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LuckyNo.5 wrote:Man you guys are something else....I don't join your quest and now you're trash talking me on Dakka?

Apparently I'm an alter-ego for Matt or a delinquent character?

If anyone was gong to be giving me a bad reputation online it's you fools and not Matt.

Seriously, leave me out of this BS. There's a reason I haven't joined Dakka In the past and this is a clear example of why.

Member of Dakka. +1
In bed with Bonder -5,000

Maybe you should do a bit of research.

LuckyNo.5 I have no issue with you and while i may not understand your wanting to join with a band with such a negative reputation theres always the possibility your doing the blog for the love of the hobby. I can not fault you for finding a way to make blog posts aboiut your favorite hobby. Now as for the whole matt issue hes a known scammer. I was one who was scammed by him on a different site. I personally can not tolerate the man.

Unfortunatly especialy in this situation theres been several users joined and post in this topic only to support matt and never be heard from again which really makes any new user who automaticaly posts here highly suspect of just bieng a alias of matts.

I find it difficult to believe the people who have popped up to defend him aren't him, its classic internetz.

sad thank you for the warnings

I’m going to agree that the other people posting in favour of RSO are probably him (including the mysterious “Damien” and “Jeff” as well). The other posters IMO have a similar sort of antagonistic style of posting. Even still, the people in favour of RSO, who didn’t antagonise when posting, did a pretty weak job defending him (usually choosing to ignore the possibility of fault). What makes matters worse is that RSO has been proven to use different aliases in the past

LuckyNo.5 wrote:Man you guys are something else....I don't join your quest and now you're trash talking me on Dakka?

Apparently I'm an alter-ego for Matt or a delinquent character?

If anyone was gong to be giving me a bad reputation online it's you fools and not Matt.

Seriously, leave me out of this BS. There's a reason I haven't joined Dakka In the past and this is a clear example of why.

Others have said it, but the sad and simple fact here is two fold - as you help his site grow, you help attract potential victims to his services. You add a level of legitimacy he simply can't achieve any more on his own because of his past dealings. And remember, whatever the reason was before, he now has the time and money to run charity gigs and give away models - so why can't he possibly make good on the things he does owe people? Because he'd rather keep that money and cash. You may not care about that, since it's not yourself or your friends who were screwed over,

The second sad fact is that so long as your name is tied to his, some of his issues become yours. Again, if you don't care about his previous dealings enough to not be associated with him, why should people trust you? I'm not saying that you're a scammer yourself, or that you don't care about the people he has scammed - but why should people trust you? You're happy to help a guy who does steal stuff from people, and that will make people wonder about yourself. Mud sticks, sadly, and with the amount the guy is burred under it will get on you too.

Maybe you could explain why you feel working with the guy is OK, and why you think it's appropriate given his previous and current scams, it might help take some of the heat off?

In fairness, I doubt the new guys are Matthew.
I'd wager that the staff looks at the IP address of anyone coming here to defend Matthew (I know I would). If they found so much as a similarity, they'd probably call him out on it.

Of course, that doesn't mean I think much of anyone choosing to associate with Matthew Bonder in light of his past transgressions.


Eric

Jon Garrett wrote:Again, if you don't care about his previous dealings enough to not be associated with him, why should people trust you?

I don't trust ANYONE online. Not that I don't care, I just don't know whats real and whats not, so there is no reason for me to get worked up about it. I have better things to do with my time. Bottom Line, I've "known" Matt for a while now with ll positive encounters. So I will side with him vs. a bunch of strangers that are ready to lynch me for no good reason other than I'm posting some tutorials on a hobby blog run by multiple people aside from Matt.

Jon Garrett wrote:Maybe you could explain why you feel working with the guy is OK, and why you think it's appropriate given his previous and current scams, it might help take some of the heat off?

What heat? From you Dakkanites? Man that's about as much heat as a match would provide in a blizzard. I'm sweating already...

TheNewMexicanGeneral wrote:LuckyNo.5 I have no issue with you and while i may not understand your wanting to join with a band with such a negative reputation theres always the possibility your doing the blog for the love of the hobby. I can not fault you for finding a way to make blog posts aboiut your favorite hobby. Now as for the whole matt issue hes a known scammer. I was one who was scammed by him on a different site. I personally can not tolerate the man.

