The Flame

The Michael Kenny Award

2011-03-02T17:05:00.005Z

Quite odd that Mr Kenny often states I have a vendetta against him here on the blog. The blog is only two years old and I first became aware of Mr Kenny when he helped instigate a product assassination of a DVD I published in 2007. In the interim has on numerous occasions made similar attempts – all, including the first one, have led to him being banned or ejected from forums, his posts removed, and his (scant) reputation becoming ever more tarnished. Most hilarious were his embarrassing attempts to troll on modelling forums – he has never built a model in his life.

Even on those forums where he sticks to research his treatment of others is sometimes appalling and its apparent he is barely tolerated by moderators.

Obviously though, when complaining about a ‘vendetta’ Mikey has not read the masthead of this blog. If someone is an odious little troll who uses forums to perpetuate axe grinding and personal agendas the he will get mentioned here. Regularly. Until he stops. As Mikey has been for some time the Poster Boy for this description he gets mentioned. A lot. And will continue to get mentioned until he stops and sticks to what he is good at – research. At which point he will be sincerely congratulated on his change of heart (as have several others over the years).

Fortunately, because of his much publicised failed attempts ( all of them), more and more members and moderators are starting to see through Mikeys attempts – sadly though it takes courage to take an opposing stance when Ole Mikey has poisoned the waters. He is remarkably clever at stirring up others while remaining on the sidelines wearing a halo. Often his opponents are lone voices of reason and pay the price by having their agendas and associations questioned while he never answers a single question about his own.

So from now on, when I see someone who does stand up to him and point out his lies, evasions, half-truths and troublemaking, they will get an honourable mention here. It will be known as the "I killed Kenny" award. This will not be an easily earned accolade – you will need to fiske him point by point, and not let him get away with avoiding subjects.

Now if you want to take part its very easy. All you have to do is watch any thread by Mikey that at some point starts to slag off other members or involve myself, The Research Squad, The Panther Project, or any project we are associated with or have been involved in. This will not happen immdeiately in the thread - normally the threads have nothing to do with us and it takes him half a dozen posts or so for him to start dripping poison in a little at a time. So be vigilant. In order to help things along and save you time I have a list of his known haunts. Currently Mikey posts on the following, and if anyone knows where else he posts regularly let me know and I will add the links.
http://www.ww2talk.com/forum
http://www.armchairgeneral.com/forum
http://forum.axishistory.com
http://www.feldgrau.net/forum

The first such recipient of the honorary award is David Fleming who at great cost took on Mr Kenny on WA recently. Despite having his motivations questioned at every turn he continued to point out that Mikey was only on the forum to cause trouble and was hiding the real motives for his posts.

Mr Fleming – we salute you.

*Edit* Already recieved several requests for a copy of my post exposing Mr Kenny's long standing infringement of publishers copyright. It can be downloaded here Ole Mikey For those wishing to see what Ole Mikey got up to on WA eamil me.

Michael Kenny - Grinding Axe or Grinding bore?

2011-02-28T18:36:00.005Z

Over on WA forum Micheal Kenny hijacked a two year old thread to perpetuate a long-standing vendetta against myself and others. Regular readers will know of Mr Kenny and his actions, but on this occasiom Mr Kenny has outdone himself.

To date I have not participated in the thread, but Mr Kennys actions and some of the more obvious lies he has spread there need to be redressed. I have posted a single rebuttal which exposes Mr Kennys lies regarding his long-term copyright infringement and the resultant deletion of his unauthorised collection of images.

You can see this rebuttal on page 12 of the WA thread here.

To see exactly what an odious little troll Mr Kenny is have a look at page 2 of the thread and his disgusting methods of dropping uncommented urls on a non-related two year old thread in order to provoke members into rash and very serious unsubstantiated accusations and comments. While reading the entre thread may take some time Mr Kennys ulterior motives become quite clear on page 4 - and the rest of the thread shows his true colours.

So why this post? Over the years many forum members have been on the recieving end of Mr Kennys insults, diatribe, snide comments and put downs. He has instigated, helped and colluded in attacks on others and always hides behind the guise of being a 'researcher'. For this research he is apparently tolerated - but the list of places where he is banned has grown longer, and the those he can post smaller.

This post is a free area for anyone who have suffered at the hands of this vicious little troll, and wishes to discuss his actions and methods.

And finally - there will be no discussion off-topic.

*Edit - 01/03/11
Just seen the following bollocks by Mr Kenny:
"The only time a spokesman for KW drops in he makes it clear he will not make any comment on the issue and resorts to insult and invention."

To prevent Ole Mikey throwing out unsubstantiated lies then some time in the future referring to it as established fact (his usual practice):

Firstly I am not, never have been, nor ever will be a spokesman for anyone. Secondly if there was any invention whatsoever in what I posted then please stump up the proof Mikey. As I said before I am quite happy to post all copies of correspondence between myself and the legal dept. of Photobucket with regards to your copyright infringement. A subject which you seem to be at some pains to avoid talking about. Why? Normally you are the fount of the endless interminable fisking thread - so why not this time Mikey? Cat got your tongue?

Brian

Terry picking on Jim Rae now

2010-12-13T11:44:00.007Z

Interesting developements over at M-L Allied Forum

At 9:10am (GMT) Jim Rae posted a news article on the new Bronco Humber with a link back to Armorama.

At 9:14 however Terry Ashley posted the exact same news item (with one image) - but with no link back to PMMS. Why? Because in his haste to piss all over Jim Rae, Terry has not (as of 11.41am) yet put up a news Item on his site about the kit. One-upmanship of the worst kind.

At 9:16 Terry then added the large (mostly unreadable) large poster image, and the words "Its only manners after all" (I think this was the wording, I did not get a screenshot) which I assume was some dig at Jim. (Still no page on PMMS though)

At 9:23 Medication probably started working again and Terry saw his jibe for what it was and took it down. (Still no page on PMMS though)

Then there are some posts (all replies to Terry) about the kit. I find it somewhat unfair that all of these people (Stephen Lord excepted) fail to mention Jims post and its link back to an ACTUAL news item, where the editor had taken the time to create a page before posting elsewhere instead of spammimg other forums because he is terrified he is not first out with the story.

I also find it extremely hypocritical of Terry to now start publishing these items on ML when he previously shit on other editors for doing the same thing.

I would further like to point out that as all images in both posts came from and are the property of Bronco, and were sent to numerous Editors, that Terry watermarking these images with the PMMS logo is blatant copyright theft.

*Edit
16:13pm - Still no article at PMMS

All Change

2010-11-24T11:37:00.004Z

Some months since the last update, have been out of modeling for a while and busy with other stuff. Hopefully I will be able to start making more regular posts again.

Trucks n' tracks gone
So the ailing TnT has finally met its demise. I was surprised at the somewhat cavalier announcement on Military Modelling website - the smilies were a bit unnecessary. Though this attitude towards the concerns of modellers has been prevalent at MyHobbyStore since both shows came under their grip. Traders and punters I know have been drifting away from this show for the last few years for many of the same reasons I talked about here last year in a post about EuroMilitaire. Maybe now the organisers at both MHS and Lees Cliff will look at how shows are done on the continent, and why so many traders and and punters would rather go there than visit Folkestone.

John Murphy
Sad to see on Facebook that John Murphy is no longer Editor of MMiR. As one of the best print editors around I am sure John will be snapped up by a publishing house asap.

Credit where its due
Nice to see that for some months now Jim Rae has been behaving on Armorama. No rants, no bullying of members, just news articles, even-handed debate and reasoned comments in the forum. Well done Jim, keep it up - it makes Armorama a better place to visit.

Pay per view

2010-08-09T10:52:00.002+01:00

Let me preface the following with the assurance that I am not criticisng any modelling sites or their business models.

This thread at Armorama, a report out last week that ZERO people would pay for Twitter, and the recent trend in trying to make content pay for itself (Times Online) got me thinking about modelling sites in general and their business models. Currently there is a huge culture problem in that whilst everyone grew up with everything on the internet being free and the generation and hosting of that content was minimal, nowadays its costs substantially more time and money to host and generate.

One common aspect of all sites is a minimum amount of operating costs: they all need to cover server costs, and postage of materials to bloggers, reviewers etc. The more the site grows, the higher these costs become. Invariably these sites have grown on the strength of the community participation that they encouraged. At some point, the owners realise that it has grown too big, either from a logistical, or a financial aspect, to manage on their own. So what do they do?

The more successful sites broadly seem to fall into the following into the following catagories (or a combination):
Self-funded
Advertising based
Corporate backing

One way to manage is to have unpaid 'staff' who then donate their own time to tasks such as moderation, reviews, news etc, and cover costs either by coporate backing or advertising. Another is to involve the community and have them generate the site content in exchange for kits, books and other items. Both have their good and points, 'Staff' are reliable in output times and content, but can be limited in knowledge or expertise in certain fields. Community have a wider variety of skills and knowledge, but reliabilty and working to timescales can be a problem.

Corporate backing can bring its own problems. Modellers can be extremely hypocrital when it comes to certain sponsoring/advertising manufacturers - while they will gladly (quietly) accept the latest $50 kit for free, they will also join the crusade/rant du jour against the same company. Accusations then get leveled of bias and favouritism against sites that either advertise or are backed by such companies. Consequently modelling companies take a (justifiably) jaundiced view about support for such people and modelling sites in general. I have a lot of sympathy for all sites in this regard - While independence from advertising and sponsorship is noble, it does not pay server and postage costs. Many modellers are guilty of ignoring this elephant in the room - while happy to take full advantage of free use of sites, as soon as any form of even minimal financial contribution is raised they run to the next site where its not required. Thankfully there are still many out their who donate time and money to keep sites going that otherwise would fail without them.

Whilst still somewhere in the future, I think that sooner or later, paid content on the web will become the norm rather than an experiment. Whether it be subscription based or a different model, eventually paying for quality content will be seen as no different to paying for a newspaper or any other type of media. This will mean that like any industry, such sites will have to compete with quality content to make sure they attract the paying customer. Of course this will not happen while there are places where it can be obtained for free (the current poor figures for Times Online tend to reinforce this). But as the number of free sites diminishes due to cost, I think the balance, and the current culture , will gradually swing the other way.

Talking to "Sam"

2010-07-21T11:10:00.006+01:00

In my previous article Cutting off your nose one of the commenters - "Sam" chose to turn the topic back to the whole Terry saga. I will always respond as best and detailed as possible to any queestions or comment. Unfortunately the lengthy responses required exceed the comment box limit. The gist of it is I asked "Sam" to answer a simple question - he avoided it so I will post my reply here.

Dear "Sam"

Firstly I am surprised that you came back to post - well done. Secondly, I am not surprised that you avoided the simple question I put to in my comment. Your response is quite typical of both Terry and his fanbois when faced with one the difficult questions about what happened - long, rambling, obfuscating posts completely avoiding the question. Thirdly I am unsurprised that you will not post again - shouting LA LA LA and running away in order to have what they think is the last word is typical of how Terry and his fans have behaved so far.

Lets also address you claims that I never responded to various stuff raised by Terry - all the stuff has been responded to ad nauseum both in this blog and on the DVD website - its morons like you that that have not read the responses that perpetuate the party line put out by Terry that I never respond. What you don't seem to understand is that I have been asking the same few questions of Terry ever since this started - and has not once ever answered them. Because he cannot. Why do you think that Don Campbell and Jon Bailey have never uttered a word on this? Firstly, obviously, because they are cowards. But mainly because they know that by their actions and PRINTED words thay got caught utterly fucking red handed. Do you think Dons'bosses issued a public apology over his actions for giggles?

Oh and while we are at it let me adress your question about the lack of search facilty that gets raised by idiots who think that being able to turn a PC on qualifies them as a coding expert (also answered ad nausem elsewhere but heyho). The DVD was written in Flash and then compiled in Director package. One of the reasons this was done was to prevent copying of the content (this feature worked so well it was how Terry got caught by the way). This package did not allow for a searchable database to be set up, either on the DVD or on the users PC. The other reason was that a search feature would return so many similar hits on such a narrow subject as to be useless. Got it?

Now here is the question you SHOULD be asking: If the lack of this feature was SUCH a negative, why then has the world shattering Lack of such a feature NEVER been raised in ANY of the other CD/DVD reviews of similar products on PMMS? Given that all of them are written in HTML, which DOES allow for an easy search facility, don't you think this is kind of odd?

And to your repeated statements about me not letting this drop - I did - for two years until Terry started it up again with his spiteful little 'addendum' to the product assassination. I just keep answering morons who come and abuse me - because I am polite, and also because, unlike Terry, I have all the evidence I need to prove Terry to be the lying cowardly shitbag that he is.

By the way "Sam", emails, written statements, and admission of actions are not 'circumstantial' evidence, at least not according to the people I consulted. They called it a straightforward case of product assassination and collusion. They are still waiting btw, for the repeatedly requested address of Terrys often threated legal team - all to no avail. Strange hey?

Yes I did give Terry the benefit of the doubt when he said he had no knowledge the private forum. Fair enough. How then do you explain, (after I told Terry what this groups intentions were), that he not only passed on my emails to them wherein I informed him I had access to their forum, but also then left the DVD in Jon Baileys possession up until Jon Baileys product assassination was published?

Tough questions eh "Sam"? Don't worry - I don't expect you to come back and adress them. Maybe you could ask Terry on his blog? Oh Wait. You can't can you? Ever noticed what happens on Terrys blog if you criticise him or fail to take his side? Yup - unlike here where I publish and answer everything, nothing of that kind ever sees the light of day over at PMMS.

Finally "Sam", I am going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that you do have some integrity and a modicum of moral courage and sense of fair play - I will ask you again to come up with a reasonable explanation of the question I asked you last time.

Here it is: How then did Don Campbell know, in advance, that a NEGATIVE review of our DVD was being written and going to appear on PMMS? Given that on the day he made this statement, the DVD was still in Jon Baileys possession, and bear in mind Terry gave it to Jon before he looked at it (Terrys words).

Now then "Sam". I think this is a reasonable question - I want to know how members of the public, with a known grudge against a co-author of my product, had advance knowledge of a NEGATIVE review being written, when said product was not in the reviewers possession. Had this happened on M-L, or Armorama or any other reputable site there would have been an uproar.

If you (or anyone for that matter) can come back with reasonable explanation to this question I will accept it. If you cannot, and want come back with the same rambling, avoiding drivel again then don't bother. If however you choose not to reply at all, then I and anyone else reading this will assume that there is no reasonable explanation and that everything I accused Terry of, backed up with his own and others WRITTEN statements is true.

Over to you "Sam". And believe me I really feel for you - not once in three years has Terry, Don or Jon answered this - if they cannot what chance do you have?

Brian

Cutting your nose off to spite your face

2010-06-29T08:27:00.001+01:00

Some months back I mentioned the fantastic work going on at the Trumpeter King Tiger Build. If you have not yet seen it, go there and bookmark it - the work and research is breathtaking. I was fortunate enough to be able to help the guys there with new drawings and a modification timeline for the KT.

For several months I worked with a lot of great researchers on the forum, and worked with them to produce the new reference material for their project. I posted a few times on the forums and once the stuff was done, one of them posted a link and thanked me.

A day or two later I got a puzzled email from a number of forum members asking if I knew why all of my posts and any mention of myself, or The Research Squad, had been stripped from the forum. (Bear in mind at this point I had been posting on the forum for several months). I looked into it and discovered that lo and behold, the forum moderator was none other than Don Campbell (I really had no idea up to that point). I also discovered that my internet access to the forum, and all others of which Don is the moderator, had been blocked. I was forced to write to the forum members and explain why Don had done this. Of course this involved a fairly detailed explanation of Dons actions as a moderator on a private forum, and several links to previously published articles, screenshots, and a public apology from a magazine disowning Mr Campbell and his actions posted under their name. As none of the KT forum were previously aware of Dons history you can imagine their reaction.

Safe to say that through this new petty action, Don's ever diminishing circle of admirers has shrunk to near zero.

Here is the hilarious part though.

It took all of three minutes for me to re-access ALL of the forums that Don moderates (yes Don - ALL of them). By taking down the links on the forum Don has driven up traffic to The Research Squad site where I have had to post both the drawings and timelines for the forum members to access.

Now we all know that Don is no rocket scientist when it comes to the internet. Why? Because some years back he and several others were caught posting using false accounts on M-L. Their plan was to use these accounts and pretend to be a UK resident posting under false names, so that they could get him banned from M-L. These idiots were so dumb they thought nobody would notice the IP addresses of the accounts were in Australia - one of them from the place of work of one of the culprits!

Lets face it - if Donnie were any dumber he would be watered twice a week

Keep the day job Don - I don't think NASA will be knocking on your door anytime soon.

Aftermath

2010-06-24T09:59:00.000+01:00

With Terry Ashley finally admitting after two years to everything I accused him of, I am now happy to post my last on the subject. As before, I am more than willing to let this lie, and hope that this time he does the same. During my absence I had some time to ponder the whole episode and its outcomes. Many people, both friends and otherwise, asked me why I continued to put my case in the face of such abuse and vitriol from supporters of Terry. There were several reasons for this:

1. I have always told the truth, and have now been vindicated
2. I had major support of many in the hobby, public and private, from friends, other manufacturers and many recognised peers - all of whom had evaluated the evidence and concluded that, as he eventually admitted, Terry had lied all along.
3. The loathing I have for those who would damage the hobby (and individuals) with anonymous snipings, endless vendettas, and similar actions from private forums or elsewhere. This loathing also extends to those in a public position, or position of power, who would help these individuals and then lie about their own actions and motives in order to retain their credibility and fan base (Terry is not alone here see previous posts on Jim Rae). Readers should bear in mind that despite being the instigators of the whole mess, despite the massive damage they caused, not a single word, contritional or otherwise has ever been heard from the likes of Don Campbell or Jon Bailey. Although it cost him dearly at least Michael Kenny has posted on public forums (although they were troll attacks).

