did they send a reply back to the lucky 30 yet. I was in time for the email but have no clue if I made it.

Same here.

If you read some of the earlier posts (ahem...), you will see that Scapegoat already sent the replies. Seems like nobody here got a reply (so far)

Oh yeah.......SHIT NOT ME

Damn, Greg, from your post showing your Balzac collection, they should have given you one!

Sweet, thanks for the time info, looks like I'll stay up for Obake.

Hey, definitely no sour grapes here, but obviously an online sale is first come first served, but for the pre-sale, how about making that a lottery. It seems perfectly suited to that, being email driven and all.

It would also make it a bit more fun than just sitting by the computer waiting for a word to come up, and being the first to have a pre-prepared email at the ready!

Just a thought!

AND PS> Super happy I scored a gold, and who knows, a silver may one day turn up (already trying to put the slow and steady into practice here)

Jeez, Silver sold out in under 1 minute?! Maybe there was a "heads-up" post elsewhere before the one on Skullbrain? I sent my email within a few minutes of Scapegoats post and (like everyone else here) missed it. I can't believe no one on this board got one!

The curse of Vinylpulse strikes again!

think there's people actually out there to flip these? it's pretty expensive right off the bat. i really want them, but I can't really afford to pay much over the $69 + s&h from sxwxw

While I agree about the price (the purple one came out to $83 after shipping) I don't doubt that there'll be flipping going on. I'm constantly amazed at the outrageous Ebay listings for relatively common figures. Some don't sell, but a good percentage do. And once the younger KR crowd comes around - as appears to be happening to a degree - due to the fact that they have much more disposable income (no rent, food, etc. bills) it'll just get worse.

I'm not trying to be the voice of doom, but unfortunately it seems like popularity = profiteering for at least a percentage of "fans".

Thanks for making this sale a success, and sorry for those that couldn't get in on the action. Next time! This is also good news because the better these sell, the better chance I have of getting MORE stock for future releases.

Just to clear some things up:

Time:
- I released at 12:51am EST
- I always release based on Toronto time. So, please base everything on that. I don't always release at the same times though either.

Stock:
- The Silver SkullBxBxBxA was limited to less than 10 pieces (that's why it was pre-sale). I got over 80 emails within about 2 minutes.
- There were 30 Golds (in the shop). They sold out within minutes, but then 2 were cancelled and they went back up (again, gone in seconds).

Process:
- I might be inclined to do a random selection from the pre-sale emails in the future... but how do you randomly choose these fairly? Write all the names down and put them in a hat? Any suggestions? I would want to do it fairly.

Sounds good..
or random number generators always work.

I've had good luck with drawing names out of a hat... even when my name wasn't even in the hat.

I think if you stick with your original idea is fine, it works smoothly and your site won't bust from traffic. Great idea. I think people want to up their odds with a lottery since they didn't get it this time.

Yeah, I think this worked pretty smoothly. I will condiser some other options too for the future. Thanks for the ideas and your support, as always.

Yeah a lottery would be cool, have the email option open for a limited amount of time and when you close it pick randomly. That way people who aren't at there computer all day and night have a shot. That's my 2 cents

One thing that comes to mind is creating a list of known collectors and offering new figures up to that group. Something like that was done here before for the SDCC Pushead event at SDCC and worked really well, I think. The problem with that sort of thing is it`s more work for you.

Another idea is to hold a lottery, like you mentioned. Leave pre-ordering up for a day, and then assign numbers to each e-mall (the first e-mail can be #1, etc) Then just choose 10, 20, 30 whatever numbers using a random number generator on-line or off the top of your head. That system would take an extra 5-10 minutes per order. It would still let flippers in, but it would allow folks who have to work, sleep, etc in on the action and would, IMO create the most level playing field possible with the lowest effort on SWW`s part.

BTW, Shocker and SWW rule! I was in Shocker in Osaka last week and picked up a sweet Shocker/Balzac hoodie. Very friendly staff! The other day in Nagoya I picked up a couple of Balzac CDs.

please a lottery system for the obake

I think a lottery would be cooler, but any chance rules,

Lottery might help some, but it's a bit unfair to a diehard fan that's insane enough to sit at their computer hitting refresh for an hour or 12. Just an opinion, even though I haven't scored one pre-order yet.

Good point, but there are diehard fans out there with jobs, family commitments etc. who simply don't have the time or the means to hover over their computers for an extended period of time. Not to mention the time zone issue - I can't imagine living in the UK or Australia and having to deal with this. I'm not complaining about the way Scapegoat's running things - I think it's great to have a shot at this stuff at all - but the more I think about it the better the lottery idea sounds.

It's not that bad in Australia, well - with afternoon or evening releases!

Sucks when something is released at 11am in NY ( HI KAWS ) because I have to be up at 5-6am depending on daylight savings heh.

Adds to the fun I guess, but also the stress

for the hardcore,,it means commitment if you really want something....

end of the day,,,somebody will always be displeased with how things are run...no matter what way it is done....

nothing is perfect,,,& it is impossible to please everybody....

as for UK timing,,,i have no problems,,,especially on the weekend,,,i am a bit of an insomniac...so if it means staying up all day & night for something,,i will,,just do not release things two days in a row,,,i eventually need my sleep...

Scapegoat Ryan,

why can't you simply put an email list together consisting of all Balzac fans and all toy fans?

Then, you send out an email to the list and tell everyone that wants a toy to email you and paypal by some date.

If there are only 30 toys for sale well the first 30 people to email you get the right to buy the toy...