Calling All Lawyers: Stopping Tailbuyer Abuse in the Community

[Seatan]

I hope that people also take into consideration some of the issues tailmakers have with some clients, as well.

I'm not defending shoddy tailmakers, nor am I complaining (because all my clients are a dream to work with ), just playing Devil's Advocate.

Buying art - which custom tails essentially are - can be incredibly subjective. As a culture, we are so accustomed to buying manufactured items that show no touch of a human hand, and can be surprised when we get something that shows the hand of the maker. Handcrafted items are exactly that - handcrafted - and the item will show that.

If the tail is defective, it is incumbent upon the tailmaker to make it right. Period. But then again, customers need to do their research! If they did, no one in their right mind would throw a penny at some of these 'popular' tailmakers! Do your homework! Caveat emptor... Let the buyer beware.

Pearlie, I agree totally. I think that should be something listed in the contract in order to protect the tail maker. Because you are EXACTLY right. And it goes 100% with what I am trying to say: That if we created contracts like real businesses do, all of these things would be covered and BOTH sides would be protected. Tailmakers from buyers that don't understand what they are getting and buyers from tail makers who don't know how to do the things they are promising.

[SeaGlass Siren]

That's a lot of work!

Good luck with that.

yeah. it's complicated. but it's doable. theres a way for the contract to protect the tailmaker and the purchaser.

[SeaGlass Siren]

i finished two pages of the second schedule.


SCHEDULE 2
Agreement General Terms and Conditions

1)GOODS AND SERVICES TAXES
NOTE FROM SEAGLASS: For this part you’ll need a lawyer as taxes differ from country to country, so are the laws of that country.
2)TAIL MATERIALS
a) The Vendor acknowledges silicone and neoprene should be smoothly poured and properly cured, and damages made to the tail should be amended accordingly.

b) The Vendor shall have the right, in its discretion, to make minor deviations from the plans and specifications and to substitute other material for that provided for, provided that such material is of a quality equal to or better than the material in the plans and specifications.

c) The Purchaser acknowledges that variations in colours, shades of colours, patterns, and textures of materials may occur in finishing materials including but not limited to silicone, neoprene, latex, fabric, paint, glitters, and sequins, and the Purchaser agrees that the Vendor is not responsible for such variations. Furthermore, the Purchaser acknowledges that tails are handcrafted and it is normal for paint to fade with prolonged use and frequent wear, and the Purchaser agrees that the Vendor shall not be responsible for any such fading. Materials and colours will be as close as possible but not necessarily identical to the vendors samples.

3)EXTRAS/OPTIONS/COLOURS
a) Any options, extras, or colours specifically ordered or chosen by the Purchaser and supplied by the Vendor will be paid for by the Purchaser at the time of signing a written request for the said work prior to the performance of said work or as may otherwise be agreed upon in writing. Once any such options, extras, or colours are ordered or chosen by the Purchaser, the Purchaser shall not be entitled to cancel or amend the order or choice.
b) The Purchaser acknowledges that all colour and finish selections must be completed within the times frames established by the Vendor at the time of execution of this Agreement failing which the Vendor may at its discretion choose any colours or finishes necessary to complete the tail making schedule.
c) The Purchaser agrees that if any option and/or upgrade ordered by the Purchaser is not reasonably available during tail making so that the Vendor, by seeking to obtain it, would be delayed in the construction of the Tail, the Vendor agrees to notify the Purchaser and, if reasonably possible in the opinion of the vendor, provide the Purchaser with an opportunity to make an alternative selection within such time frame as the Vendor shall determine. If at the Due Date, for any reason any option and/or upgrade has been omitted, the vendor at its option shall be entitled to install the option and/or upgrade after the Due Date or to credit the Purchaser on the Due Date with the amount the Purchaser paid for such option and/or upgrade or to refund such amount subsequent to the Due Date, and the Vendor’s liability shall in any event be limited to the said amount.

4)DUE DATE
a) The Purchaser shall receive the Tail and close the transaction on the First Tentative Due Date (as defined in the Statement of Critical Dates provided by the Vendor as part of the [Company name] Addendum) or such extended or accelerated date that the Tail is substantially completed by the Vendor for use by the Purchaser in accordance with the terms of this Agreement including, without limitation, the [Company name] Addendum (the “Due Date”).