While I have no regrets in the matter, I do feel some sympathy for those who supported Terry through all of this, only to have their faith destroyed by his eventual admission. A pity some of the more vocal ones have not made their disillusionment more public, but hey-ho, perhaps they only have the capacity for abuse, and not the character required for apology.

So where to go from here? Happily there is still loads of stuff in the hobby to write about, both good and bad, so I will do my best.

A parting shot for those anonymous souls who send in the abusive comments - Keep them coming, they are always welcome. Not only do they make me laugh, but the concept of being a called coward (amongst other things) by someone who does not have the balls to leave his own name only makes for delicious irony, which if you had not noticed, I kind of thrive on.

Back!

2010-06-15T11:41:00.000+01:00

A recent project has kept me away for the last few months - long hours, and little or no time to even turn on the computer. However I am back for the forseeable future and getting into the swing of things. For those eager for updates on the last article I don't have much news I'm afraid - A case has been opened but I have been too busy to enquire as to progress. As soon as I hear more I will pass it on. Really looking forward to modelling and blogging again so keep an eye out for new stuff!

Just un-f*****g-believable

2010-04-15T12:23:00.000+01:00

I said previously that I would not be posting more until further developments but I just discovered something so gob-smackinging unbelievable in Terrys altered post that I just had to highlight it.

In the end this would have remained on the "private" forum was it not for Brian betraying that privacy, not for the first time either. Whatever occurred on this private forum had no bearing on the review I WROTE as I’ve already stated I didn’t even know of the existence of this group until all this blew up..

Thats right. He actually thinks that. And said it in a public post.

Terry truly believes that this entire mess is my fault because I exposed the actions of a group of individuals in a private forum who meant harm to my product. Who planned and launched troll attacks on my product on public forums. He is saying that despite the fact he STARTED this entire mess by passing our DVD to this group (without our knowledge or permission), he is not to blame for any of it. That it was my fault for making all of this public!!

This is despite the fact that Terry ONLY admitted to passing on our DVD to the private forum AFTER I told him what they were doing. Thats right Terry - that means that once you knew what they were doing, you actually APPROVED of their actions. Do you get it now Terry? Do you see what you have just admitted to?

He denies knowing about them - Yet passed on MY emails TO THEM after I told him what they were up to. So Terry - who betrayed whose privacy first? The person who passed the DVD on in the first place? Or the person who told the private forum that I had access to their forum? Or the person (me) who exposed both the instigator (you) and the conspirators in the private forum after both of the previous betrayals? (yours)

Terry - do you actually read what you write? Do you think before you write it? Do you have any idea what the quoted text says about not only your character but your mentality? Do you not have a single friend amongst all the fanbois you could send your drivelings to BEFORE you post them, and thus prevent repeatedly shooting yourself in the foot?

Till now I had just assumed that all your denials were in the hope that if you repeated them often enough people would believe you.

But you really do actually believe you are blamesless in this whole affair don't you?

Sadly, by now, I am sure that you will re-read it a hundred times and still never see what you have just publicly admitted to everyone.

A very serious matter indeed

2010-03-27T08:18:00.000Z

It has been brought to my attention that two days ago Terry Ashley posted my approximate home address on his blog. 24hrs later this was amended to show my exact address. The only reason for this action can be that he did this to encourage other s to endanger the safety of my family. I have therefore taken the step of reporting Terry to Google, as this is a serious breach of their terms and conditions. I have also reported him to the Western Australian Police for possible criminal prosecution.

*Edit 28th March

Until this matter has been cleared up, no further articles will be posted. I will however edit this one to keep you updated as to events.

Many thanks to the hundreds of individuals who have emailed to express their utter disgust at what Terry has done. I will try to reply to each and every one to express my thanks for your support. Many of these came from people who previously were very antagonistic towards myself over this matter.

I would ask that people can now stop sending me Terrys address - dozens have already supplied it, and now that I know which dept. of the WA police deals with this I will be contacting them tomorrow.

To all those vociferous fans of Terry so eager to always defend him no matter what - your silence on this cowardly act speaks volumes as to your character.

Edit 8th April
Progress being made - more soon

PMMS is back! Again! Oh wait... Nope there it is! Ah crap gone again.. Hooray its here!! Shit...maybe this time? Bugger, not yet...

2010-03-24T23:56:00.000Z

Nuff said

*ok Its 8:30am on 25th March and PMMS content is back up. Woohoo. I am not here for the rest of the day so if this changes again can someone email me?

Flowchart to help you buy an IPad

2010-03-24T23:50:00.000Z

Has to be one the funniest things seen lately to help you decide whether or not to buy an IPad

At last Terry Ashley FINALLY admits to lying...

2010-03-24T09:06:00.000Z

There is long rambling self-serving post on PMMS. Once again Terry skirts every one of the three serious questions I keep asking him, but buried in the dungheap is this shiny little gem:

"I will put my hand up for one thing, saying in some e-mails that I was working on the review, which was simply to get this wining individual to go way. Something I bet nearly everyone including Brian has done at some time when asked if you're doing something, especially at work. You say "yes working on it" so you don't have to elaborate further, that's all. Yet he takes this literally because it suits his agenda, and should be seen as such"

So on the 13th and 16th June when he told me he had been working on the review, he lied. (Apparently because I had at this point sent two emails, one to inform him of a competition, and a second to inform him of the actions of a group in a private forum. In neither email did I ask about the progress or otherwise of a review.)

So now that we know Terry had not started the review on the 16th June. He told me that to 'get me off his back'

Now for the two remaining serious questions that in 2.5 years Terry has refused even to address:

1. At 1.53am on June 16th, only hours after I told Terry we had access to a private forum, people on the forum had been told about this access. The only people that had this info were the person passing the information, Alasdair, myself, and Terry. Now - with Terry having given JB the DVD in the first place, which of those four is the most likely to have given this information to JB? Exactly - Terry Ashley. Which exposes a second lie in the blathering piss he wrote today - ? If he did not know about the private forum, why on earth was this info so important that he had to tell JB about it as soon as he found out?

2. One hour later on June 16th Don Campbell the forum moderator made this comment: "Thankfully a real review of this garbage is imminent on PMMS and should raise some questions about the ones already circulating - should but probably not...."

So if (as Terry has now admitted) no review at that point was being written by Terry, who was writing it? And how did Don Campbell (who Terry says he does not know AT ALL) have two weeks warning about an upcoming review (which he already has been told is very negative), on a supposedly 'Independent' review site?

Two and half years for the first lie to be admitted - maybe the rest of the dominoes will tumble now.

A long time ago......

2010-03-23T23:04:00.000Z

On a planet far away was the Land of Mod. It was a vast plain, only broken by a valley which lay between two hills. This area was known as The Terrytory. The hills were topped with two towers - one was ivory and so high the summit could not be seen. The other was a tall lighthouse known as The Beacon. At the top of the ivory tower lived the Terrydactyl, and old leathery bird, gimlet of eye, wrinkled of skin, and jaundiced of outlook. The lighthouse was run by an ordinary bloke with a keyboard.

In the valley between the towers were the villages: The village of Armorama, the village of Missing-Lynx, and the village of ModelArmour. (This last was a sealed Utopia where everyone got on and no fighting was allowed so it does not feature in our story). There was a fourth village - that of Tracklink, but it had few inhabitants, all of whom were grotesquely inbred. They spent all day shagging each other, so consequently no one went there, and when its name was raised in the other villages, the villagers averted their eyes and changed the subject. (*Ed - it's interesting to note that the Elder of Tracklink was so deformed that he had a penis where his right ear should be - hence his title - Dickhead). In the centre of each village was a pot of wisdom from whence the villagers derived their daily sustenance. These pots were known as...... The Forum.

For many a year the Terrydactyl would swoop over the villages. He would never speak nor deign to look at the villagers. Simply drop glowing pages from its beak. The villagers would gather them reverently, poring over the runes, then carefully place the pages in a tome on a marble pillar. The tome was known as.... The DirecTerry. Every day the villagers would face the ivory tower and prostrate themselves in the dust, worshipping the tower and the Terrydactyl.

In the village of Armorama this worship was ruthlessly enforced by the town crier. Appointed by the permanently absent Elder of Armorama, he abused the villagers endlessly and bent them to his will. A bitter man, filled with self-loathing, he looked liked Gollum, wore a tattered kilt, and smelt of stale Scotch and old piss. he was known as..... Dimrae. This creature loathed The Beacon and its owner. For twice in the past the Elder of Armorama had forced him to go grovelling to The Beacon and beg forgiveness for insults he had hurled unjustly. He nurtured this hate at night in is hovel, sitting in the dark and grinding both a tiny axe and his four teeth as he made his plans.

One day the Terrydactyl dropped a page which puzzled many of villagers. It appeared to be a hate campaign against The Beacon. The villagers could not understand this. The Beacon had never treated them unfairly, nor interfered in their daily lives. Several nights later The Beacon shone a beam of light at the top of the Ivory tower! The villagers could now see it clearly for the first time. Around the top of the tower were vast inscriptions - "The only use for villagers is to worship me", "Do you think I do this for Villagers?" and "Dragon will never get a Highly Recommended". The villagers were stunned. Could it be true? The Terrydactyl held them in contempt? They were vexed and cried to the heavens "Like - WTF dude? What did we do wrong? WTF is going on here?"

The Dimrae ran around screaming and foaming at the mouth "NONONO this is all the fault of The Beacon, he has attacked the Ivory Tower, don't believe his lies." The people were very confused and many of them refused to worship the tower. "what are you blathering on about Dimrae? The Beacon had fuck all to do with this!"

And now something serious happened - because it was sustained magically by sycophancy, the Ivory tower started to crumble. Day on day less villagers worshipped the Tower and it got lower and lower until the TerryDactyl was sitting on a pile of rubble and old birdshit. He was very angry. He swooped down and grabbed the DirecTerry in his beak and flew off never to be seen again!

The villagers were bereft! The holy documents had been wrenched form their grasp for no discernable reason. The Dimrae tried to shower the blame on The Beacon, many followed him, but many could see through his lies and told him to go and fuck himself.

The Dimrae went mental!! How dare they question him? How dare they question the TerryDactyl? So unbeknownst to all the villages, in the dead of night, he would scurry from village to village (starting with his own), and take a shit in each Forum. When dawn broke he would run around and scream that The Beacon was poisoning their Forum, and it was The Beacons fault that the Terrydactyl had taken the DirecTerry!!

But The Beacon was wise to the schemes of the Dimrae. One night, while the Dimrae squatted over the Forum in the village of Armorama trying to squeeze out a particularly big one, an incandescent spotlight shot out from the Beacon and illuminated him! The villagers ran out and saw him frozen in place, his hairy bare arse perched over their Forum!

The villagers were mighty vexed and said " What the fuck do you think you are doing Dimrae? It was YOU that was shitting in our Forum and trying to blame the Beacon!" "NONONO" screamed the Dimrae "The Beacon made me do it" "I am doing this for your own good to show you how bad the Beacon really is!"

But the villagers had had enough of his lies and abuse "Do really you think we are that thick?" they cried "The Beacon never comes to our village! It was you all along that was poisoning our Forum"

And with this they banished him to the village of Tracklink, with all the other inbred grotesques, where they could not tell the difference no matter how much shit was in their Pot.

More delusional bollocks from Terry

2010-03-21T18:49:00.001Z

I just saw the following on PMMS - the blog is back up by the way.

"It is not easy to know how to respond to fabricated “evidence” cobbled together from various sources to suit one’s own agenda, in some ways it’s impossible without looking as stupid as those making the accusations."

It is now offically beyond my comprehension that Terry now denies even sending me emails. Yet when I published them 2 years ago he went mental about the fact that I had published his 'private' emails to me. The only thing he was angry about at the time was the fact that they exposed his lies to me over a two week period.

If anyone thinks that Terry is telling the truth, and that I 'fabricated' his emails to me, please drop me a line and I will forward all of them to anyone that wants them.

What on earth is this man on? Does he think he can airbrush away his emails and actions just by repeating often enough that he did not write them in the first place? Here is an example of what I am talking about. This is a full copy of the email sent to me by Terry on June 16th some two weeks before the product assassination appeared on his site:

Hi Brian,

No, I don't have access to any of these private forums (or even know about them) which is probably a good thing as I can keep out of any "discussions" and form my own opinions. Even got banned from the MDFC forum which I couldn't care less about anyway.

But as you may be aware I do know Jon Bailey and he has told me of his posting but other than that I have no idea what is happening or not happening for that matter in any but the public forums I check out (AR. ML, MM, PA, TL).

I should also let you know that he has seen the DVD as I lent the one you sent me to him as he wanted a look and I had other items to review before getting to look at the DVD myself.

The review is almost done and again I should let you know there are quite a few errors in the content and not just to do with new information or transposed cover images.

But as always I will just report the facts fairly without any hidden motives as with all my reviews.

I am a bit disturbed that someone like Vinnie Brannigan who has been involved with the project would be writing a review as he did. That is up to him of course but personally if I was involved with any product I would disqualify myself from commenting and reviewing that product but I guess that's just me.

Some like David Bryden don't seem to have any problems waxing lyrical about the Tiger kits he has been involved with, which I think shows a complete lack of integrity.

Just on my response to the Dragon Blogger this was apart from some initial comments to ignore the clown as there was no point in responding further as it just encouraged him. Anyway most people I have spoken too about him got a good laugh from his waffle more than anything.

And as I told Jon, I don't really want to know what goes on in private forums as I don't want to get involved with whatever may be happening between individuals. It also takes up too much time that should be spent reviewing stuff so I'll sign off now.

Cheers

Terry Ashley
Perth Military Modelling Site
http://www.perthmilitarymodelling.com

Bear in mind where he says "The review is almost done and again I should let you know there are quite a few errors in the content and not just to do with new information or transposed cover images." We know that when he wrote that our product STILL HAD NOT LEFT JON BAILEYS POSSESSION.

Now dear readers if you think I have 'fabricated' this, drop me a line and I will send it on, with all datestamps and header info included.

Terry is not only a despicable liar but apparently is seriously delusional as well.

Open Letter to Armorama members

2010-03-20T14:40:00.000Z

Some of you will have noticed Jim Rae's (your Managing News Editor) persistent attempts on your own forums to keep alive the Terry Ashley saga by demonising myself at every opportunity. He does this in the face of increasing criticism from many of you, and indeed now has to resort to the cowardly tactic of dropping a little turd on the forum, ptending its 'News' and then locking it, so you cannot comment.

What you may not be aware of is that Jim Rae is doing the same thing on other forums IN YOUR NAME. He is embarrassing both himself and the good name of Armorama and at the same time dragging it through the mud in the eyes of the hobby. No other staff member, of any other forum, goes onto other sites to perpetrate the same disgusting practices as Jim Rae.

And do you know why?

Because twice in the last few years, Jim Rae was forced by Jim Starkweather to write grovelling apologies to me after I complained about the abuse he leveled at me in your forums. The same kind of abuse he levels at his own members on numerous occasions.

This much I promise: As long as Jim Rae is allowed to keep on trolling on other forums, and continues to insinuate that I am responsible for actions I have no knowledge of I will continue to write about him here - on a daily basis if need be. As a consequence your site and forums may suffer some embarrassment and I do apologise for this. However if like myself, you are sick of this odious, petty, bitter individual lowering the tone of your site and our hobby, then please make your feelings known either here, on your own forum, or in an email to Jim Starkweather.

Jim Rae is the worst kind of cowardly Internet cyber-bully. He will only post on his own forum, or go and spread his muck on places where he knows no opposing comment will ever be allowed. You will never see him post here - because here people are allowed to answer back.

If anyone wants to come here and defend Jim Rae then please do - otherwise - why the fuck do you STILL put up with him?

*Edit And bear in mind people - before you accuse me of selfish motives - I am urging you to stop an individual whose practices are driving over a 1000 readers A DAY to this blog.

Knobheads

2010-03-19T17:30:00.000Z

I see that certain idiots are telling people over on Track-link how to google this blog, without warning readers that it contains adult material. These same idiots are then COMPLAINING about the language used here!! Well Graham, Micheal, Paul etc, if you don't like to see the words fuck, fucking, c**t, c**ting, lying bastards, shit stirring scum used in conjuction with the names Terry Ashley, Jon Bailey, Micheal Kenny, Don Campbell and Jim Rae - THEN DON'T FUCKING READ IT!

I too find all four of those names utterly disgusting - unfortunately I have to print them here otherwise people will not know who I am talking about

**EDIT
A comment left by Brian shows I was partially wrong about the warnings
You are right Brian - my apologies. They layout of threads and text there causes me to miss stuff sometimes.

Sincere apologies to Graham - he did post the warning.

However there are several people there who keep complaining about the language used here when its quite obvious to me (Yes I have Statcounter) that this blog is permanently bookmarked and regularly updated on their pc's. You cannot have both ways.

I would also like to point out that Micheal Kenny is STILL dumber than a bag of hammers. Saying that I had to create a site to 'peddle filth' ignores the fact that I contacted all forum owners at the outset and said I would not be dragging this matter through their sites. I also asked them in the strongest terms to remove any posts that pointed to my blog.

You see Micheal, because you are an odious little c**t who got caught trolling on Armorama last time round - you have pretty much run out places to post anyway. Why don't you try peddling YOUR'E filth on a real mainstream forum and see how long it stays up? Nope thought not. The cesspit you now reside in is pretty much your'e level. How the mighty have fallen eh Mikey?

For those readers unaware of it, Micheal Kenny was ejected from the private forum that started the entire mess because he orchestrated product assassination troll threads on both Armorama and M-L.

Have a nice day Mikey

P.S Alasdiar Johnson has been trying to post a reasonsed rebuttal to Mikeys little insult thread but Uber-pscho Paul Owen deletes them as soon as they are posted. Power of free speech eh? Your'e a real prince Paul.