Unfortunatly especialy in this situation theres been several users joined and post in this topic only to support matt and never be heard from again which really makes any new user who automaticaly posts here highly suspect of just bieng a alias of matts.

Weren't you called a scammer and other slanderous things in this post? http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/417601.page#3769360
Pot… Kettle… Black… What?

MagickalMemories wrote:Of course, that doesn't mean I think much of anyone choosing to associate with Matthew Bonder in light of his past transgressions.

I'm crying on the inside.. really I am.







The only thing useful about this thread is the use of Ork emoticons....

Maybe Lucky is Matt's wife.
You know, the one that's had 27 fatal ailments over the last few years.

LuckyNo.5 wrote:

Jon Garrett wrote:Again, if you don't care about his previous dealings enough to not be associated with him, why should people trust you?

I don't trust ANYONE online. Not that I don't care, I just don't know whats real and whats not, so there is no reason for me to get worked up about it. I have better things to do with my time. Bottom Line, I've "known" Matt for a while now with ll positive encounters. So I will side with him vs. a bunch of strangers that are ready to lynch me for no good reason other than I'm posting some tutorials on a hobby blog run by multiple people aside from Matt.

So you know him off line then?

I guess you do think the string of people he owes money to are lying.

@Lucky -
Dakka isn't the only place he's catching heat. Check BoLS, Warseer... Heck, read this thread. It's a laundry list of gaming web sites across the internet.

When you find yourself on the sh** end of the stick with Matthew, don't come crying to us. The best you'll get out of this group is an indignant "Told ya so."



@Coldfire

That might've been a bit too far. I know not many people believe him about his wife and son but, for Karma's sake, you might want to err on the side of caution.
Just saying.

Eric

Thanks for the karma warning, Eric, but I don't believe a thing Matt says--he's the one who needs to keep an eye out for karma

Yeah I had issues with my transaction but you know what we got it rectified and unfortunatly it was one of those cases where a package got lost and that happens. So yeah I had a bad transaction and had some issues I worked to rectify them something your pal matt cant seem to accomplish. Saying pot calling kettle black isnt applicable to my situation. While yes things happened and due to some isssues I was away from dakka for 2 months and wasnt able to contact him which is regrettable I did everything in my power to fix the situation and am still trying to discern the where abouts of his package. Where as matt doesnt give a frak about his dealings.

Ok well Lucky No.5 and Matt as I know for a fact you are following this if not posting to it. IF you feel youve done nothing wrong and feel we are in the bad here and were a site not worth visiting well then frak off. Theres tons of other 40k sites with which to be a part of and all this thread was about was posting a warning about suspicious activities occuring on the part of one Miniature Wargames Conversions. He was not slandering anyone saying oh this is a bad bad man hate hate hate. He was saying hes been notified of behaviours that warranted a unfortunate warning to the Dakka Community. He did what he did with a heavy heart as no one likes to hear about something like that happening. Furthermore if matt would pay back his previous debts then thatd alieviate a lot of issues. But instead he chooses not to and chooses to act through several aliases to portray himself as the good guy whos done nothing wrong.

If you believe hes in the right and truly thinks hes a good guy then best of luck to you maybe you might just have a pleasant relationship with him and truly i hope you do.

EDIT: Mods if I was rude or not following forum policy I did not mean to but If I did feel free to edit my post of those issues and please Pm myself as to my discrepencies with policy.

Also we have to remember that RSO's defenders usually have a very low number of posts, so they all could possibly be him
Just saying- although this is pretty obvious

Howard A Treesong wrote:

LuckyNo.5 wrote:

Jon Garrett wrote:Again, if you don't care about his previous dealings enough to not be associated with him, why should people trust you?

I don't trust ANYONE online. Not that I don't care, I just don't know whats real and whats not, so there is no reason for me to get worked up about it. I have better things to do with my time. Bottom Line, I've "known" Matt for a while now with ll positive encounters. So I will side with him vs. a bunch of strangers that are ready to lynch me for no good reason other than I'm posting some tutorials on a hobby blog run by multiple people aside from Matt.