5)WARRANTY
NOTE FROM SEAGLASS: This depends if your company chooses to have warranty, and what you want to include in the warranty. In any case, see below for what you should include in the agreement.
a) The Purchaser acknowledges that
(i) any defects covered in the warranties listed by the vendor shall be reported immediately in writing; the vendor shall only be obligated to repair defects actually covered in the warranties and for which it is responsible. Any applicable limitation periods shall continue to run notwithstanding any work which may be undertaken to remedy the defect;
(ii) the Vendor shall provide the Purchaser with a Tail Care Guide containing details of the warranties and applicable care and maintenance requirements;
(iii) all remedies available to the Purchaser are deemed to exclude:
(1) Damages for mental distress, loss of enjoyment, or loss of a personal preference or personal choice;
(2) Punitive and/or exemplary damages; and
(3) Substantial indemnity costs (you might want to run this over with an actual lawyer)

6)UPDATED PHOTOGRAPHS AND CONTACT
a) The Vendor shall remain in contact with the Purchaser with the dates to be established by the Vendor listed in the Vendor Addendum to deliver updates on the Tail.

7)TIME OF THE ESSENCE
a) Time shall in all respects be of the essence of this Agreement provided that if any date established by or in accordance with this Agreement or any date of termination of a period of time set forth to referred to in this Agreement should fall upon a day on which the Vendor cannot operate their business then such date shall be deemed to be the next following day on which the said Vendor can continue business.

8)HEADINGS
a) Paragraph headings are for identification purposes only and are not to be construed as limiting the content of the paragraphs. This Schedule and the Agreement to which it is attached shall be read with such changes in number and gender as may be required by the context.

[SeaGlass Siren]

ok so i have like 11 pages. i have 10 more pages to go of the vendor's addendum and tentative due dates.

let me know if anyone wants to see the full doc

[PearlieMae]

Tl;dr.

I'm an artist, not a "vendor". I don't sell a product, I create art on commission.

If you want a tail I make, you might have to wait until it's done. It's done when it's done.

Extenuating circumstances happen all the time. Deal with it.

I'll update when I can. I answer every email and post images when I can.

If you want to pinch pennies, there are plenty of tailmakers less expensive than me.

If you want to hold my fins to the fire and expect me to sign some "contract", you can swim on by.

READ my FAQ. READ my Payment page. It's all spelled out, simply. I accept PayPal and they have protection plans for both buyer and seller.

If I sound arrogant, sorry, but mine is a new and evolving business. I can't make the jump to doing to full time just yet, so I have to keep my day job. There may be setbacks. If that's not your cup of tea, I'm sure Mertailor will take your money, because he's all about volume sales. He told me himself.

And no, you just can't go out and get a loan like it's a loaf of bread.

I'm sorry for every person who has been screwed over by an unscrupulous tail maker/scammer, and hope they all get their money back for shitty tails or no tails at all. But to require tailmakers to agree to terms that are untenable just isn't going to happen. You can't make them. The only way to get a good product is to do your research, dig into reviews, choose well, and don't cheap out and expect high quality.

I'm trying to build a reputation as a quality tailmaker, and you can ask anyone who has placed an order with me whether or not I have good communication and customer service. Hell, I've even given away my entire process on this very website and now there are many mers making their own tails using my process when I could have kept it all to myself.

So, am I on a tear? Yeah, maybe. Will I have to come back and apologize for some of this? Probably. But I am offended by a lot of these proposals in that it's so heavily one sided.

[deepblue]

*applause*
Pearlie, you make perfect sense, I hope you don't apologize. Honesty is needed in this conversation, and you brought it from a tail maker's perspective.

[AniaR]

Tl;dr.

I'm an artist, not a "vendor". I don't sell a product, I create art on commission.

If you want a tail I make, you might have to wait until it's done. It's done when it's done.

Extenuating circumstances happen all the time. Deal with it.

I'll update when I can. I answer every email and post images when I can.

If you want to pinch pennies, there are plenty of tailmakers less expensive than me.

If you want to hold my fins to the fire and expect me to sign some "contract", you can swim on by.

READ my FAQ. READ my Payment page. It's all spelled out, simply. I accept PayPal and they have protection plans for both buyer and seller.

If I sound arrogant, sorry, but mine is a new and evolving business. I can't make the jump to doing to full time just yet, so I have to keep my day job. There may be setbacks. If that's not your cup of tea, I'm sure Mertailor will take your money, because he's all about volume sales. He told me himself.