The plotters thicken

2010-03-19T08:54:00.000Z

It was with some hilarity I have read several posts on different forums advising Terry to take legal action. Why is this so funny? Because from the outset, I obtained legal advice on this matter. Why else do you think I have been able to post details of this affair with impunity?
Because:
1. All the documentary evidence I have over Terry, Jon Baileys, and their friends actions will stand up in court.
2. What they did was ILLEGAL. If it were go to court either as a civil or criminal matter Terry would be in serious trouble.
3. I have on numerous occasions, after Terry threatened me with legal action, publicly asked him for the adress of his legal council so I could send all the documents to them. So far - no reply.
4. Do you honestly think that if Terry was was the injured party here that my site would still be up and his removed? Terry is well aware of all of the above - why else do you think he tries to divert attention from it?

I warned Terry a long time ago that eventually people would come to realise I am telling the truth about what he did. He chose to ignore me and hope that the pressure from his numpty fanbois would sway opinion and this, and I, would go away.
How did that work out for you Terry?
By the way - 2.5 years on and STILL waiting for that adrress.

Guest Article

2010-03-19T07:23:00.000Z

Dear reader when I read this I just had to put it up as an article rather than let it languish in the comments section. This is what I started this blog for - interesting debate and stimulating comment. This is most definitely stimulating comment - Anonymous we salute you - we are not worthy.

Bright sun, sand, scorching heat (130ºF or 54ºC if you prefer), and a man appears in the distance, sweating like a pig (do pigs sweat?) dragging a huge bag.
That sand only made matters worse, as the bag was half buried due to the weight.
A couple of guys run to him for assistance and ask:
- Poor man! What's in the bag?
- Papers... a bunch of them, around 130Kg (or 286 lbs)
- Let us help you
And they open the bag and they see reviews. Glossy white paper with the exception of one that was already a bit yellow of being passed from hand to hand before landing on the bag.
He says
- I'm going to hide this away. There are people trying to rip them and I have to hide them.
- Don't do it!! They are reviews!
- Yeah I know, but I don't give a shit. They were of good use while I wanted. I'm going to hide them, or better yet, burn them
- don't do that Sir, please. We'll take them and make good use of them
- Nooope (he says with a mocking smile and raising his eyebrows). I'm going to burn them. You should be helping me when I started this desert crossing alone. Not now! I don't need you help now.
And he grabs a match and a small bottle of distilled Foster's alcohol and starts to sprinkle those nice glossy papers with it.
And he lights the match and throws it into the bag.
The guys in total disbelief start to scream
- Don't do that! Don't do that! They are precious. We'd heard of them before and we're not sure they existed. But they do, and you are destroying them like that?
- They're mine. Fuck off
And while he stares at the effect that his foolish gesture causes on those poor souls, he laughs (just inside, we don't want to make the man too devious , do we?) And he empties the bag into a pile of ashes and starts to move away.
The poor souls, sobbing, dive their hands in the ashes and start revolving them in the hope that something was spared.
And all of a sudden they grab one of those pieces of paper that didn't burn. And they raise it above their heads and thank God for that piece of paper that survived the cataclysm.
But they look again and they discover that it's no more than a piece of a strip club leaflet. A pair of b**** is still visible.
Meanwhile the guy is staring at them with a smile.
They understand that he still has another bag, lighter, and much more convenient (in digital format) that will appear somewhere, probably in the middle of other THINGS when no one expects.
He screams back to them:
- Got you, you f****rs!!
- I do this all the time just for the fun of it. And sure it's fun. I could do without the sweating, but it comes with the terrytory.
- I did this a few times in the past few months and you always fall for it. Geez... how can you still believe this shit is real?
And one of them screams back at him with Scottish accent
- You bastard! I suspected you from the beggining. I was just trying to get them to burn them myself!!!
- I know
He screams back
- I just wanted to see your face, and to see how low you could go. You did pretty well! I always like to see a fucker like you down on his knees trying to take advantage of a situation where he also looses. I can never get enough of useful idiots like yourself.
- Eat my dust Rob Roy! Is that a skirt?
- It's a kilt! Damn you!
- What's the deal with the dead rabbit hanging there?
- Fuck off! Go to the antipodes you bastard. You tricked me!
The other guy, silent, looks at all this in desbelief, as he thought the burnt reviews were real and that the guy beside him really wanted to help.
- I'll never believe these fuckers again. Both of them. I'll take note of their faces and names and I'll never be fooled like this (he thinks)
And thinks a little more (which is kind of amazing taking into account the lack of a brain) but can't come up with nothing useful (as usual)
But he silently follows the guy with the empty bag, just in case he wants to give him some of the ashes still in the bag in exchange of some favor.

An Apology

2010-03-18T23:59:00.000Z

For some months now I have been contributing images, drawings and stuff for the guys over on the King Tiger 1/16 build forum. If you have not seen it, please go and visit. It has some of the most well researched and breathtaking scratchbuiling you will ever see. A couple of days ago I built an interactive King Tiger Design Modification Timeline (please go look - I am REALLY proud of it) for the forum so that the modellers could easily see appropriate changes for their models. As a top banner for the page I used the forum banner image to tie them together. It appears that this image belonged to someone who had donated it to the site for their use. I would like to apologise for using the image without permission, I changed it as soon as I found out.

In the meantime all previous posts I had made, the content, and links to the drawings, images etc have been apparently been stripped from the forum. This was done by Don Campbell, moderator/owner of the forum. Had I known that it was his forum I would never have posted there in first place, my dispute with him is well known, and had I been in his place, may have done the same thing. It is sad that this and future content have now been denied to the forum members, but I will endeavor to keep adding new stuff and post it over at The Research Squad site with the rest of it, and hope the forum guys pass it around themselves.

If you want to know WHY Don did this - read this.

The Life of Brian

2010-03-16T22:17:00.000Z

I have often wondered over the past two years at peoples abilities to blithely ignore what in court would be considered hard evidence (I know because I checked), and instead deny that their hero had done anything wrong at all - quite the opposite in fact. In their view their martyr was bravely staggering on, the huge cross on his back, bleeding from wounds, with nasty people like me stabbing him with spears. Eventually to tragically bring him down, his last breath drawn as he expired heroically.

"Look what you've done they shouted, the saviour and his cross are finished! Oh Woe! Our world is ended, but while our hero is dead we still have the cross to touch and stroke. Yay!"

But then got he up, grabbed the cross and fucked off into the distance.

"Oh my God!" they cried - "it's a miracle! But er... hang on - where's the cross? Don't we need it? Oh wait!" they rationalize with convoluted logic. "He took it because he could suffer no more abuse! Better to hide the cross forever so that it remains pure in our memories."

Nowhere has this ludicrous train of thought been more apparent than a statement I saw today by one C. Sherman on M-L:

"By the time the serious attacks began, Terry had already had a chance to establish himself as a fair-minded reviewer."

I see. So because Terry had not previously (to anyone's knowledge) done anything wrong, he was not capable of any wrongdoing whatsoever? Despite all the documentary proof and admissions so kindly provided by Terry to the contrary?

Really? Then why do people go to jail? Because using this nutjob logic - up until the time THEY initially offended all criminals were model citizens and therefore should never be prosecuted. OR - Do you think maaaaayyyybbeee that's why its called a FIRST OFFENCE?
Lets use Mr C. Shermans utterly batshit logic on a couple of other real world scenarios:

"Hey. George Bush and Tony Blair could never have lied about WMD, they were doing a superduper job up until then"

"Tiger Woods slept with all those women? Never! He is such a good golfer and besides all his adverts make him out to be a real nice guy."

"So what if Hitler DID misbehave a little bit - boy did he know how to run a country"

Sometimes I despair at the paucity of intelligent interrogation in our hobby. However as one commenter pointed out "Sunlight is the best disinfectant". I will do my best to keep pouring it.

Jim Rae - Frantically masturbating chimp

2010-03-15T20:36:00.000Z

From the gift that never stops giving - the pen of Jim Rae
His new pious words on Armorama about drawing a line under this affair are belied by his attempts to stir up trouble on other peoples forums YET again. Not 24hrs after his troll attack on M-L was deleted he now posts this on Track-Link:

Before PMMS went off-line, this is the message that appeared on Terry's Blog:
It was picked up by Pat McGrath, Terry's words, NO embellishments:
'posted by Terry Ashley at Perth Military Modelling Site Blog - 14 hours ago I’m sorry to say this blog was subjected to a troll attack (see rule 2) yesterday by the disciples of that Balkwill individual, spewing forth the same language we have heard ad nausea from Balkwill himself...'

So just because Terry said I have disciples who organised a troll attack on his blog it must be true? So if I said Jim that you were an alcoholic who posts most of his worst stuff after his 10th Scotch of the day, would that make it true? Of course not. Thats obviously just how you come across.

Jim, for someone even as fucking dumb as you are (i.e REALLY, REALLY, REALLY, fucking dumb), you must realise that by now, EVERYTHING I do has my name on it, and can be found here. Why would I waste my time and dignity posting on blog where my comments would never see the light of day? I tell you what Jim, I am going to educate you, in words of very small syllables, that will not hurt your brain cell, what I understand happened to PMMS. This version of events comes from two people who saw what happened before it all got deleted. They were kind enough to send me copies.

Apparently one or more people went onto Terrys blog and started asking questions of him. These are the same types of questions that were also posed to Terry on your own forum two years ago. Remember that Jim? Here is hint: That was when you were supporting Micheal Kennys troll attack against me on your own forum. (your finest hour by a long way). Now these new comments on Terrys blog were neither insulting nor abusive (I have been told - remember I have not seen them) - they simply questioned Terry on his version of events. Terry then went into thermonuclear foaming at the mouth rant mode and posted a load of vitriol, a copy of which I posted yesterday. One of the posters came back and pointed out further flaws in his story. It was after this that Terry took down his blog and site.

Now heres the thing Jim - I have no 'disciples' - only visitors that can read, use logic, and spot lies in documents. Google Blooger cannot be hacked - which means Terry took down his site and blog out of pure spite. Not to spite me Jim - no - to spite all the modellers he holds in such high regard.

Now Jim. I understand your position. As the title of this article indicates, you are desperately trying to implicate me in this on other peoples forums. But really Jim - Track-link? Isn't that a new low in desperation even for you? What do thay have - 10 visitors a month? Why not try Tanks 'n Things - I see no one has posted there for months - maybe you can become a new legend there.

Troll attack (part 2) and Return of his Gaping Twatness

2010-03-14T18:08:00.000Z

For some reason (Jim Rae posting crap on M-L's doorstep and running away again) I seem to be getting the blame for some sort of troll attack on PMMS early this morning. And now its closed, so that must be my fault too? Yet the first I heard about this was an email in my inbox around 10am this moring, 7 hours AFTER all this stuff was posted and then deleted by Terry. Here is how I first became aware of this:

"Also Brian - I see he is now blaming and attacking you for what someone has posted as a comment in his blog? Obviously he has no idea about timezone's" and "Since I read the post that he responded to on his "blog" it is interesting that he has turned that into a "troll attack" on himself and Jon Bailey, when it did not mention Messr Bailey at all, merely quoted Terry's post and added some astute comment's."

Apparently someone posted something that did not agree with Terry and now its a 'troll attack'. For fucks sake if all you want to hear are people that agree with you why have a blog at all? The only thing I have posted in the last 24hrs was the reply here to Terrys latest deluded rant. (quickly removed like all his other stuff when someone pointed out the flaws in his arguments)

I too am mystified as to why PMMS has been removed, I wanted it to stay up, otherwise how would I get my explanation and apology?. The last I heard Terry did all this work for modellers and was going to leave the site up as a resource. Surely he did not take the site down out of spite? Really? What kind of person would delete 13 years of work rather than admit he got caught lying in emails?

Return of His Gaping Twatness
Jim Rae never fails to entertain. On this post at M-L he does his usual shit stirring on other forums - implicates me in the attack on PMMS and makes this comment about troll attacks: "Jeez makes you want to puke... "

Only for this to be pointed out to him straight away:
"BUT, You are absolutely right Jim. Troll attacks in any way shape or form are to be condemned and abhorred. Its a pity you did not hold this view two years ago when you actively supported Michael Kennys troll attack on your own forum, much to the public disgust of many of your members. By the way Jim, why ARE you posting this stuff on this forum WITHOUT your signature as Managing News Editor of Armorama?"

Also he is desperately trying to masturbate this subject to life on HIS OWN forum. AGAIN. And once again his own members have picked up on this:
"Ok, and i'm sure i'm going to get blasted here for being one of the fanboys of the opposing side which I assure you i'm not, but this and other threads have been slammed by you Jim and others because they end up being a slagging match and as far as I can see thats the way this thread is now headed, because of comments you are making. Up until today this thread was about the end of PMMS, nothing more, now I start seeing comments about Brian Balkwill, Terry's blog being trolled etc and I can guarantee where this thread is headed, I see you are also posting stuff on ML Jim which in my view offers nothing useful to the discussions.

Honestly, and I think I speak for many people here, im sick to death of this whole saga, its boring and offers nothing useful to this site or any other site. If Terry decided to give it up then thats his decision please can we just leave it there instead of continuously going round in circles blaming people for it. Brian has a blog where you are freely allowed to discuss whatever the hell you want about this matter so take it there. As you rightly said Jim this isnt the place for such discussions.

I'm not attacking you Jim, but it seems very hypocritical of you to moan about these threads ending up being a slagging match, and you are now the first one to throw some mud in this thread, as well as on ML."

And look Jim! your fellow 'serious researcher' and pet troll Michael Kenny just posted for the first time in ages in support of you on M-L! Seems like Mr Kenny only appears when YOU need him for support. God Jim - I'll bet your members are SOOOO proud of you right now. Again. For the umpteenth time. Why don't you take Rob's advice and come HERE for a debate Jim? You gutless fuckwit.

Finally to all those who are as sick of this subject as I am. I did not cause this fight - Terry did. I did not reignite it after two years - Terry did. I did not close down PMMS - Terry did.

Troll attack

2010-03-14T09:46:00.000Z

Is there someone out there who knows Terry Ashley well enough to tell me if he is on some sort of reality altering medication? Or maybe needs some? Someone sent me rant he has just posted and its just unbelievable that he expects anyone with any IQ higher than 3 to believe the fantasy version of events he puts forward. Lets examine some of the more jaw-dropping statements.

"I’m sorry to say this blog was subjected to a troll attack.."
Really Terry!!??. You mean a group of individuals with ill intent, attacked your site anonymously? Is this the same as attacks done by Jon Bailey and friends from a private forum who made troll attacks about our DVD on both M-L and Armorama? And they did this with your help, and collusion, after you gave Jon bailey our DVD? After all Terry, when I told you what they were doing not only did you NOT apologise for your part in it and instruct them to stop, you then passed on my emails to Jon Bailey to warn him we had access to his forum. Remember Jon Bailey Terry? Your 'good friend', who you gave our dvd to 'at his request' 'before you looked at it' (all your words from your own emails Terry).

I had no knowledge of, or who, or what, was posted on your blog. I imagine in some way it was critical of you, or failed to be leg-humpingly sycophantic enough to be posted. After all Terry, we all know just how well you respond to any form of criticism.

"...but this also contains a cowardly attack on Jon Bailey who has no web presence to defend himself..."
Again - Really Terry!!??
Are his fingers broken? Has he lost his internet connection? I see Jon still posts regularly on Planet Armour, Schwerpunkt and other forums, and gets articles published in magazines. He had plenty of web presence in his private forum from where he wrote your review for you Terry. No Terry what you should have said is that Jon Bailey likes to all his dirty work in private. At least you have some balls to post publicly Terry and for that I give you credit. Jon Bailey is a cowardly cretin who has never once, in public. either given reasons for, or apologised for what he did. He has the whole fucking internet to defend himself on Terry. You fuckwit.

"Let’s understand that this nasty vindictive campaign resurrected yet again by Balkwill and his mindless followers is over a review first posted on July 1, 2007, that’s two and a half years ago for god’s sake."
For fucks sake Terry we both know this was dead and buried for two years until you started attacking me with an 'addendum' to Jons review in October last year. You even admitted this!! Get some better medication Terry - or get checked for Alzheimer's. Secondly Terry, it was not a review, it was a quite obvious product assassination, as was pointed out by several individuals in forums two years ago, none of whom had anything to do with me. And if anyone doubts that, compare it to any other review on PMMS, for the same amount of bile and poison.

"....yet he just dismisses anything said and continues to plough on even making up more stuff as he goes along..."
Words fails me. Go back your 'Sent' box Terry. Everything I have posted was based on your emails, your actions, and those of Jon Bailey and his private forum. Does this not penetrate your tiny , un-medicated mind Terry? When somebody reads YOUR EMAIL from 14th June where you tell me that you have nearly finished the review, and then they see a screenshot of Jon Bailey saying in a private forum on the SAME DAY that he still has it in his possession, they know you are lying Terry. The problem was Terry that you did not expect us to have access to that private forum, for reasons known only to yourself, you were going to post Jons bile as your own. When you got caught out, instead of apologising and dropping it, you put it up and hoped that your previous good name would prevail. Well you were wrong Terry. How much of your good name do you think is still left? Precious fucking little.Your own emails sank you.

Oh. And your 'good friend' Jon Bailey? Funny that. In two and half years, this good friend, now (according to you) obviously instrumental in ending PMMS, has never once come out in public to help you Terry. Way to go Jon. Now that (according to you Terry) the public know that Jon and his friends played a part in killing off PMMS, they will now be as popular as a fart in a spacesuit(maybe this is your revenge on them). What a lovely little group you are Terry.

"Oh, and if you’re wondering what sort of stuff this man posts, this is a quote from his blog posting of 12 March [quote]The one I have in mind is "Once a despicable lying c**t, always a despicable lying c**t".[end quote]"
Yes Terry that's exactly how I and many others feel about you and group of troll friends. And you know why I used those words? Because what I actually wanted to say was unprintable even on an adult blog.