So you know him off line then?

I guess you do think the string of people he owes money to are lying.

That is a good question.

I'd love to hear Matt's explanation for why he's still holding a lot of my miniatures hostage, especially after he was already paid for the conversion work. Years ago.

There are many reasons why I'd love to meet Matt in person.

One of them is to see just how charming he must be, literally, to have anyone believe him 100% and think that everyone else who has had negative dealings with him is just... making it up?

We should start an Alpharius Charity Recovery Fund.

Once I do my taxes I'll get him a rhino(not that it will cover the 5 rhinos plus other models but baby steps) to help cover the models lost that it's obvious won't be recovered by Matt.

I know this could come across as sarcasm, but it is genuine. It is unfortunate that something like this happened/happens.

I'd like to help out a fellow gamer in recovering what was stolen from him.

Anyone else want to pitch in and get him a model off his list?
Granted this doesn't cover the conversions that were supposed to be done, or the money lost, but every little bit helps.

Aerethan wrote:We should start an Alpharius Charity Recovery Fund.

Once I do my taxes I'll get him a rhino(not that it will cover the 5 rhinos plus other models but baby steps) to help cover the models lost that it's obvious won't be recovered by Matt.

I know this could come across as sarcasm, but it is genuine. It is unfortunate that something like this happened/happens.

I'd like to help out a fellow gamer in recovering what was stolen from him.

Anyone else want to pitch in and get him a model off his list?
Granted this doesn't cover the conversions that were supposed to be done, or the money lost, but every little bit helps.

The DCM and mod crew actually did this already, and managed to finance him an army. Which genuinely helped restore my faith in humanity just a little.

Ketara wrote:

Aerethan wrote:We should start an Alpharius Charity Recovery Fund.

Once I do my taxes I'll get him a rhino(not that it will cover the 5 rhinos plus other models but baby steps) to help cover the models lost that it's obvious won't be recovered by Matt.

I know this could come across as sarcasm, but it is genuine. It is unfortunate that something like this happened/happens.

I'd like to help out a fellow gamer in recovering what was stolen from him.

Anyone else want to pitch in and get him a model off his list?
Granted this doesn't cover the conversions that were supposed to be done, or the money lost, but every little bit helps.

The DCM and mod crew actually did this already, and managed to finance him an army. Which genuinely helped restore my faith in humanity just a little.

Well dammit all! Meh, he is still missing models yeah? I'm sending him a rhino whether he wants it or not!

LuckyNo.5 wrote:

Jon Garrett wrote:Again, if you don't care about his previous dealings enough to not be associated with him, why should people trust you?

I don't trust ANYONE online. Not that I don't care, I just don't know whats real and whats not, so there is no reason for me to get worked up about it. I have better things to do with my time. Bottom Line, I've "known" Matt for a while now with ll positive encounters. So I will side with him vs. a bunch of strangers that are ready to lynch me for no good reason other than I'm posting some tutorials on a hobby blog run by multiple people aside from Matt.

Lucky No. 5, I really appreciate your posting in this thread (I am being genuine here- I know it's hard to tell in text). However, I don't understand this view. I know you're in the vicinity of Mike Clark (mikhaila)'s store, and everyone I know in that area knows him and his store. I mentioned that he could vouch for what I was saying about this and has been aware of it. He's a reputable wargame store owner in your area... if you do care (as you say it's not that you don't care) why not just call up Showcase Comics and ask him? Or shoot him an email? You don't have to believe me... I also mentioned that I'd be up there at the end of the month.

That's where this excuse breaks down for me... of course, you can't trust what a stranger says on the internet. But there's so much evidence of the scamming that Matthew Bonder has done, it's nearly undeniable. Add to that a real person near to you with a good reputation that can fill you in on it, and how can you plead ignorance?

The hobby blog and tutorials give Matthew credibility, as many others have pointed out, so of course your posting there does harm. Posting those things on your personal blog, which looks excellent, would cause me (and I believe everyone) zero issues. Why can't you see that?

