http://money.cnn.com/2005/05/19/technology/personaltech/e3_phantom/
Look like it pretty close to the end of the road for Infinium Labs.
Look like it pretty close to the end of the road for Infinium Labs.
At E3, Phantom is once again MIA
- Thread starter Geeforcer
- Start date
WHAT?!?! They didn't show up at E3?!?!?
Well I for one am just flabbergasted. Completely and utterly flabbergasted.
Well I for one am just flabbergasted. Completely and utterly flabbergasted.
Good, good; it feels very purple today.ANova said:
What "game makers" want a bunch ( six?) of underpowerd, gfx5200, comps? And how hard is it to "acquire content? Dont you just call up a Publisher and ask for the Lic. agreement and pricing. "Hello Atari. IL here, i would like to have some of your games. Whats is it going to cost?" And Channel programing? Duh you need a server farm.....
Geeforcer said:
Not really, as the topic of whether or not IL would ever ship a product never concerned me (as I don't "do" consoles.) What did concern me was using a website as a podium from which to kick around a small, startup company which hadn't even shipped a product merely for the sake of creating an artificial conflict for the sole purpose of site self-promotion.
I was, and still am, of the opinion that investors are grown men who can take care of themselves and that they would have done exactly as they did with or without a website doing its best to derail IL before IL could get a product out of the door. I think I was pretty clear about that...
BTW, wasn't at least the inital gpu IL announced it would ship in its product a nVidia gpu?....
Maybe you should tell that to all the people who invested in Enron, Worldcom etc?WaltC said:
Roberts is a first-rate crook and scammer. He's good at selling snake-oil to people by making it look like a legitimate product and then milk them out of more money as time goes by (probably by hinting that 'just a little more and we can finally finish our product!'), and then finally let the project crash and burn when the influx dries up at last. It's not as if he hasn't done it before you know...
Wow Walt, you really hate HardOCP, don't you?
Anyway, IL has raised something like $50 million in investments for the past several years. How much do you think HardOCP pulls in a year? Definitely not that much! This is not a case where HardOCP threw its financial backing into some article that will totally destroy a company that is barely making $100,000 a year! No, the article was well done, it was well researched, and the information was on public record.
Now, as for investors being "grown men"? Not all of us are savvy investors. now that investing is becoming the big thing to do, many people are taking their meager savings and throwing it into stocks and venture projects. So say this first time investor gets snagged by Tim and the gang and he doesn't have a great knowledge of the industry. If they give him the spiel, show off the ex-Microsoft console guy, and talk about the potential market and the potential profits, then quite often that first time investor with stars in his eyes will fall for it. So that $13,000 he had quietly horded, thinking he would make 10 to 100 times his invested amount into a company poised to make billions, would all go into Tim's Florida mansion when IL eventually goes flop.
So, I am quite happy that Kyle and the gang did their little expose, because it acts as fair warning towards investing into IL for somebody who really can't risk it. Sure, there are VC's out there with millions who think a couple hundred thousand dollar stake in IL is worth the tremendous risk (not to mention the potential tax writeoff when IL goes away). For those smaller investors who put in a comparatively large stake into such an enterprise, then this article is honestly priceless. I have first time investors come up to me often and ask what I think is a good stock or venture they should invest in, and if the folks from IL get a hold of these small investors it can spell trouble for their little golden nest egg.
Anyway, IL has raised something like $50 million in investments for the past several years. How much do you think HardOCP pulls in a year? Definitely not that much! This is not a case where HardOCP threw its financial backing into some article that will totally destroy a company that is barely making $100,000 a year! No, the article was well done, it was well researched, and the information was on public record.