You want this to end Terry? Then either take me up on my previous offer or shut the fuck up and go back to sniffing glue. But if you do not, then every time you post some bluster and bullshit about the review having been written by you, I will refer readers back your own emails. Does this penetrate the drug induced haze Terry? YOUR OWN FUCKING EMAILS are what sank you.

How to spot a ghost written product assassination

2010-03-13T13:18:00.000Z

Quite easy really. Instead of looking at what was said - look for that which was not.

Common amongst many emails from our DVD customers was very high praise for a single feature on the DVD - the Design Modification Timeline. This interactive screen showed with one click, all appropriate factory and field modifications for all Panther variants for any given month of production. This could be accessed at any time from a large button marked "Timeline" on the bottom of any screen. Feedback from modellers has been universally positive, and indeed, several people, including one reviewer, said this feature alone was worth the price of the DVD.

Compare this to what Jon Bailey said about it.
Nothing.
Not.a.single.word.

Had it not been for other reviews which highlighted it, anyone reading Jon Baileys review would not have known it existed. How bad does your hatred have to be that you deliberately omit a feature so widely praised by normal modellers? Or was it that because he could find nothing wrong with it was not mentioned?

Anyway. Heres what I am going to do. I have posted the Panther Design Modification Timeline from the DVD for everyone to use - just click the link to view

What I would like you to do is the following:
Go and look it over, if any corrections are needed let me know and I will change it. Next, come back here, and debate why this feature was omitted by Jon Bailey from his product assassination.

Finally, if someone is willing to make up the equivalent charts and send them to me, I will build similar Timelines for other popular vehicles. I will put them up on my site and also make them available to other modelling forums (yes - even Armorama) to host on their servers if they wish. Just let your various owners/editors know and I will send them the files at their request. Or if you want it yourself drop me a line.

Death throes

2010-03-12T21:18:00.000Z

With the closing/opening/closing going on at PMMS Mk2 my head is spinning. One positive though is that at least now that its closed (until it opens again) we are getting much more blog updates from Terry than when it was open. Obviously with more time on his hands for relaxed reflection we are benefiting by getting an insight into his thoughts. Personally I think this is great as I have long observed that Terry never actually appears to read or remember anything he has posted previously, and consequently completely contradicts himself, or makes stuff up out of thin air, then gets annoyed when its pointed out. Here's the latest:

"I never wanted any sort of notoriety or claimed to be any sort of expert but left the talking to the reviews, all this adoration type talk makes me a little uncomfortable and slightly embarrassed as I was just a modeller trying to help out other modellers."

This from the same person who, when announcing the previous closure of PPMS several months back said: "I am sick of doing all this work for ungrateful modellers who do not defend me in public on forums when I get attacked"

Indeed, it was only after the last outpouring of "adoration type talk" that we had the rebirth of PMMS2. I see there is a LOT less of it time round. People a bit more cynical about intent?

I see there is also a saying directed towards me ('sad individual', 'plain facts' etc). Well Terry on this side of the pond we also have our colloquialisms. Unfortunately we lack your diversity of wildlife so we have to be a bit more pithy. The one I have in mind is "Once a despicable lying c**t, always a despicable lying c**t".

++ Newsflash ++ Jim Rae leaving Armorama for M-L

2010-03-12T20:07:00.000Z

Very surprised today to see Jim Rae offering to help set up a New Kit News section on M-L. Obviously its a full time job so he will be leaving Armorama in the near future. Never thought I would see Jim Starkweather let him go. Even more surprised that someone else would take him on. Read more about it here:

Can you stand back and be neutral?

2010-03-09T10:11:00.000Z

Every time I mention Terry I keep getting emails from a hotmail account (anonymous). They berate me for impugning Terry Ashley and insist that the whole affair was about a negative review with which I did not agree. This could not be further from the truth, but then I realised that most people have this view simply because Terry told them this was the case, repeated it ad nauseum in the face of questions from all quarters, so eventually it became perceived wisdom. Because its annoying to keep reading the same bilge, and because I keep seeing comments along the lines of 'I agree with Terry about this' I thought I would shed some light on what actually happened. Bear in mind, for each and every statement made below, I have confirmation in writing, either from Terry, or Jon Bailey, or Don Campbell, and I have published them. Conversely, Terry does not have a single written document anywhere that contradicts anything I have ever accused him of, which is why he desperately deflects all questions about his actions PRIOR to the review being posted and insists on focussing on the events thereafter. Now Terry can try and denigrate my 'facts' (as he calls them) as much as he wants. But when they are his own words in his own emails, does this not call into question anything Terry has written?

The truth is we made our protest to Terry 3 weeks BEFORE John Baileys review was posted on PMMS. Thats right. 3 weeks before we had seen it. Two weeks before it was posted we told Terry we knew it was not being written by himself, and IRRESPECTIVE of its content we withdrew permission for the review to take place. Just to clarify, even if that meant it praised our product to the skies, we STILL did not want the review posted, because we knew the review process had been tainted. Now irrespective of your loyalties in this matter, ask yourself why we would do that?

For this excercise I would ask that you put all loyalties aside and read the following neutrally. Read it as if you coming to it for the first time, and knew neither of the parties involved. A company has sent its product, which so far has had glowing reviews, to a highly respected reviewer. They have never previously sent him a product, fought with him, disparaged him in any way, and hold him in high regard. When reading the following it might help to have the graphical timeline up in a separate window. All documents and emails between myself and Terry can be seen here

Day 1 - 21 days BEFORE the review appears.
Jon Bailey, a person with a severe antagonism towards one of the products authors, in a private forum (where at leat 4 others, including the moderator Don Campbell, hold similar feelings), announces he has our product and starts berating it. At that point the only copy of our product sent to Australia had gone to Terry AShley.

Day 5 - 16 days BEFORE the review is published.
Terry tells me in an email that his review is nearly finished. (This is shown to be a lie by Jon Bailey two days LATER who STILL has the dvd in his possession.) I reply to Terry and tell him we have direct knowledge of what is being done in the private forum

Day 6 - 15 Days BEFORE the review is published
Someone tells Jon Bailey we are being sent copies of their discussions - the private forum goes mental. Terry was the only person we had told. And given that Terry was frienldy enough with Jon to give him our review sample in the first place, its hardly the biggest leap to conclude Terry ran straight to Jon Bailey as soon as we told him.

Day 7 - 14 Days BEFORE the review is published
Terry admits he initially gave our dvd, WITHOUT LOOKING AT IT, to Jon Bailey, at Jon Baileys request. He also repeats that his review is nearly finished. This is STILL one day BEFORE Jon Bailey admits he still has the dvd, and therefore Terry has not ever had it in his possession to write a review. We now know that Terry gave out our review sample to group of particularly nasty individuals who actively hate one of the product authors (not my words, theirs in their private forum)

Same day - At this point a VERY significant statement is made by Don Campbell in the private forum: "Thankfully a real review of this garbage is imminent on PMMS and should raise some questions about the ones already circulating - should but probably not...."

Why is it significant? And bear in mind 24 hours later Jon Bailey confirms the DVD has never left his possession.
1. Don Campell knows that a review is being written. How?
2. Because he also knows that the DVD has never left Jon Baileys possession, and therefore he knows that any imminent review can only being written by Jon Bailey.
3. He already, without ever having seen the product, refers to it as garbage - an opinion that can only come from the person who HAS the dvd, Jon Bailey, who is writing the review.
4. He knows, without having seen it, or it being finished, that the review is going to be very negative. Despite not having seen the product, his antipathy to one of the authors is such that he is happy with this.
5. Worst of all, it confirms he knows that this review IS going to be posted on PMMS in THE FUTURE. Which means Terry has already confirmed (either to Jon or Don) that he is going to post this review on PMMS.

This disgusting statement was the whole reason we told Terry we no longer wanted a review of our product on PMMS, and withdrew permission two days later. It was also the reason, when I presented all of the above information to the owners of AFVModeller, that they issued a statement completely disassociating themselves from Don Campell (their Associate Editor), and his actions in this regard. Now irrespective of what you think of me, do you honestly think AFVModeller would have issued such a statement if they had not thought my case had merit?

If you read this neutrally perhaps you may begin to understand why this has been such a source of anger to us. Or Perhaps you still blindly believe what Terry has said. But if you do, consider this: What if I am telling the truth? What if all the proof I have stands up? (to reiterate: all proof was supplied by Terry, Jon and Don) Where does that leave Terry in all of this?

Now if you would still like to debate this, by all means leave a comment, but please, debate what I have stated above - the actual assassination piece Terry posted as a 'review', was and is immaterial. We have never denied errors being on the dvd, but given that every other review was glowing, and the ONLY complaint we ever received was from Jon Bailey via PMMS...well - you do math.

What we have always wanted was an explanation as to the events and actions on Terry's part detailed above, and why he instigated, facilitated and encouraged a group of individuals with a hate campaign against one of the product authors. Also bear in mind I made a genuine offer to Terry to solve this with a joint apology to the hobby and removal of all material pertaining on both sides to it . I never had a reply.

Jim Rae - Gaping Twat

2010-02-25T00:18:00.000Z

I see Jim Rae has posted a link to a Youtube Downfall parody video saying ' At least THIS one is funny'. Well I have news for you Jim - according to Terry Ashley - so was the one I posted. Obviously this is an attempt by Jim to stir trouble again. Oh but wait! Its not posted on Armorama - no - he posted it on Missing-Lynx. And guess what? He did not post it on his own site. Why? Because every time he starts this crap on Armorama, sane, non-psychotic staff members slap him down, delete his threads, or lock them. And we all know how Jim Rae loves to post this crap on other peoples doorsteps and run away. I wonder how proud the members of his site are of his behavior in this regard for the umpteenth time? Could this waste of skin be any more of a gaping twat than he already is? I also see that despite crapping on his own members about posting links to other sites on Armorama, once again he has posted a linked news item on Missing Lynx. Hypocritical bully. For crying out loud, how long is this pathetic individual going to be allowed to repeatedly bring Jim Starkweathers site into disrepute?

EDIT*
Just got an email from a friend pointing out that Jim Rae DID post the Youtube link on Armorama.(Actually not in Armorama)
Buried in the Aircraft section of Kitmakers Aeroscale forum
Without the snarky remark designed to stir trouble.
Apparently 3 hours AFTER I posted my article and 6 hours AFTER he posted it on ML
Funny how he posted it in the General section of ML - an armour forum, and not on the Aircraft section of saaaaay Hyperscale.Hmmmm?
Prick.

Jim Rae - the only man in the hobby to reach rock bottom and then start drilling

Where do YOU go for your review?

2010-02-22T11:04:00.000Z

A comment posted on my last article got me thinking - it read as follows: "Terrys reviews are a million times better than Vinnies, and most other reviewers out there because he doesnt(sic) bullshit with remarks about how nice the box is, or whether the parts are crisp"

Obviously the comment above is subjective hyperbole and contains a large degree of loyalty to one reviewer over another but it did get me musing the various styles and motivations of the reviewers, and how this consequently affects the value of the end product. I will use the two sites mentioned to illustrate this.

Before I start let me address the initial comment above as it applies to several reviewers not just Vinnie or Terry. All good reviewers include a description of the packaging whether it relates to box art or the sturdiness of the packaging and how the contents are protected. The need for this was recently highlighted by the high number of S100 kits from Italeri which arrived with badly damaged hulls. The comment about crisp parts is ill-informed and stupid. The hobby is about producing perfect finishes from plastic components - to say that highlighting the quality of moulding is not needed is the statement of an obvious non-modeler. (And Terry mentions moulding crispness in every review he does, so I am not sure what the commenter was getting at.

Let me say at the outset that all reviews are subjective. When assessing the review, primarily the reader should take into account the experience, skill, and expertise in the of the reviewer as a modeler in that particular subject. What is the reviewers modeling output? can he address problems that need various skill levels to fix? Is he conversant with new techniques, products etc?

There are reviewers and vocal 'armchair experts' out there whose output of finished models is either non-existent, or to such a poor standard that images of them never see the light of day. Secondary considerations are factors such as the relationship of the reviewer or his site to the manufacturer in question, and whether or not this colours the review.

The initial comment alludes to an article where I previously said that I rate Vinnies photography in his in-box reviews as the best around. I would still stand by this. Crisp, clear, macro detail with all images shown in a modern lightbox, with 'next' and 'previous' navigation meaning you do not have to click on each thumbnail to open it, nor do they irritate by opening a new page. As with PMMS, there is a consistent style, layout and quality to images and reviews. For myself this is preferable to sites where all and sundry are allowed to submit reviews, and these factors are compromised to one degree or another.

At ModelArmour the reviews themselves do not go into the detail of assembly that you see on PMMS, but then this is an in-box review, and PMMS tend to combine in-box with assembly, after a fashion. Where Vinnie and others have the advantage over Terry is when they blog the build of the kit in question (this goes for any build blog really). This goes into far more detail than PMMS and the reason is simple - the motivation is a passion to produce a finished painted model that was inspired by the original kit, not just an exercise in measurement and comparison to references, after which the plastic is apparently binned, and the next item on the production line is opened for dissection. Lastly, a very important difference is that on ModelArmour and other sites there is a 'Discuss' button on both in-box reviews and blogs - a feature singularly lacking at PMMS . This allows others with more expertise to come in and help improve the build itself.

Also I tend to see that when Vinnie (or John Murphy, Spence, Marcus etc) are not an expert in a particular subject, they make this clear, and define the limits of their knowledge at the outset, acknowledging that experts better than themselves will have more insight. On PMMS however it seems as if all reviews, irrespective of subject or genre, are done from a point of full authority, based on whatever references are listed at the bottom of the page. To me this a misleading form of authority as this means the reviews are not done by a modeler, but a critic. In addition it excludes 90% of modelers, who do not have access to a large library of reference material that was mostly sent free of charge. While it's great to know that a certain aspect of a model is incorrect according to several expensive/OOP books, that does not really help the modeler who wants to build a finished model, and cannot afford/access such references. To expand on this - being able to compare a piece of plastic to however many books does not make an authority - it means you have a lot of books and a micrometer. Most importantly, as a critic and not a modeler, it means you are basing all of your opinions on other peoples measurements and conclusions. Conversely the argument could be made here that faults highlighted by these comparisons benefit the modeler who does not have the references. True, but only if you post all the relevant reference pictures so that each fault can be seen in every variation throughout all the used references and modelers can then make their own judgments.

So what about motivation? Why do reviewers do what they do? It's generally a time-consuming thankless task and with one or two exceptions, all the reviewers I have spoken to would rather be building models. All of them are passionate model builders who don't see a box of plastic but endless possibilities and diorama opportunities. They acknowledge the time, effort and cost put into a developing a new product, and try to highlight the positives, and its potential to readers as a subject. They are aware that the current state of business for most manufacturers is fragile, and that a continuous stream of negative comment on otherwise perfectly build-able kits results in lost sales, less investment in new subjects, and eventual harm to the hobby. Many of them have been building models for decades and probably will continue long into the future. They get excited about aspects of a kit they know will excite modelers, and are willing to balance the negatives against these positives.

Their motivation is the future finished, painted project which hopefully reflects perfectly the original vision they had when the box arrived.

Terry is a good example of the exception to this rule. Of the dozen or so finished models on PMMS I cannot find one more recent than 2003, nor are there any reviews of paint, airbrushes, pigments or other products used in the hobby after the build stage. It appears that for some time now Terry no longer build models, simply assembles them to see what is right/wrong with them. He has no experience of modern paints, pigments, finishes etc, nor any idea as to how they can be used to improve a kit found wanting at review stage, and turn it into a success. Additionally he recently said that he was 'sick of doing all the work for ungrateful modelers who did not stand up for him when he was attacked' (my paraphrase). I was very surprised to see this statement . I can think of nothing more soul-destroying than doing a job day after day, for the benefit of a group of people you hold in contempt, and where you have no interest or passion in taking the product to its conclusion.

All reviewers I talk to get negative mail - if its constructive they take it on board - if it's not they laugh it off. If your only motivation to review kits is positive public admiration for your prodigious output then you are probably in the wrong job. I could be wrong - Terry might build and paint every item he reviews. If so I would love to see the images. As a modeler, if I had not, in the last 6 years, actually finished one of the 83 Dragon kits I had in my review section, I would find something else to do, because modeling is obviously not my passion.

Big fun on Little A

2010-02-17T12:07:00.000Z

So who does post the best reviews......

There is a brilliant thread over at Armorama which I have been watching with real enjoyment. The initial poster wondered if PMMS was still active but it descended almost immediately into a comparison of review and news articles between the two sites. My take on this is that both sites have their different styles, and there is good and bad on both. I do agree that on Terrys site it is easier to locate stuff and his photography is better, and for the accuracy people, his reviews tend to go into more detail. This goes for any of the major sites - as one poster pointed out, he goes to all reviews on all sites to get as much info as possible before buying a kit - as I am sure we all do. (For my money though if I want to see a highly detailed in-box review, with the best photography bar none, it will always be Vinnies reviews and blogs at Modelarmour. Of course I will immediately get flamed that Vinnie is a good friend - of course he is - but I defy anyone to find better in box images than his.)

But back to the thread over at Armorama. As per usual, whenever any member goes slightly "off-message" bully boy Jim Rae is always close at hand and willing to berate his own members:

JR: "However, what PMMS does is the business of PMMS. The Forums here are not for a critique, rumor dissemination center or anything else about another site. Those who contribute here are getting frankly tired of comments such as:"

Quote: "Shame too, as PMMS is/was the go-to site for kit news and reviews."

JR:"REAL Tired."

Now as a piece of breath-taking, gobsmacking, self-deluded hypocrisy this statement is without peer. In his position as Managing Editor Newsdesk Jim Rae has started, participated in, supported, encouraged and carried out some of the most vicious, spiteful, actionable, rumour spreading attacks on other people, sites and site editors ever seen in our hobby - and all in the name of Armorama. As discussed before, most of these have been sanitised and removed by saner heads, which does illustrate just how bad they were.