Again, I appreciate your posting here. I'm also going to PM Rictus, since he is a Dakka member, to see if he could give his thoughts. However, the other thing I don't understand is your looking up a Transaction Report (which has been resolved, albiet by Paypal) about TheNewMexicanGeneral... that is a bit of trouble to go to for something that you don't care about. I just find that odd... I also find it odd that you've never responded about Mike. If you do care, as you post seems to indicate and you just don't know who to trust, wouldn't it make sense to check with him and verify what we're saying here?

LuckyNo.5 wrote:

Jon Garrett wrote:Again, if you don't care about his previous dealings enough to not be associated with him, why should people trust you?

I don't trust ANYONE online. Not that I don't care, I just don't know whats real and whats not, so there is no reason for me to get worked up about it. I have better things to do with my time. Bottom Line, I've "known" Matt for a while now with ll positive encounters. So I will side with him vs. a bunch of strangers that are ready to lynch me for no good reason other than I'm posting some tutorials on a hobby blog run by multiple people aside from Matt.

No one wants to lynch you, so far as I know. It's simply a matter of no one being quite certain how you can justify this, and being unable to trust you because you're happy to associate with and defend a criminal. If you take a few minutes to look around you'll find it's not a couple of people giving the guy a bad reputation, but well into double digits. Unless you assume that Matt is being targeted by a hate group who hate dying families or something, there are too many of these things to believe anything other than there's something up and it's on Matt's end. Especially given that no one else has had trouble with many of the people claiming problems.

LuckyNo.5 wrote:

Jon Garrett wrote:Maybe you could explain why you feel working with the guy is OK, and why you think it's appropriate given his previous and current scams, it might help take some of the heat off?

What heat? From you Dakkanites? Man that's about as much heat as a match would provide in a blizzard. I'm sweating already...

There are 50,000 people registered on Dakka. Assuming only 10% of them have bothered reading this topic that's 5000 people assuming you cannot be trusted. Even 5% would be 2500 you can no longer hope to deal. I don't know if you sell painting and converting services, but if you do that's a big chunk of change unavailable. If it was me, I'd feel quite unpleasant having that number of folks assuming I was involved in similar shenanigans. But that's me.

I've been reading this thread with a lot of interest over the past few days. RiTides, on the one hand I really commend you for spreading awareness about a guy who's proven himself a scammer. On the other, I don't think there's much to be gained trying debate with his defenders (ignoring for a moment the remarkable similarities in their tone and writing). I think all you really can do is say "This was our experience, here are people you can contact to verify, please be forewarned". It sounds like the majority of Dakka who are paying attention have taken your advice to heart. (Myself included )

The whole "I don't trust anyone on the internet" schtick is reminiscent of another person who defended RSO, though I can't recall the name.

Vetric wrote:On the other, I don't think there's much to be gained trying debate with his defenders

I agree, but was hoping for less of a debate and more of a simple explanation as to why the large amount of evidence / testimonials pointing towards the owner of the website continuing his fraudulent activities currently does not matter to them, as contributors to the site. That was a long sentence, hopefully it makes sense

I don't have any particular desire to continue to spend my time hounding Matthew Bonder... the problem is, he seems to lie in wait and them pop back up and scam people through a different venue. It's obvious how dangerous it is for him to have a reputable-looking conversion website, making it easy for him to solicit or even be sought out for commissions.

I don't really think there's much left to be done, though, other than keep an eye on it... from what I can tell, the prices of PIs will be too high to make it worthwhile, and what would they find out that people researching Matthew post-scams haven't already? From what I've heard, he lives with his parents and has few assets (hence making this kind of scam appealing, as someone with more means would not find the proceeds of it worthwhile). There's not much to be gained from it, that I can tell, and I'm not bitter / just wanting to make his life miserable. I think he deserves justice, but the expense it would take to hire a PI is prohibitive and I don't see how that Would bring him to justice.

The most likely route for a true "in the courts" solution would be for someone who is in Texas and was scammed, who can more easily take him to court. I looked into that option a bit when helping Alpharius recover some of his items, and it really is prohibitive to do so across state lines. So that, or a pro bono lawyer who wanted to take it on as a group suit, or the like. But I don't see any of that as likely... so it seems the only real option is to keep a watchful eye on his online presence, and to make sure that he cannot establish himself as reputable while continuing his scamming "on the side".

