recall campaign pressure that would have necessitate that. If he designed it the trip makes sense. If he didn't did he just want a trip to China or was there a feeling it was needed for the campaign?

As I recall it, by this time the campaign had already become way overfunded and concerns about the quality as well as the legitimacy of the project itself were in progress in the comments. So I don't find it implausible, considering that he was heading for a 320k$ payout, that he would take the expense of at most a few thousand dollars to go to Shenzen and take a tour of the facility in order to calm the doubters. Hey, he probably got a few nice days in Hongkong out of it besides.