Watch how he ties himself in knots:
Member: "So we're not allowed to express our opinion on other websites just because they may be "competing" with you? Interesting....."
JR says: Nope, that was never said. It is though, a bit like eating in a restaurant and handing out flyers for their competitor down the street.
Member: Or posting on other forums web sites with articles, items of news etc. that link directly back to your own site.

Bingo. Jim is well known for refusing to post links to other sites in a foaming-at-the-mouth kind of way whilst simultaneously whoring himself on other forums with links back to News and Reviews on Armorama. Apparently he sees no hypocrisy in this. Good thing some people over at Armorama are there to hold up the mirror.

Of course now that Jim has been criticised the loose grip he has on self-control disappears and he once again starts attacking his own members:

"Yeah Alan, if you say so... Everyone does it - TerryA has done it on more than one occasion. I've also frequently linked to items of interest on OTHER sites. There have been some damned interesting items published on ML, TL or others which i've put in the Forums here. Is your selective memory disorder playing-up again? "

What a class act he is. His members must be so proud of him.

And here's Jim Starkweathers take on it:
"In short (for this whole topic) I give (and have given) Terry his dues. He is a great reviewer. And he does produce some of the best scale modeling reviews on the net. But PMMS is not better than Armorama. Not by a long shot."

I wonder if Terry is aware of the esteem in which his site is held?

Jim S is also being a bit rose tinted here. As several members point out, Armorama suffers badly from being very complex, and waaaaaaay too busy - he should take this on board in the spirit it was written. Fortunately Jim Lewis, a Contributing Editor, seems to be taking the suggestions and comparisons in a positive light. Maybe some good will come of this?

Euromilitaire - You be the judge

2009-12-08T12:31:00.000Z

During the many times I have attended Euromilitaire, I've chatted with a wide variety of modellers, traders, publishers and organisers etc. I came to Euromilitaire late in life so my experience of it has always been where probably half of the competition entries are in the armour, or armour diorama categories, and a lot of the traders have also begun to cater more to this market than any other. Over the last two years, as I heard more stories, some aspects of this event have started to leave a bad taste.

Judging
Looking at the judging of the competition first... First let me say that it's of course a thankless task, done without monetary remuneration, and in the eyes of the modellers, judges very rarely get it right (unless of course the modeller gets an award). Of course judging is subjective, and often throws up results which to everyone else can look either bizarre, or in the worse cases, rigged. However...it is BECAUSE of this subjective nature that every effort should be made by the organisers to make judging and its environment, as neutral as possible, to ensure a level playing field and the fairest possible outcome. Unfortunately at Euromilitaire a culture seems to have arisen that to a large degree works against these principles.

Firstly, all entries have the entrants name on the accompanying card for the judges to see. Secondly, judging takes place at the end of the first day, by which time virtually everyone, judges included, know which entry belongs to whom, and have...even if only subconsciously...started to form opinions about the pieces. Next we have the ratio of expertise amongst judges - typically figure modelling judges outnumber armour ones by 3:1. Then we have judges who ignore the rules and guidelines of Euro judging because they are used to a different system.

How do these factors work against neutral judging? Read the following items...these are examples...there are many similar instances I have both witnessed first hand and have had related to me. I cannot divulge the sources because I have been asked not to, as those involved fear the backlash.

1. An entry was marked down by the judges at this years show purely because of the modeller's identity...which the judge had read on the back of the entry ticket - this was actually related to the modeller involved by the judge involved!

2. A judge marked down one criteria of a diorama that he had no expertise in, simply because he did not like the style it had been painted in, this despite there being 25 other judges around him who were experts that he could have called on for more advice.

3. Here is a story related to me by a respected name in the hobby - let's call him 'Fred'.

"I was asked to judge at Euromilitaire, and was teamed up with two other individuals. I arrived 15 minutes after the doors closed for the commencement of judging. I was immediately told by one of the other two judges in my group that he had already gone through the entire category and awarded all the gold medals, and that all we (the other two in the group) needed to do was go and award the Silver and Bronze. I was appalled by his actions and told him in no uncertain terms that I would be checking the entire category for myself. During this process I found he had awarded Gold to a fairly average build. It turned out that the entry had come from a good friend of his who belonged to the same modelling club as him. An argument ensued which eventually had to be taken to the head judge, with the result that eventually the Gold award was removed - but even then it was touch and go - I gained the distinct impression I was viewed as a troublemaker by all those involved. Despite the massive increase in armour entries over recent years, the overwhelming judging bias at Euromilitaire is towards figure modellers and this is represented by the ratio of figure modelling based judges to those who model armour - about an 80/20 % split."

4. Here is another story by a respected modeller - let's call him 'Jim': "Year on year, despite the fact it was my best work going in, I never medalled. This year I entered two models under a pseudonym. I got a Gold and Silver."

The Issues
Armour modellers make up a large percentage of entrants at Euromilitaire, they also provide a large portion of the trader revenue. If this is how armour modellers are regarded and treated in this competition, then what is the incentive for them to enter, or even attend? I know that getting a large number of judges together for this event is difficult, but I refuse to believe that in the whole of the UK and continental Europe a representative percentage of decent, honest, unbiased armour judges cannot be found. It cannot be coincidence that year on year a figure, or a figure heavy based entry, wins Best in Show. When was the last time a large stunning diorama with 100's of hours of work won Best in Show?

Those with a much better knowledge of this than myself have suggested to me that judging at Euromilitaire should move towards the AMPS system and the following takes place:
Entries are registered, given an anonymous ticket number, and immediately taken to panels of judges located in a separate room. Using the AMPS based points and guidelines system, anomalous or biased judging can be virtually eliminated. There can still be more than one Gold, Silver, Bronze in each category but there should also be a 'Best in Category' award. From these, the judges would select their 'Best in Show', and there should also be a public 'Best in Show' voted on by the public. At a stroke this system would eliminate all of the problems listed earlier, and actually encourage modellers to believe that they have an even playing field at Euromilitaire.

Traders
Lets examine the situation amongst the traders. This year some big name traders such as Resicast and Accurate Amour were noticeable by their absence. I have been reliably informed from several different sources that on the day the before the event started, the organisers were so short of traders that they desperately started phoning non-attendees and offered them tables at reduced rates (apparently 50%). Sheer genius. Did they honestly think that those traders who paid full whack (+/- £240 per table by all accounts) would not find out about this? By Saturday morning word had already spread and a lot of traders were rightly pissed off. The organisers then compounded the error by denying any such offers had been made...apparently the official word from the organisers on this is that it did not happen....as a result several traders are now reconsidering any future attendance at Euromilitaire.

This is the premier event in the modelling calendar and yet over the five years I have attended, traffic at Euromilitaire has seemed to drop every year. You would think the organisers would be doing everything in their power to attract traders and modellers - yet it seems the opposite seems to be the case. Opinion is fast growing amongst some traders that the organisers are trying to make too high a profit from them. The organisers should think long and hard here - if two of the largest traders do not attend as it is apparently not commercially viable for them - how long will the smaller ones be able to keep attending?

The Media
Lets be honest, after the utter fiasco of last year's media ban, things could only get better. But have they? For the last four years the organisers have used the same system to take images for later print media. Opinion on the quality of the images, publication, and expertise of the photographer is largely negative. This should not be the case. If this is your flagship edition each year, it should be free from criticism in every respect. From the taking of the images, post processing, and publication, the only argument should be about the merits of the various winners. Yet the same system is still in place. When someone says on a public forum "...Someone should tell the official photographer that the autofocus on his mobile phone is broken..." - how do you NOT make changes? How is it that year on year the best images, taken at the same venue, are produced by an alternative publication? And why is the assistance given to other publications minimal, grudging and not set up properly? After all - they are publicising your event for free. Why not have a closed room period on the Sunday morning when the media can take their pictures in peace and quiet, without the inherent risks of carrying models to and fro in a room crowded with the public?

The organisers also fail to take cognisance of the internet and the effect it has on information distribution. The event cries out for a Wi-Fi connection, password protected for media only, that will take the event out to those who cannot attend, to encourage them to make the trip next year. Media can upload images; blogs could be updated and video interviews with modellers, traders etc posted. It's supposed to be the premier modelling event of the year - why not organise it with that in mind? If they don't, someone else will.

Back in the swing of things

2009-11-23T21:21:00.000Z

Apologies dear readers - been busy of late with work stuff hence the lack of posts. I do have some new stuff coming up soon, so bear with me.

I have noted with interest however the complete silence from Terry on the suggestion that we both remove all the recent and historical diatribe. It does tend to reinforce the growing belief that despite all his protestations, Terry had no intention of closing PMMS, and simply used the entire situation to get some fan mail going. I am now assuming that he will never respond to the suggestion anyway. I'm ok with that - if he wants to leave everything up I am happy to do the same. Strange though - I would have thought the he would have jumped at the chance to redeem himself in the eyes of the hobby by any means possible.

Anyway - I am pretty much done with subject now - although if the eagle-eyed amongst you spot any future troublemaking then let me know.Oh - I replaced the original Terrys Downfall with an HD version

Who is fooling who? - The Emperors New Clothes

2009-11-08T12:56:00.000Z

With Terry now back and making reference to this blog again the moratorium is now over.

Since Nov 3 (the PMMS is closing.Not. - announcememnt) I am getting a lot of email from people who are started to feel conned about PMMS Mk2. They feel that the entire fight has been orchestrated by Terry, who was feeling very unloved, and wanted to be back in fanlight, and that I should be discussing this. While I have idly speculated about this in recent weeks it was not until Friday that something occurred that got me thinking they may have a point.

The one thing that has always bothered me about the whole mess is this: Why did Terry start it up again after it had been dead and buried for 2 years?

Terrys explanation is that he was responding to links put into a signature on a forum, one of which went back to The Panther Project. Ok. But it was not my signature, and I had no prior knowledge of it being done, and only found out several days later. Why then go and put a very provocative update into Jon Baileys review, and refer to our commercial website as a 'hate' site? Our page in question was two years old, had never been updated, and had been known to Terry from day one. And why do this update when Terry knew full well I had promised him if he ever raised the subject again, I would respond equally in kind? Bear in mind this happened a month before I started this blog.

Then we get to the announcement that PMMS will no longer do news of Dragons kits. (But not dropping reviews because the impact on site traffic would have been devastating). That got a few 'attaboys' Terry on forums from fanbois but not a lot. But if you go and look at Hiroshis posts over the last six months there does not seem to be any increase either in the amount or the 5 year old insults - so again - why the announcement?

Lets move forward to 10th October when I discovered Terrys 'update'. At the time obviously I was furious he had seen fit to bring this up again and adressed this in the second article on this blog. If you go and read the last two paragraphs you will see even back then I could not understand why he had resurrected this and encouraged him in no uncertain words to drop it or face the consequences. I see know that my response was exactly the kind of oxygen he apparently needed. Instead he posted ever increasing unbalanced rants both on his blog and forums, and every time he did I responded, as he knew I had promised, which has kept the whole thing going.

Then came the whole "PMMS is closing" con. Immediately not just myself but many people said this was never going to happen, and that this was a cry for 'I love Terry' threads on forums. (In fact in his announcement, Terry says exactly those words. He is sick and tired of ungrateful modellers not going onto forums to fight his battles with Hiroshi and myself. I must say on a side note it must give all you Terry fans out there a glow to know how he really feels about you - you are there to praise him, nothing more.) This ploy worked in spades for Terry, and now after 'reflection', poor Terry is once again going to shoulder the cross on your behalf, and trudge manfully up that big hill again. Magnanimously, he is even going to reinstate Dragon into new Kit News. Awwwww. Bless. My hero.

But now we come back to the event I mentioned from Friday. Those who read all the stuff on both sides will know I have regularly called for Terry to drop this whole mess, and we both go back to ignoring each other. Terry ignored these calls all along, and just kept posting stuff which naturally got responses from me. I just assumed he did this because he was ill or something, and not thinking straight. However after it seemed to calm down last week I contacted Terry privately and made the following suggestion:

As we were both apparently sick and tired and of writing and reading about this, we drop the entire thing. We agree to remove all content on this subject from sites or blogs. In addition we could also issue a joint apology to the hobby (not to each obviously), for dragging the hobby through this mess for the last two years. This was a sincere offer, made without any ulterior motive. I wanted to get back to blogging about other stuff, and I was sure Terry wanted to get back to reviews.

Terry rejected the offer.

Thats right, Terry WANTS all of this stuff to stay up. Despite all his complaints that everything I have published, is untrue, lies etc, he WANTS people to keep on reading it. Now why do think that is? Given that he is aware no matter what he says, a very large number of people realise he has a serious case to answer? No publicity is bad publicity perhaps? Ongoing 'I love Terry sycophancy' to fuel PMMS MK2?

So the next time you want to leave a comment saying I should drop this and move on, rather send it to the person who apparently has a vested interest in keeping it all on the net. Terry Ashley.

So. Now I will happily make the same offer to Terry in public so that this time round, he can explain publicly, to all those fans of his who wanted this stuff gone, why he would reject it and keep it alive:

Terry

I am quite happy to remove all content on this blog, The Panther Project website, and Youtube pertaining to the review of our product on PMMS, if you will agree to do the same. I will agree never to raise the subject again, or mention your name in connection with it, if you will agree to the same. I will be happy to issue a joint apology to the entire hobby, which can be posted on all forums, for the distress brought the hobby over this period.

Over to you Terry

Cyber-bullying - the new black

2009-11-05T09:19:00.000Z

Increasingly I am seeing this term bandied around by many people, much of the time lately with my name in the sentence.Its quite apparent that these people have no idea what cyber-bullying is, and have not read a definition of it. Cyber-bullying is a term used when children are harassed by other children. Cyberharassment is the term used when perpetrated by adults towards other adults.The definitions of the methods used are however the same in both.

Now here I would like all those people currently throwing this word around on forums to read very carefully.

I will quote here from the National Crime Prevention Council's definition on Wikipedia. There are bits that don't apply (phone texting etc), if I missed any relevant ones please feel free to point them out.
1."...when the Internet, ...is used to send or post text or images intended to hurt or embarrass another person."
2.".......ganging up on victims by making them the subject of ridicule in forums, and posting false statements as fact aimed at humiliation."
3."Some cyberbullies may also send threatening and harassing emails...."
4."...to threaten a victim's earnings, employment, reputation, or safety"

I will be the first to admit that in recent weeks I have definitely posted an item designed to embarrass (a video). However - this was posted as a direct response to an instance of No3 above where harassing emails were sent to a number of completely uninvolved parties. Everything else I have posted was based around documention that backed up my arguments. In addition over the past few weeks everything I have posted was in relation to a cyberharassment attack which fell under definition No4. I have never lied, nor invented anything to further my case.I have always encouraged those who disagree, and want to debate, to join in. I have also clearly stated that I am happy for anyone to publish any mail from me they might have that they think would further their argument.

Its quite obvious that as a blog, I have single voice, no members, and no way to facilitate concerted attacks, or the ganging up on targets. You can come in and read it or not, and decide whether its valid.

Lets turn to Jim Rae
In one of many particularly vicious attacks on one of his favourite targets, Jim Rae facilitated a three page thread on Armorama in which groundless (and actionable) accusations were leveled at his target. He also not only allowed the posting of disgusting photoshopped images of the target, but stated that he found them hilarious. He then egged on other participants in this thread to more disgusting remarks. personal insults etc until a senior staff member stepped in, publicly rebuked him, and deleted the thread. This instance would be covered by definitions No1 and No2.

Jim Joined (in his official capacity - ever noticed how BIG his title is and how prominently displayed) a forum specifically designed to attack a model manufacturer and heap insult, foul language, and personal attacks on its products and employees. In fact Jim was so enthusiastic about this if I remember correctly his was the first or second post in the forum. (correct me if I am wrong Jim, might have been the third). This instance would be covered by definitions No1, No2 and No4.

Yesterday another thread was started by Jim Rae to specifically target and humiliate me (apparently I am scum). He was told by his own members that he was shaming the forum and that he should take this stuff to his own blog. He essentially told them to f**k off (I paraphrase, but that was the intent of his reply), he was going to post it on the forum anyway.This instance would be covered by definitions No1 and No2.

These are just two instances of many over the years of cyber-bullying by Jim Rae on the forums at Armorama. Unfortunately most of them were so bad, more rational minds have deleted them, otherwise you could browse them at your leisure. Make no mistake, as a senior staff member, and (apparently) a moderator, Jim Rae is in a position of power over his members and the targets of his vitriol, and by several of the definitions above, most definitely a serial cyber-bully.

Here is the real sad part. By allowing Jim Rae to continously perpetrate these actions, by allowing threads to run until they are a train smash, by never publicly reprimanding him for actions, Jim Starkweather falls into the same category. He facilitates, and by his actions, indicates to his members that he sees no wrong in have a cyber-bully as a senior staff member.

So Jim and Jim. Glass Houses. Stones.

Jim Rae and Micheal Kenny - dumber than a bag of hammers

2009-11-04T22:41:00.000Z

Terry is away for a bit so there will be a moratorium on all stuff Terry for the time being. Not fair if he is not around to respond.

However that does give me a breathing space to examine more closely the activities of two of the more unsavoury members of our hobby. (Actually, strictly speaking thats not true - Michael Kenny has never built a model, and Jim Rae only reviews them)

In an earlier post I alluded to the fact that Jim Rae in his position as Managing News Editor at Armorama, often uses his own forums to post particularly nasty attacks on those he has grudges against. He also then attacks his own forum members when they point out he is abusing his position. In addition he frequents other forums and spreads bile under the position he holds at Armorama (for instance his full support of the Dragon hate site now thankfully defunct)- Something strangely that no other staff members of other forums do on Armorama. The fallout then inevitably gets tracked back to Armorama and their members have to sit through it again. Hers a typical example of Jim Raes behaviour:

From 28th Sept until yesterday Jim did not post on Armorama (some sort of sabbatical). Do you know what his first post was on his return? Jim came out of his enforced sabbatical to level abuse at me on Missing-Lynx yesterday in his official position as Managing Editor of the Newsdesk at Armorama. (Hence my response to him lower down this page). How proud his members and fellow staff must be at his dedication - so selfless he did not even stop first at Armorama to announce his return (an hour later to abuse me in a thread again). Later I pointed people to his involvement in a particular nasty two year old thread on Armorama, lo and behold, the bits that incriminated him in the thread up started to get quietly deleted an hour later. (forgot the old automated notification from your server eh Jim?). I notfied Jim Starkweather of this and he confirmed he had no idea it was being done.