In that vein, it's interesting to note that this thread brought out a few current / recent scam victims. Matthew is very intense about not having his clients post their problems online- this obviously helps him continue his practices, and the people who were updating here haven't in a while. If it's like when I was communicating with him, he probably threatens to not deliver at all if they continue to do so. It's a vicious cycle. Hence this thread being needed to get the word out that he's still actively doing these things... and, while I don't think there is a real way to bring him to justice that is feasible "from a distance", I will continue to keep an eye on his website and for new contributors that may not know about his practices.

It may also be worth notifying his local police again, but from what I remember of his Transaction Reports on here, that was tried without much success. It's also easier for a "first party" to do, rather than someone who is simply following his actions (as I personally have not been scammed by him). So I am not opposed to more happening to try to shut Matthew down, but from what I can see the only feasible and effective avenue that those of us not directly involved in a deal with him have is to make sure his online presence does not grow and become more reputable, masking his past actions. At least searching for his website brings up this thread as one of the top results- but not the very top. Maybe if we all type "Miniature Wargame Conversions" in replies (please don't do so, that's a joke).

I appreciate people remaining civil and helping hash this out, and again I do really appreciate the contributors to Miniature Wargame Conversions that have come on here to post. It has been very helpful to see your point of view, and I think at least a few of you have reconsidered your involvement in the site / become less active... which, given all of the evidence against Matthew Bonder, seems like a wise decision to me.

I don't see any reason for this thread to necessarily be closed, however- as, if Matthew stays true to form, likely there will be another issue in the not-too-distant future where another victim finds this thread, or perhaps finds it Before commissioning him and is able to simply update on any new tactics that he is attempting to defraud people with. And, of course, if the website ends up being used to sell things in any fashion again- but I think he's learned his lesson on that one and knows people will be watching, and will instead be using it's name "behind the scenes" to identify himself as "Matt from MWC", and lend himself credibility without exposing what he's really doing for everyone to see.

The likely hood of the local police department getting involved likely depends on whether or not they're big enough to have dedicated cyber crimes task force (most don't), as your average beat cop like myself, or even your average detective, really wouldn't even know where to begin (and likely wouldn't prioritize it very highly as a result).

If your were to notify them it would be helpful to have all the evidence proving a crime took place was organized and documented. It would also have to be an actual victim contacting them for them to take it seriously (alpharious would suffice I think, but more is always better here).

What state does RSO live in again? I can take a peak at the criminal statutes on fraud and cyber crime for it and list out the elements of the crime that the evidence would have to show so you could get all your ducks in a row.

RSO's apparently in Texas.

Isn't what he does mail fraud? Don't you just inform the postal services that you've paid money and not had items received?

His home address must be quite well known after all the people he has taken work from.

Actually on your sugestion I'm reading through the US code on mail fraud now...It's pretty damn dense reading even for criminal code.

Postal police might be a good way to go though, especially if you can get several victims together to report it.

CorvidMP wrote:
Postal police might be a good way to go though, especially if you can get several victims together to report it.

I don't think that it would be hard to do that

CorvidMP wrote:If your were to notify them it would be helpful to have all the evidence proving a crime took place was organized and documented. It would also have to be an actual victim contacting them for them to take it seriously (alpharious would suffice I think, but more is always better here).

CorvidMP wrote:Postal police might be a good way to go though, especially if you can get several victims together to report it.

I definitely think it would be worthwhile to get together a group of evidence... I was wondering about this, but wasn't sure how it could be shown to be legitimate? Wouldn't any statements by people need to be notarized and sent by mail, rather than email, to be worth anything?

RiTides wrote:I definitely think it would be worthwhile to get together a group of evidence... I was wondering about this, but wasn't sure how it could be shown to be legitimate? Wouldn't any statements by people need to be notarized and sent by mail, rather than email, to be worth anything?

Either way im surprised that this thread wasn't created with such evidence.

I mean that is why the RSO defenders are defending the allegations so easily? Even the real innocent unbiased ones have trouble believing us.

The last thing we want is to dive in a real court issue without backup and be dismissed, which would add to RSO's accountability.... *shudders