Now, as for investors being "grown men"? Not all of us are savvy investors. now that investing is becoming the big thing to do, many people are taking their meager savings and throwing it into stocks and venture projects. So say this first time investor gets snagged by Tim and the gang and he doesn't have a great knowledge of the industry. If they give him the spiel, show off the ex-Microsoft console guy, and talk about the potential market and the potential profits, then quite often that first time investor with stars in his eyes will fall for it. So that $13,000 he had quietly horded, thinking he would make 10 to 100 times his invested amount into a company poised to make billions, would all go into Tim's Florida mansion when IL eventually goes flop.
So, I am quite happy that Kyle and the gang did their little expose, because it acts as fair warning towards investing into IL for somebody who really can't risk it. Sure, there are VC's out there with millions who think a couple hundred thousand dollar stake in IL is worth the tremendous risk (not to mention the potential tax writeoff when IL goes away). For those smaller investors who put in a comparatively large stake into such an enterprise, then this article is honestly priceless. I have first time investors come up to me often and ask what I think is a good stock or venture they should invest in, and if the folks from IL get a hold of these small investors it can spell trouble for their little golden nest egg.
Guden Oden said:
Don't you think Enron and Worldcom investors already know the score?...
What on Earth would they need my advice for?...That's my point: they are adults and investors and there's not one single stock you can buy anywhere on earth, nor one single company you can invest in, which guarantees you a profit within a certain amount of time. Adults know when they invest that it isn't like buying a US Treasury note where you are guaranteed (by the US gov) never to lose your principle under any circumstances. You run the risk of losing all of your investment when you invest in technology startup companies like IL--and trust me when I say IL is merely one of thousands started up around the world every year seeking similar investment. That is a fact. Many of them fail--also a fact.
Roberts is a first-rate crook and scammer. He's good at selling snake-oil to people by making it look like a legitimate product and then milk them out of more money as time goes by (probably by hinting that 'just a little more and we can finally finish our product!'), and then finally let the project crash and burn when the influx dries up at last. It's not as if he hasn't done it before you know...
And, as you know, the so-called "expose'" of Roberts did not deter those people who wished to invest from investing, did it? I've said from the start that if IL fails it won't be from a lack of investment but rather because the company fails to ship its products.
WaltC said:
Because once product ships success is guaranteed? IL could ship 1m Phantom units and still crash 'n burn if the market didn't buy into their games service (because, let's face it, insofar as hardware goes the Phantom console is now pretty badly dated).
JoshMST said:
Really, I just won't dignify that remark with an answer.
Yes, and for all of the reasons you point out [H] knows absolutely zero about what's involved in starting up a technology company of the kind that IL was/is. [H] cannot build or sell or manufacture gaming consoles of any type ([H] has no experience in the field whatever), nor could [H] ever draw the kinds of investment necessary to engage in such an effort even conceptually. Yet, as truly ignorant as [H] might be in terms of being itself a technology startup of any description, [H] felt qualified to pass judgement on a technology startup, and to ask ridiculous questions that had, in fact, no answers even relevant to what IL was trying to do.
Yes, the info was compiled from public gossip and speculation pieces and cobbled together to form a very unflattering picture of the company. That was always my biggest objection to the way the smear was conducted: although [H] was *asked* to come in and do personal IL interviews and tour the IL facilities--*that never happened* because [H] refused to do it. Immediately in my mind that disqualified anything [H] might ever have said about the company afterwards. To me that deliberate strategy on the part of [H] was an unforgivable journalistic sin that proved beyond any doubt that [H] was in this case merely posing as a journalistic authority but in reality was no better than a mere National Enquirer-type tabloid in terms of credibility.
This is the kind of thinking that I call ignorant, to be blunt about it. The investors in IL were initially *private* investors--which has absolutely nothing to do with "buying IL stock"--since there was never any issued publicly that I'm aware of. Private investors of this type represent either rich individuals or rich companies which specialize in venture capital investing--and which do that kind of investing routinely. It has nothing whatever to do with some poor slob being conned of his life savings--venture capitalists lose millions around the world *every day* investing in companies just like IL. IL is neither unique nor an exception in terms of the venture capitalist funds it raised. Venture investment companies know that if they get lucky in seeding the *RIGHT* venture then they'll *more than* recoup the losses they incur in the other *dozen* ventures they invested in that went south.