Today, once again, Jim used Armorama to spew bile at both me and his own members. For the umpteenth time, his thread (aimed squarely at me) has been removed by a senior (I assume). Unfortunately I was laughing so hard whilst reading it my screenshot was the wrong type and I missed Jim being castigated by some upstanding members who are heartily sick of this continued behaviour on his part. However at the top of the image you can see, posting for the first time in two years on Armorama, in support of Jim Rae, your favourite troll and mine - Michael Kenny! You would think after the pasting he got from members for doing the same thing 2 years ago, on the same subject, he would stay away. But nooooo. He really IS THAT thick.

Oh and Michael. When you posted this link on ML and nobody bit, were you frustrated? Never mind. Unwittingly you did achieve a very significant purpose. You showed people the exact point in 2002 when you, Jon Bailey, and several others fell out with Alasdair, something which Jon Bailey has been denying all along. Isn't the Internet great? And Michael if memory serves me correct, the two people actually caught creating false accounts, and then using them to pretend to be Alasdair were two of your Australian friends, whose names appear in screenshots elsewhere, ranting against Alasdair 5 years later? They WERE forced to admit this on ML after the IP's used were tracked to their places of work yes? Do you think they will thank you for bringing this up again Michael?

What the image does not show is that Jim Rae quickly removed Michael's post. Even Jim is not that stupid - having Michael Kenny come in and support him again was as desirable as dose of syphilis. And then Jim magnanimously closes the post, saying he does not want axes to be ground any further. The idiot actually ignores his own members telling him he started the thread with that exact intent in the first place.

On a serious note, on the occasions in the past when a gritted teeth apology was forced from Mr Rae by Jim Starkweather, I warned JS each time that JR is a very corrosive influence on his website. His abuse of fellow staff has led to them leaving, and his abuse of members on Armorama forums, and willingness to do the same on other forums knows no bounds.

Still I am sure Jim Starkweather, who I hold in high regard, has his reasons for keeping him on. Though it might pay you Jim to go and explain these reasons to the members that Jim Rae abused again today. For the umpteenth time.

Does anyone read anymore?

2009-11-04T13:34:00.000Z

For some weird reason, people are still sending comments in along the lines of: "Its all about the errors on the DVD...", "Stop whining about the review pointing out errors", and I keep having to delete them.

Now I have to say to those who have posted this view (or intend to) that you are exhibiting an embarrassing lack of reading skills or more worryingly, have not bothered to read anything written either here or elsewhere over the 2 years this has been an issue.

If you had, you would have found one of the multiple occasions on which I clearly said we accepted BEFORE we sent out review samples that errors WOULD be found on it, that some people would not like the navigation structure etc. We set up a mechanism at that point for people to feed this stuff back to us. Whatever factual errors Jon found and subsequently Terry when he actually started looking at the DVD a month after the review was posted - we never disputed. Does that penetrate? Were the words too big?

Now. Perhaps this is my fault for using words of several syllables. I am going to spell this out in small words so that the (apparently huge swathe) of the cognitively challenged amongst you can have no misunderstanding as to what this is about FOR US THE MANUFACTURER.

We sent a product to Terry for review, because up to that point TERRY HAD DONE ALL HIS OWN REVIEWS.
HE gave our DVD to JON BAILEY WITHOUT LOOKING AT IT, and without our knowledge or permission, which in any case was removed the minute we found out what he had done, and who he had given it to.
HE THEN LIED ON THREE OCCASIONS about having the DVD and being busy with the review whilst at that time it was in Jon Baileys possession.

That's it. That's what this whole mess is about.

And for the really mentally challenged that say its common practice for reviewers to give out samples I fully agree. EXCEPT ON PMMS where it had never been done to that point, and as far as we know, not since. And even if this was a policy on PMMS why did Terry then need to lie about doing it, and pretend he was writing the review?

Now if you intend to send in any more of the type of comments I mentioned earlier don't bother. You are wasting both our times, and insulting me by giving me motives I clearly do not have - go and post them on Terry's blog - he could use the traffic on his 'closed' site (still up apparently). I am sure he would welcome more fan mail from modellers who he said he holds in contempt anyway.

If on the other hand you would like to debate the morality, integrity and motivations behind the actions of Terry and his friends which ARE the ONLY cause of this mess, feel free.

On Urban Myths

2009-11-04T09:03:00.000Z

Its becoming apparent that several myths are doing the rounds and because they are repeated so often, regarded as fact. Let me dispel a few.

1. Why won't the Panther Project let this subject drop after 2 years?
Not true. This subject was dead and buried until Sep 7Th 2009 when Terry posted a new paragraph in the 'review', calling our commercial website (not this blog) a 'hate' site. I responded on this blog. Rather than debate this in private as I requested, Terry made frequent posts on his own blog and forums. I chose to publish each of my responses here, hence the number of them. I contacted forum owners and asked them to remove all links to this blog that may appear as I did not want a war on forums. All of Terry's increasingly rabid rants were removed from forums, leaving only the material here to read. Terry also sent nasty emails to companies and individuals I had linked to on this blog. All of the subsequent publicity on this matter is due to Terry's own actions, not mine

2.Terry did nothing wrong
Not true. Of all the thousands of people that have read the timeline and more detailed version of events not one has publicly or privately come forward to say that Terry did not give out our product without permission, or that he did not lie to me in emails, or that Jon Bailey had no input in the 'review'. Not. One.
What they HAVE done is gloss over/ignore these facts because they are loyal to Terry and CANNOT ask these questions because they already know the answer. Contemptible behaviour really is it not?

3 PMMS is run on altruism
Not true. In his announcement Terry shows what utter contempt he has for modellers in general. He says he is sick and tired of doing this work for ungrateful people that will not go out and fight his battles for him. Worse still, apparently if you have the temerity to actually put questions to Terry that we have been asking then "you people" are beyond the pale.

4.PMMS is closing
Not true. Here I would like to quote from a comment Bill left on a post:
Terry is coming off like a whiny little attention whore.
My feelings are hurt. I'm gonna stop reviewing Dragon kits....okay I'll review them again.
My feelings are hurt again. I'm gonna close down my site....okay, I'll keep it up.
Seems like he's doing all this cause his ego's hurt and just needs some love. Pretty soon people are going to realize he's been crying wolf and ignore his attention seeking antics.

Here is a second quote:
S**t, there is a better chance of the sun not coming up tomorrow than Ashley actually pulling the plug on his site. Where else can he slap his clientele in the face and get his arse kissed as a result?

In Closing
Terrys announcement is a culmination of a four week period in which he tried desperately to get modellers to fight his battles on public forums. When it failed, and ESPECIALLY when people actually started to realise that my version of events was factual, he goes off in a huff, and blames all of you because now he has to close his site. Do you honestly think that someone who so obviously needs unquestioning adulation will keep his promise to remove the sole source of it?

Here is a promise I WILL keep - If Terry closes PMMS I will take down this blog and the relevant pages from our commercial site. They will stay down as long as PMMS does. Don't hold your breath

The resurrection of Jim Rae

2009-11-03T14:37:00.000Z

I see Jim has managed to stagger from his sickbed to his keyboard for the first time in eight weeks to wade in - welcome back Jim.

As many of you know quite well, Jim Rae never loses the chance to abuse his position and have a go at me and several others in his forum.

Here are a couple of things you don't know about Jim. On two separate occasions Jim Rae has been forced by his site owner to apologise to me via email for abuse he has levelled on the forum where he is a moderator. Of course Jim would never publicly apologise, might make him look bad.

When the Armorama review of our DVD was posted (95% highly recommended) Jim stayed out of the thread until Michael Kenny (of the same private forum as Jon bailey) posted for the first time in two years in a deliberate troll attack to instigate trouble. Jim then quickly SUPPORTED Mr Kenny in this attack, IN HIS OWN FORUM despite many Armorama members openly questioning Mr Kennys motives and prescence on their forum. In order to embarrass me Jim also lied in the thread about Mr Kenny sending him a piece of research, only to have Mr Kenny deny writing it at all 1 hour later in the same thread. (I don't know which is more hilarious, the thought that anyone would believe Micheal Kenny emailed a research paper to Jim Rae, or Michael dropping Jim in the s**t). Its all still there for anyone that wants to read it

And Jim, when you say that the Downfall Parody "catered to my own constituency of the mentally challenged" I assume you are including both Mike Land and Terry Ashley in that description as both of them posted under the clip that they found it funny.

*Edit* Interesting. Somebody over at Armorama is selectively removing certains parts of this link which I posted earlier. Wonder who? Wonder why?

PMMS Closing down - Ironic is it not?

2009-11-03T09:58:00.000Z

Two years ago Terry Ashley and John Bailey lied and colluded to try and destroy my product. Two years later I spend 3 weeks publishing the truth and now Terry is closing his site. What a small bitter man he must be. All he has ever had to do is explain why he gave our product to Jon Bailey and why he lied to me in emails. I'll bet right now Terry is REALLY regretting starting this whole mess up again with his little update of Sep 7th. Or not. Going on past history Terrys ability to admit wrongdoing is as prevalent as the Dodo.

And all this apparently because Finescale locked a thread and denied Terry a right to reply. Boohoo. Funny Terry, you did not see fit to complain about the thread when untruths about me were being put forward in it? Only after I added a reasoned rebuttal and some links to your own emails? Do you see the breathtaking hypocrisy in your statement Terry? I have NEVER had the right of reply on your site, nor has anyone else. So when I post the truth elsewhere about your actions and people start to publicly agree that you have some answers to give, don't start whining. You have had more than enough time to answer questions we put to you two years ago. You chose not to. Despite repeated warnings about the publicity you would get if you posted Jon Baileys rant, you went ahead. All of this is down to you Terry. You started it all, and now again through your own actions you will finish it.

Still, I fail to see how closing your site will help. Despite what you did to our product I have always assumed that was a one-off motivated by some personal axe being ground. Given the firestorm of negative publicity you got thereafter I took for granted that all subsequent reviews were your own work? You would rather deny the whole modelling community access to this resource than give us an apology?

And eventually Terry how will your fans judge you for closing your site over this? Rather than man up and admit to what you did you will close down the premiere modelling review site? There is no doubt about your actions, your own emails sank you. Why not give us the explanation we requested and move on. As I have always stated, once we get it, and Jon Baileys piece is removed, all posts on this matter will disappear and never be mentioned again.

And Terry here's the thing, I and many others will have no respect for anyone who would rather throw out all the toys and the sandpit than own up and apologise.

Something to celebrate

2009-11-02T11:14:00.000Z

If you have not yet seen the fantastic group build being done by some very dedicated modellers on Trumpeters 1/16 King Tiger - go and have a look. Excellent research work, breathtaking scratchbuilding, and casting and turning of new resin and brass items. A real inspiration - congratulations guys.

Did I miss something?

2009-10-31T20:14:00.001Z

I was away all day yesterday in London giving a presentation (fingers crossed, possible new client). When I got back I saw that the traffic on Terrys Downfall and the blog had gone through the roof. It became clear when I opened an email from someone - According to this thread on Missing-Lynx, someone had started a (now deleted) thread which implied that Dragon were behind the Terrys Downfall clip on Youtube. Apparently there was a post on Militarymodelling in the same vein?

Just for the record Dragon/Dml had no input, influence in any away in the compiling of the clip. Nor do they contribute, sponsor, or send free kits (I wish!) in any way to myself or to this blog. I would like to think however that in an office somewhere at Dragon headquarters someone watches the blog and is having a quiet smile at Terry Ashleys complete loss of face.

As ever if anyone has details about the deleted thread or the one deleted at Militarymodelling add them to the comments on this post and we can debate them

More bollocks from Terry Ashley and Mike Land

2009-10-28T21:03:00.000Z

If you head on over to Terrys Downfall you can see that rather than come here and enter an open debate, Tweedledum and Tweedledumbest have left some self serving comments under the clip. (Mike Land - ex/current member of the private forum to Jon Bailey belongs)

Mike Lands position is that it was ok for Terry to give our product to Jon Bailey, to lie to me on three occassions in emails, and to pretend he wrote the article himself. Why was this ok? Because Jon Bailey found things wrong with the DVD. Aaahhhh thats all OK then. Every other manufacturer reading that must get a really warm fuzzy feeling when they read that and think about their products being sent to Terry in future. Breathtaking Mike. Ask your students to explain the word 'Ethics' to you. And integrity.

As for Terry. Its the old "why don't you address the issues on the dvd" crap again. I don't know how many times I have said over the last two years we happily admit there are errors on the DVD. Its 1.5Gb of data - of course there are errors. ALL products have errors Terry you delusional fucking idiot. But here's the thing. Every other review accepted that the positives of this product far outweighed the negatives. Jons review did not have one positive. I have not had a single complaint on the content of this product from any customer, DESPITE Jons review on your site.

Now Terry here is the thing that apparently your medication (or lack of it) keeps you from seeing. You lied to me three times in emails. This is what started this whole mess. Your lies and collusion with Jon Bailey
You lied about having the DVD BEFORE we knew who you gave it to
You lied about doing the review
You lied again a week later about doing the review when you did not have the DVD.

At this point Terry I really feel obligated to tell you that not only have you now hit rock bottom, but have now started drilling. You have never answered me or anyone else when we asked you why you lied. Not once. Ever. Tell me Terry, as a company who sent you a product in good faith, why did you lie to me? Why don't I deserve an explanantion?

And Terry, no matter how many times you say its about the errors, its not. Its about you lying, the reasons for your lying, and your collusion with Jon Bailey (your good friend), in producing a product assassination of my product that flew in the face of every other review.

But perhaps that IS the problem Terry - unlike Jons every other review was written from a neutral standpoint by someone with integrity. Not two nasty, lying little shitbags with some sort of personal axe to grind. You should wise up Terry. In the eyes of this hobby you and and your little friend have less credibility than Robert Mugabe. And a lot less integrity. The more you post self serving, delusional bullshit, the more you avoid answering reasonable questions about your behaviour, the bigger the twat you look. Give it up Terry - you're done

Don't believe me Terry? Type your name into Google - page 2 and rising fast

*Edit* 11:25am Looks like Terry has now removed his comments form the video. Funny that. No matter where he posts on this matter his comments get removed either by himself or moderators. Anyway - go here to see both his and Mike Lands comments

Lest we forget

2009-10-26T12:37:00.000Z

Remembrance Day will soon be here again. Last year I read Peter Bartons incredible book Passchendaele about the slaughter at the Ypres Salient. A sobering and powerful read, one of the best books I have ever read. Of all the haunting passages in the book, this is the one that I keep coming back to:

The healing process following such cataclysms is a slow one. Four out of five sufferers from shell shock, for instance, were never able to return to duty. Even in the mid-1960's, there still existed hospitals entirely filled by men who had not recovered from their own personal darknesses. The last such First World War 'casualty', David Ireland of the Black Watch, died in June 2001. Unable to rejoin society he had spent more than 80 years in care.

If you can, support The Poppy Appeal, or the Help for Heroes campaign - worthy causes both.

Terrys Downfall - the video

2009-10-23T20:28:00.000+01:00

My very own public service video. Found it went a lot quicker than I thought. This is a small resolution version - go to Youtube and see it in all its widescreen glory - take popcorn. Of course any similarity between characters in the video and those in the real world are purely co-incidental.

Merry Christmas Terry. When you have had enough let me know. I can carry on showing the world the lying little cowardly shit you are for as long as you wish. And Terry - just because it tells the truth about the poisonous actions of you and your friends does not make this site a 'hate' or 'bullying' blog. Its fun! Ask any of my readers! I certainly derive infinite pleasure from it!

Terry at it again - FFS!

2009-10-23T17:38:00.000+01:00

You would think that by now Terry had had enough humiliation and loss of support. How many times have I publicly told him to drop this? But no. Today I found out he is emailing people I have linked to and is asking them if they know they are being linked to 'cyber bullying blog'. This from a lying sack of shit that used his position as a respected reviewer to try and deliberately scupper the sales of the only product of a small company. WoW.Pot.Kettle.Black.

Talk about opening your mouth to change feet. I swear to God, Terry is so dense light bends around him. Obviously he needs another lesson. You know me by now dear reader, I never let this kind of sneaky, backstabbing, underhand, poisonous behaviour by Terry and his friends go unanswered. So, I am preparing an early Christmas present for Terry and friends. Come back same time tomorrow to see Terrys Downfall - it will be a Youtube classic

The Good Guys

2009-10-21T14:19:00.000+01:00

The are people and companies in the hobby for whom I have the highest regard. Given the support I am getting here I am happy to help them in whatever small way I can. Consequently I will be listing either their news blogs, or banners in the left hand side column. Please visit them if you can. I must emphasise I am not doing this for any advertising revenue or sponsorship of any kind - its just my way of saying thanks.

Blast from the past

2009-10-20T12:21:00.000+01:00

Just received an odd email from Paul Owen at Track Link. Told me to take down this page or else because apparently it 'deformed' him

As you know dear readers I never post anything not backed up with documented proof so here is a copy of the reply I just emailed to Paul:

"Dear Paul

Nice to hear from you, I had assumed you had seen this page when it was posted 8 months ago and were happy with my description of events. As I assume the text you object to contains a brief mention of you blindly accepting Terrys version of events as true I have removed that part of the text and apologise if this was incorrect.

Can I now assume that you have read both Terrys and my own accounts and now accept Terrys?

Secondly Paul the correct spellings for 'slanderour' and 'deformation' are 'slanderous' and 'defamation'.

Thirdly I am assuming that by 'slanderour' you actually meant libelous, which pertains to the written and not the spoken word (THATS slander Paul).

Lastly, I fail to see where you have been libelled as :
You did remove a product news item I posted for Cammets.
You did email me and tell me you reason for doing so was 'the trouble I caused Terry Ashley'
You did then post this reason on your forum for all to read, and prevented me from having access to the forum to put the opposite view.
You did remove the opposite view posted by Alasdair Johnson within sixty seconds of it appearing on your forum.

Consequently Paul, the page will stay up. The only difference now is that thanks to your email it will be seen by thousands instead of hundreds. Thanks for the traffic.

Best regards
Brian Balkwill

Finally if you still think I am casting aspersions on your good name then please have your legal team contact me (aspersions means...ahhh forget it - buy a fucking dictionary Paul)

Lets cut through the crap

2009-10-18T16:03:00.000+01:00

It was rightly pointed out to me this morning that trying to make head or tail of all the 1000's of words written between me and Terry causes people to lose the will to live. I agree - especially having to read the stuff being made up by Terry which bears no resemblance to what happened. It was suggested I put the events, all confirmed by emails from Terry, into a simple timeline. I have done so here.

It will take all of three minutes to read. If you still have doubts the long version, with Terrys emails, and screenshots from Jon Baileys forum are here.

The timeline alone is enough to conclusively prove that Terry Ashley is a lying, duplicitous sack of shit.

Crewe Model Show - free DVD giveaway

2009-10-18T08:47:00.000+01:00

Today I will be going along to Crewe Model show. I will bo taking 50 or so copies of The Panther Project DVD each worth £24.99 which I will be giving away free to the first people to come up and ask me. All I ask in return is that if you take one, you come back here to the blog and leave your impressions of it. All will be published irrespective of whether you like it or not.

An invite to Terry - an open, unmoderated discussion

2009-10-16T13:55:00.000+01:00

Further to this new, rambling wander (bottom of page 3) in to the realms of historical fiction by Terry

*EDIT* All threads on both M-L and Armorama have now thankfully been pulled by the moderators. Although Terry has now added an apology for hijacking the thread in Armorama. And thanked people for their support. No mention of the pointed questions being asked of him by lots of others though. You would think the moderators pulling the tread would be enough of a clue for him to keep quiet.Heigh-ho. The man just cannot live without forum love

Really not sure whats going here? Terry seems to be retreating ever faster into some kind of alternate reality - not only is he forgetting what he wrote to me in emails, he is forgetting that people have actually read everything he has written on forums and elsewhere, all of which is really starting to contradict itself.

Publish Emails? - did it 2 years ago Terry. All of yours and all of mine. Especially the one where you lie about currently doing the review on the same day Jon Bailey was 'pounding his keyboard in frustration' while looking at it. Even the email where you whine about me publishing your emails? Remember? Remember how you brought this fact up on Armorama afterwards. Are the mists clearing form the memory Terry? Maybe you should wear a mask more often when gluing and spraying

Me banned from forums? Nope - thats a lie - Never have been banned from a forum

You 'covered above' about giving out review samples? - Nope - another lie. You said you gave out OUR review sample. Not why. Not why to Jon Bailey. Not how did he know you had it. Not how often you give out samples and to whom. Not why you lied to me about having it when you did not (copy protection Terry - look it up). Nowhere on your site EVER has this practice been mentioned before you gave out our product. And I and many others over the years have often seen your somewhat manic speeches about the reviews being ALL YOUR OWN WORK.

Do I regret asking about the update - nope. Vinnies link to an article on what it was like to to work at Armorama and in particular with Jim Rae had nothing to do with me - so why put the update where you did? I imagine the dishonest link was put there because you are dishonest - of course all the people rushing to defend you disagree. Oh wait - there aren't any. You have your own blog - why not put it there - certainly more people would have read it and fawned all over you. Putting it where you did was deliberate and now (again) you are whining about the consequences.

Its also very apparent Terry that every time you post, you gloss over and refuse to answer all the questions I and others are putting to you in this regard. Its quite sad to see. If you are not going to answer any questions Terry you really should stop this now. Otherwise I am very happy to keep responding to your slef-delusional obfuscations and shoot holes in them every time you post this self-justifying crap until I get an apology and explanantion.

I also urge you to come across to my blog to discuss this. The will be no mederation so you can say what you want. This goes for any of your friends brave enough to finally show their faces. People in forums are quite correct Terry, is unedifying and bad for the hobby to play this out in a forum.

Terry Ashley needs an intervention

2009-10-16T09:57:00.000+01:00

I have already said I will not play this game in forums. If Terry will not come here then fine, I will fisk his statements here. A flaming war in forums is unseemly, bad for the hobby, and not fair on the owners and moderators who have to pick their way through this. At no point however will I let any lie, untruth, or other garbage written by Terry go unanswered. This is a fisking of Terrys recent post on Armorama

1. Neither I nor Jon Bailey knew (or know) of this "hatred of Alistair Johnston" as claimed.

Words fail me. Really. I feel as if I am trying to teach klingon to a chimp. So be it - Just for you Terry here is the English translation from Klingon. After the massive public row on M-L, after he and his friends formed a private forum with the express intent of keeping Alasdair out, after at least 3 attempts since 2002 to slander Alasdair via private email to forum moderators (yes Terry they all immediately informed me), after their own written statements about their feelings about Alasdair IN THE WEEK YOU GAVE THEM THE DVD, after I TOLD YOU HOW THEY FELT THE DAY AFTER you told me you had given the DVD to Jon. After all of this Terry, do you honestly think there are not people out there with memories longer than 5 years? Do you think they do not have links, emails, screenshots of how Jon felt? And finally Terry, how many people in this hobby have had their ear bent by Jon Bailey over his feeelings for Alasdair, 100's? Do you think any of them are reading your statement now Terry? Have you actually read your own emails and the dates in which you lied to me, claiming to be doing the review whilst it was still in the possession of Jon? And why DID you lie Terry, if your motivations and actions in passing this out were above board? Why did you continue to lie to us about having the dvd, when we knew that you did not - AND YOU KNEW THAT WE KNEW?.

Jon asked to look at the DVD and I didn't see a problem as I was busy on another review at the time.

Of all the thousands of samples you get, Jon Bailey 'just happened' to ask specifically for this one? Or does he come in on a regular basis and get review samples 'to look at'? How did he know you had it Terry? How many other members of the public do you hand out review samples to at their request? Samples sent TO YOU. for YOU to review, by companies that trust you. I would strongly urge anyone living in the Perth area to go along to Terrys house/office (does he work?) and ask for whatever review samples they feel qualified enough to 'have a look at'. After all, if Jon Bailey can do it, why not anyone else. And while we are on the point of review samples Terry, what percentage of all the samples you get come from a single import company? Strangely, A quick comparison of all their imported lines show that you regulary review nearly all of them. With one exception. They don't import Dragon.

Mr Balkwill goes on and on about giving the DVD to someone without permission. What is he taking about "permission”? Since when does any reviewer receiving a review item have to get permission to do anything with it? This is just an example of trying to make something sinister out of something that isn’t.

You did not pay for this Terry - it was sent to you on the understanding that YOU would carry out a fair and unbiased review of it. This understanding was based on the fact that YOU had always done your OWN reviews without fear or favour. That you had never once in the history of PMMS handed out a review copy AT THE REQUEST of a member of the public. How many times have you handed out review samples Terry? You don't mention this practice anywhere on your site. Do you still do it? Was this THE ONLY TIME YOU EVER DID IT TERRY? Don't be shy Terry, I am sure each and every company who sends you stuff would be interested to find out if the next product to be given out might be theirs. Especially if the subsequent product assassination is a review posted under your name.

Mr Balkwill and Jon Bailey have never met nor ever communicated in any way, so how does Mr Balkwill know of this supposed hatred as well as using some of the most insulting and inflammatory language towards Jon.

Refer to point one Terry and also The Jon Bailey Factor - At least a dozen respected names in this hobby have confirmed to me how Jon feels - give up Terry, this does not wash with anyone who a) has brain b) has a memory c) is not seriously medicated/unmedicated

Surely it’s not due to the influence of his "good friend" Alistair Johnston?

Alasdair Johnson - good friend? Absolutley. Co-authored the DVD, spent several years and a small fortune collecting info, travelling the world for pictures etc. Helped me get back into modelling, that was how I met him - bought a Hold and Fold. Now he's a halfway decent editor on our books :). But heres the thing Terry. All the way up to publishing the DVD, Alasdair told me to leave his name off of it because there were a group of people out there who would make every attempt to cause trouble for it, due their history with himself. And you know what Terry? - he named them. Each and every one that took part in your little 'review' was known to me by name before we went to print. The only one he did not name was you. How could he know that Jon Bailey was such a 'good' friend' of yours that you would give him our product at his request. Maybe we should compare 'good friends' Terry? Whats yours done for you lately?

2. Let's get this clear, I wrote that review, no one else, Simple as that.

Lets get this clear Terry, your own emails, and Jons own written statements, and the timeline of events show that you did not. You are a lying sack of shit.

And finally, once again, just point out any factual errors in the review. What is so hard about that?

Errors on the DVD - we have never denied it, never disputed it, and at every stage encouraged people to hightlight them. However Jon Baileys review goes to extreme lengths to be as negative as possible, to pour poison and bile at every opportunity, and find nothing positive. Compare it to this one on Missing-Lynx. Do you see what everyone else does Terry? Do you see how nasty and vitriolic yours (Jon Baileys) is by comparison? And do you know what the most insulting statement to your readers intelligence is on that piece Terry? That they could go out, buy a several copies of another reference book, and it would more use to them. The DVD contains information from over 80 books Terry, it has printable drawings in four scales of all Panther variants. It has virtual reality tours of real vehicles, some of which will never be open to the public. You muppet.

For God's sake this is two years old, surely these people can't be that obsessed and vindictive?

Wow Terry. I mean WOW! I am not sure what medication you are on/off but do you even remember updating Jon Baileys review on Sep 7th THIS YEAR!? I know that you have serious problems with dates, denial, the truth, self-delusion and must also be colour blind (black really is not white Terry no matter how much you insist people believe you) - but that was only six weeks ago you posted that. Its there for all your readers to see Terry - you forgot? Honestly? My advice would be to consult a Memory Clinic. But as you obviously have no idea what I am talking about here it is:

Updated September 7, 2009 In the intervening 2 years since the posting of this review no one has identified any errors of fact within this review.The only response from the producers and those associated with the project is a classic example of what I referred too in my blog posting of August 28, 2009.Unable to dispute any of the facts in the review the response has been to post a "hate" site with what can best be described as an over excited imagination, as the farcical stories and "facts" listed get more bizarre with each update. Even if remotely true (which they aren't) they have no bearing whatever on the facts contained in this review. After all the facts is what this is about and no amount of farcical smoke screen diversions will alter the facts as stated above.

Yeah. Vindictive - an excellent description of the piece Jon Bailey wrote about our product and you published under your name as a review.

Links on ML and Armorama

2009-10-15T22:04:00.000+01:00

Firstly welcome to all new visitors. Next - this blog was set up BEFORE Terry posted his DML statement. If you read the the mission statement on the right you can see what the original aim was. You will note that the recent posts here on Terry Ashley are in response to an update Terry put up on Sept 7 2009 which was brought to my attention several days ago. Terrys bonkers DML statement just happened to be a happy coincidence. I have deliberately avoided putting any mention of this blog on any forum, nor will I debate this on them - recent articles were for the benefit of Terry Ashley and the group of scum he colluded with in 2007

For those Terry worshippers who will blindly vilify me over this - please go and read this first. Then when you come back, we can debate what you have read. If you are still willing to ignore admissions made by Terry Ashley and Jon Bailey IN PRINT as to their guilt then you probably don't belong here. I WILL NOT be painted as the guilty party in this by a reviewer who handed my product out without permission to a lowlife whose intentions he already knew. Terry was warned what would happen if he did not let this go. Just like the first time - he ignored me.

And this is to Mike Land. For all of you that were not previously aware of it - at the time of this incident in 2007 Mike Land was, and had been for some time, a member of the same, private forum Jon Baileys belongs to. If you go back and read the thread in Armorama you can immediately see where Mike tries to troll in support of his friend Michael Kenny (also of the said private forum), and in the face of respected members of Armorama who wanted to know what Mr Kenny was doing on their forum.

Terryworld (like Discworld but without the fun)

2009-10-15T09:15:00.000+01:00

Someone left an interesting comment yesterday in which there was an insightful observation:

One of the things that makes me laugh is that according to Terry, he is taking the news items down because of the attacks on him and other companies by DML. If we apply the same logic to The Panther Project, then why is that "review" still up on his site? Brian has certainly not been shy about defending his work and telling the world exactly what he thinks about TA.

This point is one I had not considered but bears further discussion. I would wholeheartedly agree that what I have said about Terry is far stronger than anything Hiroshi has said, and yet he leaves the review up and refuses to respond at all. I think there are several reasons for this. The first is obviously that everything I have said is true, backed up with Terry's own email admissions, and Terry cannot afford to debate this in public - the last time he tried no one believed him.

The second is more complex and goes to Terry's state of mind. Have a look at Terry's email response on page 4 of our expose - its completely over the top and when I first saw it I was both flabbergasted and alarmed. It gave me the impression of someone extremely paranoid who was mentally in a very bad place. Not only that - he is maniacally defending the right to free speech of a hate group in a private forum which at that point he says he knew nothing about. Of course in hindsight we now know that he was lying and had given the DVD to his 'good friend' Jon Bailey in order for this group of scum to tear it to pieces. But, knowing that was their intent from the outset, he still sent me this foaming at the mouth defence of their actions, and its obvious he truly felt this way. Over time I have come to the conclusion that Terry's immense power of self-delusion, coupled with a complete inability to accept any criticism makes him believe that he he has done nothing wrong. He apparently sees himself as the saviour of modelling, a beacon of Light in the dangerous modelling Wastelands, slaying dastardly manufacturers with his Sword of a Thousand Truths whilst we modellers cower gratefully in his munificent shade. This can be seen in his complete over reaction to Hiroshi, and his total blindness to his own hypocrisy in carrying on with Dragon Reviews. If Terry does have any real friends, I would hope they care enough about his mental state to keep an eye on him - when the truth does come crashing he is going to need them

*Edit*
I would add that I am still only interested in getting what I have been requesting from Terry since 2007:
1. A detailed explanation of his actions, those of his friends Jon Bailey and Don Campbell, and the motivations of those actions.
2. A public apology from Terry on PMMS and other major modelling forums
3. The retraction of the assassination piece on our DVD written by Jon Bailey and posted by Terry on PMMS under his own name.

As soon as I get these all articles relating to this matter both here and elsewhere will be taken down for good. However, until I do get them ......

St. Terry Ashley - Patron saint of Hypocrisy

2009-10-13T23:09:00.000+01:00

So Terry is no longer going to feature DML kits in New Kit News. Swoon. Gasp. I have read with some hilarity and nausea Terrys statement about this and clearly the concepts of 'irony' and 'hypocrisy' have not yet made it to Perth. Lets do a little fisking shall we - for Terrys benefit I will indicate whether his statements (in red) are covered by irony, hypocrisy or both.

First off let’s get one fact straight. It doesn’t matter if this spokesperson is from Japan, Antarctica or the Moon, the underlying fact is he posts on an official DML website; therefore it is official DML comment.

Well Terry. YOU published a review of my product written by your 'good friend' Jon Bailey, under YOUR name on PMMS. So according to your own statement - product assassination, lying to the public, and publishing under a false name are official PMMS policy. (Irony)
Update.
Hi Terry. Your statement really IS the gift that keeps on giving. Remember what happened to Don Campbell over the statements HE made while helping you and your 'good friend' Jon Bailey?Tsk Tsk Terry. Glass. Houses. Stones

Recently I suspended the DML news items for a period and this created some speculation but the real reason is I simply could no longer in all conscience continue to provide free publicity to such a morally bankrupt company.

Really? I see that your shiny new integrity has not stopped you REVIEWING their kits though - maybe because the loss of traffic to your site if you did would be catastrophic? The free publicity your reviews give DML massively outnumbers an entry in New KIt News which most people will only visit once. Oops - Blemish on the old Moral Armour there Terry? Give it quick polish with some Self-Delusion (Hypocrisy - and a little sarcasm on my part)

They don’t have the common courtesy to even use a company or persons real name but have to come with some insulting nickname.

Oh.My.GOD. Terry YOU posted a review of my product under your name, which was in fact written by your 'good friend' Jon Bailey. (This statement contains very strong 'Irony' AND 'Hypocrisy' Terry)

This will remain so until such time as this disgusting individual is flushed down the toilet where he belongs and DML behave as a responsibly and professional manner in this regard.

Good Luck Terry. I hope you have as much success as we have with getting an apology and explanation from YOU on your behaviour over our product.(Hypocrisy). And by the way Terry I strongly support your determination to keep this in place until the individual is flushed down the toilet. I intend to do exactly the same - we can stand together on this.

Note: This announcement only applies to new product listings (free adverts), I will continue to review the kits as time permits.

Yep got that already Terry. You REALLY REALLY cannot afford to lose the DML review traffic to your site, and loss of hits for your other advertisers. In fact I see several places where you emphasise this. To me it looks like a silent appeal to DML and your other advertisers NOT to take your entire statement seriously. I don't. Your moral high ground is a floater in a sewer. The stench of hypocrisy pervades it all.

Jon Bailey - 'Good friend' or good riddance?