That's why they are called "venture capitalists"--"nothing ventured nothing gained" is essentially their credo. Typically, the public rarely hears of ventures that fail but only hears of the ones that succeed and make it big. I believe that is the basis behind the ignorance that supposes that what happened with IL was in any sense unique. It wasn't unique at all, but very, very typical. [H] being ignorant, though, of the industry in that sense, it wasn't too surprising to see [H] jump to all the wrong-headed and bone-headed premature conclusions it was possible to reach. (I liken it to a layman explaining to a neurosurgoen what's "wrong" with his operational techniques because the layman sees no "sense" in them--that kind of thing...
) I'll pose the same challenge to you that I posed to [H] awhile back: provide me with the name of even *one* IL investor who has stated for the record he was cheated and conned by IL. I'm still waiting for a list of those people, as I stated from the start, and until I see such a *verifiable* list of investors who will state for the public record that IL robbed them, then despite anything at all that [H] may infer or imply or postulate or spin--I will hear the silence of the people who actually invested in IL as much, much louder than all the ranting and raving in the world from [H.]
Apparently, you don't realize it, Josh, but screaming to the heavens about "investors being cheated" without being able to provide substantiation of the claim by even *one* actual investor who has actually stated such for the record, let alone being able to prove that *any* IL investors were ever cheated out of anything--well, to me that's akin to yelling "Fire!" in a crowded theater when you can't even see a whiff of smoke. People will get hurt or worse, and that kind of behavior is criminal.
I said it plainly from day one: provide a list of investors who state that IL cheated them and I'll sit up and take notice. But until that time I really could care less what a non-IL investor like [H] might have to say about IL investors being cheated--since apparently [H] could never find a single one of them to back up the claim from the start. That's been the problem all along from my viewpoint and I hope never to see it repeated again. From some posters even in this thread I hear "Fire fire!" being yelled but all along they fail to show a single flame.
It's your prerogative to applaud this kind of behavior--but as you well know I cannot and do not--for all of the reasons I have stated over and over again. Should I be the last man on Earth to have this sentiment about it that will be just fine with me (I often mistrust the herd instinct and have, I think, ample and sufficient reason for doing so in this case.)
John Reynolds said:
Unfortunately we may never know what could have been. For that I will always be pissed for what HardOCP did. They should have left well enough alone and let IL control their own fate. Oh well. Hopefully IL will sell of some of its IP(game service technology and lapboard) to another company that can do something with it.
Tommy McClain
John Reynolds said:
I have no disagreement with this statement, John. I insist, though, that investors have the right to invest where they see fit--and in terms of technology startups the truth is that many more of them fail than succeed. But that strikes at the very heart of what drives the tech industry itself--even in successful companies for every one product of their R&D which succeeds there are five R&D products which ultimately fail for one reason or another. The public, however, hears *only* about the successes and in these companies the failures are buried and forgotten. IL, to me, was merely one tech startup out of thousands. This idea that IL is somehow unique is almost beyond understanding, but I suppose that's because the general public really has no idea about the number of technical initiatives (even in successful companies) that fail commercially as contrasted with the number of initiatives that succeed. The failures greatly outnumber the successes in terms of quantity--but a single big success can wash away the residue of a hundred earlier failures. And that's exactly why the IL story will not put off even a single VC investment company in the future--there's just nothing remarkable about it at all, imo.
AzBat said:
Why? All [H] did was look at public records that clearly established a pattern of the company's CEO being associated with failed company after failed company, a pattern that refuted his claims of being such a business wizard. VCs are adults and do you really think they were actually swayed just by one article on a PC hardware website?
Just read an analysis of Infinium's most recent filing. They're dead in the water, financially. And they paid Kyle $50k, cash! Glad to hear it.
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