2009-10-13T12:53:00.000+01:00

Its no surprise that given the amount of interest in this site in the last week I have had numerous emails from across the spectrum of the hobby. All of these were in support - one in particular came from a respected name in the southern hemisphere and asked me to call him. Intrigued, I did. The resulting conversation can be paraphrased as follows:

"I ran into Jon Bailey several times after the whole M-L thing, prior to which I had seen him on forums, beyond that I do not know him. My impression of him was quite negative ("a prick"), on both occassions he went on and on about Alisdair Johnson and how he would like do him physical harm."

Now this is telling Terry. In 2003 Jon Bailey (your 'good friend') is willing to tell total strangers about his hatred for Alisdair Johnson, and its quite obvious from the screenshots of their forum discussions in 2007 that at the time you gave our DVD to Jon Bailey, these feelings were still widely held by Jon Bailey and the other gutless scum.

And yet dear reader, Terry says he knew nothing about these feelings his 'good friend' held. Really? After five years there was not a single conversation with his 'good friend' about this subject? About an individual that caused such anger in his 'good friend'? About the individual his 'good friend' held responsible for him and his group having to leave a research forum of which they were a major part?

Really Terry?

Terry, come oooooooooon. Do you honestly think that ANYONE out there actually believes you? Luckily I can confirm that here in real world that they do not. In fact Terry, they think you are an utter idiot to continue to peddle this fantasy. They are annoyed that you seem to think they are moronic enough to buy your lies simply because in your mind it was uttered by yourself then floated down on the farts of angels from the top of the ivory tower.

After one week My traffic stats are going through the roof Terry. You really should start thinking about the effect your continued association with your 'good friend' Jon Bailey and the gutless scum is having on your name. They are a millstone around you neck.

This will not go away Terry, a lot people want to know why you gave our DVD to Jon Bailey. As a company who sent you a product in good faith we deserve an explanation and an apology as to our treatment by yourself.

Have a nice day

Terry Ashley and the Jon Bailey Factor

2009-10-11T12:02:00.000+01:00

Why did a previously respected reviewer actively collude and enable in a product assassination of a DVD sent to him in good faith?

Edit - Further to yesterdays post

This morning I had a moment of clarity. For the past two years Terry has always deflected questions about his actions by saying that the whole row is about errors on the DVD. He has especially glossed over and tried to minimise the one question I should have been emphasising all along: Why did Terry Ashley give out a review copy to a member of the public? Terrys says its because he was too busy to look at it and that Jon Bailey (his 'good friend' in his words) requested it. He also stated he knew nothing of Jon Bailey and friends hatred of Alisdair Johnson. I will come back to these reasons later, first I will set out the fact on which every possible reason Terry can give will founder and fail. I will call it the Jon Bailey Factor.

The Jon Bailey Factor
In 2002 a group of members including Jon Bailey left Missing Lynx in a very public row because M-L would not ban Alisdair from the forum. What they did not know was that Alasdiar had provided the owners of M-L with detailed IP tracking logs which proved he had not done that which they accused him of. Incidentally, the same IP tracking logs showed two of Jons Australian freinds WERE caught setting up false accounts on M-L pretending to be Alasdair under an assumed name. So they went off in huff and formed a private forum. If you doubt the depth of their feeling look at the screenshots from 2007 in my expose - the chief moderator of the forum states that the main reason to form the forum was so that Alasdair could not access it. Now we come to the crux of this: Terry is asking you to believe that:
a) He had no knowledge of the very public and massive fallout on M-L, nor the consequent leaving of a group of its main members.
b) That in the intervening 5 years, in all his modelling discussions with 'his good friend' Jon Bailey, that the subject of Alasdair, the M-L episode, and the reasons for setting up the private forum had never been raised.
c)That Jon Bailey had never once in 5 years made clear his feelings on Alasdair Johnson

Still think its credible Terry knew none of this? No. Neither does anyone else. There can be no doubt that Terry knew all of this, and still handed over the DVD. There can also be no doubt that he knew exactly what Jon Bailey wanted the DVD for, because to believe that Jon Bailey and his group of trolls would have any positive motive for viewing the DVD means Terry is essentially a moron - and that is not the case.

So here is the John Bailey Factor:
"Terry Ashley, knowing Jon Baileys history with Alisdair Johnson, handed over a pre-release review copy of commercial product produced by Alisdair Johnson, without the authors knowledge or permission, in order for Jon Bailey and a group of friends to write a negative review on the product".
In all further scenarios listed below, you should test every one against the Jon Bailey Factor.

From what we know, Terry handed the DVD to Jon, at Jons request, within days of receiving it. This means the following:
1. Terry told Jon he had it - why? in light of the Jon Bailey Factor?
2. Jon, realising a review copy may be sent to Terry, asked to be given it when it arrived, and Terry agreed -- why? in light of the Jon Bailey Factor?
3. Jon came into Terrys office, fell over the DVD in surprise, asked Terry if he could look over it, Terry agreed - why? in light of the Jon Bailey Factor?

Why did Terry give out a review copy? He has always stated that all reviews on PMMS are his own. And how come Terry has never once before this incident needed to hand out a review copy of ANYTHING EVER, no matter what the subject or media? Its not as if he is short of references on the Panther which he has trotted out on every other occasion.
1.Did he give it out because Jon is an expert on that subject? - why? in light of the Jon Bailey Factor?
2. How often does he give out review copies without asking permission of the authors.
3. Why did he deliberately not ask our permission to give this DVD to Jon Baily ESPECIALLy in light of The Jon Bailey Factor

The inescapable conclusion is that in light of his good friendship with Jon Bailey, and his knowledge of Jon Bailey and friends feeling towards Alasdair - that this was a deliberate act on Terrys part. What we don't know is why. Does Terry for some reason share Jon Baileys feelings? Why not tell us beforehand and recuse himself - we would have understood. But to deliberately do what he did, collude and enable this group in a product assassination of a commercial product, is beyond the pale. Its made worse by his susequent slimy justifications and deflections which are an insult to the intelligence of anyone with an IQ higher than 3.

I would urge anyone reading this, whether you are for or against the argument, to do the following: The next time you see Terry post anywhere outside of his self-moderated sychophantic fan site (his blog), ask him, in print, "Why did you give a review copy of The Panther Project DVD to Jon Bailey". And don't let him fob you of with 'thats not important, what is important is the errors' bullshit. It was this initial action on Terrys part that started all of this. I as the commercial producer of this product have never been given an answer. I don't think its an unreasonable question.

I would like to reserve my final paragraph for the gutless scum that are Jon Bailey and his group of trolls. You knew full well what you were doing to somebody who apparently regards you as a 'good friend'. You have ruined his good name and left his reputation in tatters. After your other cowardly backdoor attempts in the last 5 years all failed, you saw a chance to have a PUBLIC go Alasdair and had no compunction about using Terry to do this. With the exception of Micheal Kenny who at least had the balls to come onto a public forum, there has not been a single peep from any of you to help Terry out of the mess you landed him in. You are without exception the most cowardly, gutless scum I have ever had the misfortune to come across. There is not an ounce of integrity among you - you are an utter disgrace to and a blight on this hobby.

Edit* It may interest you to know that since this kicked off in 2007, Jon Bailey and several of the other scum involved have been invited as judges at Euro Militare. Now whether or not the Judges are aware of their actions I do not know. I for one think that their complete lack of integrity, willingness to pursue personal vendettas and bias should preclude them from ever being invited in a judging role again. After all, it could be your entry they are judging next year. If you feel as I do send your thoughts on this to Daniel Webb , the event organiser, or leave a message on their Facebook page. On both you can encourage them to pass on your feelings to Charles Davis who selects the judges, and Tony Greenland, the head judge.

Stick your fingers in your ears and shout "La La La La La..."

2009-10-10T14:16:00.000+01:00

To Terry Ashley - Why cry and whine about 'hate' sites when this was all your own fault?

It was never my intention to raise the subject of Terry Ashley and The Panther Project DVD on this site. Yes there are links to what happened, but editorial - no. Unfortunately on Sep 7 Terry has put up a one-sided update in his product assassination of our product (written by Jon Bailey and posted under Terrys name on the PMMS site). Had this update, or in fact any place on Terrys site contained a link to the other side of the story I would not be writing this piece. The update does however contains a link to a long, rambling, self-deluding justification on his blog which contains references to 'hate' sites. Hilariously, all the people commenting on his post seem to think he is is talking about Blogger Hiroshi. How frustrating for Terry that he cannot point them to this 'hate' site - he knows that if he did they would then read what he had done - and there is no way he could afford that. I however want people to see both sides of the argument and make their own judgement.,

Lets look at Terrys update from Sep 7:
Updated September 7, 2009
In the intervening 2 years since the posting of this review no one has identified any errors of fact within this review. The only response from the producers and those associated with the project is a classic example of what I referred too in my blog posting of August 28, 2009. Unable to dispute any of the facts in the review the response has been to post a "hate" site with what can best be described as an over excited imagination, as the farcical stories and "facts" listed get more bizarre with each update. Even if remotely true (which they aren't) they have no bearing whatever on the facts contained in this review. After all the facts is what this is about and no amount of farcical smoke screen diversions will alter the facts as stated above.

Now lets look at this statement in detail
1. The Panther Project site was a commercial one set up to sell the DVD - Terry knows this. Secondly, the 'hate' material he refers two are two pages on the site detailing Terrys actions on the DVD and a second one detailing Terrys plagiarising of parts of the US Army magazine for one of his reviews. They were posted after he saw fit to publish the disgusting product assassination piece under his own name, written by Jon Bailey, and a year later when he plagiarised copy from the US Army Magazine for a review (Yes Terry I phoned them, and they agreed you had plagiarised it). Terry was warned on several occassions, and in explicit detail what steps I would take if he posted this piece - apparently he did not believe me and did it anyway. Once his lies and collusion were exposed he screamed blue murder about privacy of emails. This AFTER he passed on all my emails to Jon Bailey and in a private forum. Now on a regular basis he whines about 'hate' sites, and about how he behaved honourably in this matter. Well Terry Ashley is a liar. Thats not just me saying that - its his own emails. Its the thousands of people who have bought the DVD and the 100's who have emailed me with nothing but praise. Its the several hundred people including well known modellers, magazine editors, traders, and forum owners who have privately told me they have lost all respect for Terry over this.

2. Jon Baileys piece, posted by Terry Ashley under his own name, is now widely regarded as a product assassination based on his hatred of Alisdair Johnson. Of course there are errors on the DVD - we never denied it and we never disputed it, its the largest single collection of information Panthers in one product. 80+ books were used in the compiliation so of course there will be errors. But go through Jon Baileys piece with neutral eye and you can see that great lengths have been gone to to be as negative and vitriolic as possible. No positives are mentioned. It is criticised for lacking features which, when also lacking on other CD/DVD product reviews on PMMS, are not mentioned. Compare this to the other reviews by repsected members of digital and print media. Nows here is the real test - compare it to any of the 1000's of reviews on Terrys site. You will not find one as biased, negative, nasty and with an obvious personal axe to grind as the one in question. I can spare you the effort - there is no other 'review' on Terrys site which comes within a light year of this one. Not only is the style different to Terrys usual stuff, but he forgot to take out the verbatim parts of the rant that Jon Bailey wrote in the private forum. After a catastrophic attempt to defend his actions on a forum, Terry refuses to post anywhere on this subject except on his own site, and of course, refuses to allow people to see what he did.

3.Facts. Every part of my original expose of Terry Ashley, Jon Bailey, and the private forum that colluded with them in their actions is based on statements made, in print, by Terry, Jon, and the others involved. I did not make any of this up - I did not have to - Terry and his cronies were not only dumb enough to admit it but also supplied all of it to me in hard copy. Terry gave the DVD without viewing it (and without permission) to Jon Bailey, at Jon Baileys request. This is verified by Terry in an email to me. One week after Jon Bailey got the DVD from Terry, he , and members in the private forum were talking about the upcoming review on Terrys site which would 'expose' the DVD and all its faults. At the point the 'review' was posted, it had NEVER been returned to Terry, yet he was telling me he was in the middle of reviewing it - this is verified in a statement by Jon Bailey in the private forum AND by an email containing this lie from Terry. This can all be verified by reading the expose I wrote on this.

Heres a fact for you Terry. Before I posted the original article, you threatened me with your 'legal team' (BTW - still have not been given their address so I can post them all this stuff despite numerous private and public requests to Terry). So I took it to a solicitor for a once over. He told me that in any court you would be serious trouble. He said that both you and Jon Bailey had hung yourself by YOUR OWN WRITTEN COMMUNICATIONS. He also looked at the timeline and concluded there was no doubt that you could not have written the 'review' because it was not in your possession at the time.

Whats Terrys response to this? To stick his fingers in his ears and shout "LA LA LA LA LA". I mean, FFS Terry! YOU admitted all of this to ME in emails! What planet are you on to keep denying this? Or is your ivory tower now so high that lack of oxygen is affecting your brain?

Now if after reading the article anyone still has doubts I will be more than happy to forward all of the original emails, mine and Terrys, together with the date stamps. I would also urge you read the following reviews of the DVD by respected modellers (according to Terry and cronies all of them took bribes to give good reviews)
Military Modelling
Missing-Lynx
Armorama

Believe it or not I am still a regular visitor to Terrys site. When he writes his own reviews they are pretty good, informative, and on the whole, balanced. Quite often he has news before anyone else. However I doubt that he will ever again post a review written by someone else pretending its his own, as the cost to him over this has been catastrophic. Unfortunately Terry seems to have a blind spot. No criticism of him is ever allowed, and when he thinks censorship is being placed on him he goes into meltdown and behaves pretty much as the clip below demonstrates.(Courtesy of Comedy Central Networks)

Now Terry, heres the thing. I know you will never explain what you have done or the reasons for it - you cannot because it would mean admitting what you did and your role in it. I can live with that. Why? Because every time you raise this issue, and I have to refute it with the truth, more people visit my site, and find out what you did, and are rightly disgusted with the behaviour of you and your friends. What you seem to be oblivious to, is that by leaving up Jon Baileys piece, and regularly defending your actions on it, you are losing fans by the week (I keep a folder just for these emails - they warm my heart). I could care less - your tattered reputation is obviously worth even less to you than it is to me, and by prolonging this you only hurt yourself (and I sell more DVD's). But I promise you this Terry: As long as that assassination piece stays up, as long as you present yourself as some hard done by saint and not show what your actions actually were, then the site that shows the truth will stay up and I will keep linking to it as long as you keep this alive and I draw breath.

So if you want to keep the few remaining fans you still have that have not read about your behaviour - my advice to you Terry is this: Shut.The.Fuck.Up.

According to the References

2009-10-01T01:32:00.001+01:00

Denigrating an entire kit for tiny errors nobody else gives a toss about

Did you ever get the feeling when some reviewers have used the above phrase, that it should be accompanied by the sound of reverential heavenly music? (see clip below)

I am not referring of course to reference pictures - but measurements, and sometimes how it appears that a perverse pleasure is taken in slagging off an entire kit for the sake of a few millimetres on a dimension which they have measured from a scale drawing. The same type of person can impart a massive importance to small discrepancies, and this can adversely affect the success in terms of sales of any particular kit.

I studied engineering drawing for seven years, and additionally in the last 12 months have completely redrawn many WWII blueprints for restoration purposes in 1:10 and 1:25 scales using CorelDraw. From my studies I already knew that taking a measurement from a scale drawing is a very inexact way to obtain an accurate measurement, and is fraught with dangers. This has been borne out by the work I have recently done on the blueprints. Even a high resolution scan at full size does not mean that lines are straight, or even that time and the elements have not adversely affected the paper itself.

There are only two ways to obtain an accurate measurement:
1. Go to the subject and measure it
2. Use a written dimension already on a drawing placed there by someone who already carried out point 1.

So what do they mean when they say "according to references"? Firstly, since 99.99% of people who use that particular phrase never actually gets to take actual measurements on a vehicle, we can safely rule out option 1 above. Secondly, reference books with measured dimensions are extremely rare, so what they are actually relying on is a 1:35th scale drawing without dimensions. How is that a bad thing I hear you say? Let's take a look in closer detail.

The better reference books contain drawings that have been generated from measured dimensions. However such books usually carry a disclaimer that the drawings are not to be taken as perfect due to the margin of error that can apply. Where does the margin of error come from? It starts when a graphic is printed - distortions can occur when the print file is read by the printer. If the drawing crosses the gate fold then don't even bother to measure it. Secondly there is line thickness - scale drawing lines can vary from around 0.2mm up to 0.5mm where lines are superimposed due to scale reduction of the original diagram. This is a margin of error of between 14 and 35mm at 1:1, and that margin of error itself is the minimum you can get by using a digital calliper - if you are using a ruler it will be far worse. If you were building a toothed gear would you be able to accept a 14mm - 35mm margin of error? Of course not - so why accept it as gospel from somebody who says "according to the references"?

The next time you see this phrase used with regards to a measurement, where the person using it is relying on a scale diagram, remember that what they should be saying is the following:

"When comparing the dimension on the kit to a (1:35/16/72) scale drawing (with/without) measured dimensions - using my (calibrated/uncalibrated)( ruler/digital calliper) I found a discrepancy of 'X' mm. The margin for error on the drawing, when measuring from the outside/inside/middle of the line is Y to Zmm. As the manufacturer based their mould on (measured/diagram) dimensions, the error is a minimum of Y minus Xmm and a maximum of Z minus Xmm."

Without this detail you cannot really make an informed decision as to the methodology and equipment used, nor accuracy of any error that may or may not be there.

Now here's the thing that makes all of the above mostly redundant anyway: Most times no one will know what the manufacturer used to make the kit, so that variable means you can never get a fully accurate comparison unless you have an indicated, measured, dimension for every aspect of every item on the kit.

Additionally, once the model is finished, painted, weathered etc and sits in a display case who is going to know that the hull is 1.5mm too short? Only you, unless your guests are allowed to pick up your models and apply digital calipers.

Makes you think doesn't it?