And no, you just can't go out and get a loan like it's a loaf of bread.

I'm sorry for every person who has been screwed over by an unscrupulous tail maker/scammer, and hope they all get their money back for shitty tails or no tails at all. But to require tailmakers to agree to terms that are untenable just isn't going to happen. You can't make them. The only way to get a good product is to do your research, dig into reviews, choose well, and don't cheap out and expect high quality.

I'm trying to build a reputation as a quality tailmaker, and you can ask anyone who has placed an order with me whether or not I have good communication and customer service. Hell, I've even given away my entire process on this very website and now there are many mers making their own tails using my process when I could have kept it all to myself.

So, am I on a tear? Yeah, maybe. Will I have to come back and apologize for some of this? Probably. But I am offended by a lot of these proposals in that it's so heavily one sided.

*sings in the style of hozier* aaaamen! Aaaamen! Take me to church!

3 well known tail makers actually have messaged me about this thread thanking me for saying something. They found it insulting and ignorant .

Why can't we just say what the real issue is here? Mertailor who is a Russian roulette when it comes to tails but people keep throwing Money at him and hell never in a million years sign anything like this... And tail makers who bite off way more than they can chew cuz they see mertailor getting rich and they think they can get rich too while magically maintaining better quality, more output, non stop emails, and it just never ever ever works.

Let's stop acting like the problem is with anyone else. Its not like merbellas or finfolk lie about their wait times, refuse to fix issues, delay for no reason at all, change their TOS every other day, call clients liars, or steal money.

I'm sorry people can't handle the fact the best tails on the market take a long wait times and no time for hand holding. If you can't handle it take a chance on someone else but don't freak out when you decide to save a few bucks on someone with a horrible reputation.

[SeaGlass Siren]

Tl;dr.

I'm an artist, not a "vendor". I don't sell a product, I create art on commission.

If you want a tail I make, you might have to wait until it's done. It's done when it's done.

Extenuating circumstances happen all the time. Deal with it.

I'll update when I can. I answer every email and post images when I can.

If you want to pinch pennies, there are plenty of tailmakers less expensive than me.

If you want to hold my fins to the fire and expect me to sign some "contract", you can swim on by.

READ my FAQ. READ my Payment page. It's all spelled out, simply. I accept PayPal and they have protection plans for both buyer and seller.

If I sound arrogant, sorry, but mine is a new and evolving business. I can't make the jump to doing to full time just yet, so I have to keep my day job. There may be setbacks. If that's not your cup of tea, I'm sure Mertailor will take your money, because he's all about volume sales. He told me himself.

And no, you just can't go out and get a loan like it's a loaf of bread.

I'm sorry for every person who has been screwed over by an unscrupulous tail maker/scammer, and hope they all get their money back for shitty tails or no tails at all. But to require tailmakers to agree to terms that are untenable just isn't going to happen. You can't make them. The only way to get a good product is to do your research, dig into reviews, choose well, and don't cheap out and expect high quality.

I'm trying to build a reputation as a quality tailmaker, and you can ask anyone who has placed an order with me whether or not I have good communication and customer service. Hell, I've even given away my entire process on this very website and now there are many mers making their own tails using my process when I could have kept it all to myself.

So, am I on a tear? Yeah, maybe. Will I have to come back and apologize for some of this? Probably. But I am offended by a lot of these proposals in that it's so heavily one sided.

Honestly it's all legal wording I don't agree with either. I did put a disclaimer though that you don't have to follow through with it as I'm not actually a lawyer and it's completely up to you. But it's up here if anyone decides to use it.
Every company has a toas so that they're covered and don't get screwed over by people. There really is a fine line w tail making as an art and a business . I don't have a contract when I sell art either but if I ever decide to do this on a ful time basis I'd rather have some sort of contract done up.

its ok pearlie I totally understand your anger.

[AniaR]

Yeah sorry sea glass I wasn't trying to undermine your hard work good on you for doing it

[SeaGlass Siren]

also i forgot to add the rest of the schedules in last night so now that i'm reading the whole thread over, it really does look one sided so i'm super sorry if it seems that way.

another disclaimer: a reminder that you should seek legal counsel from someone who is actually a lawyer. this is what i've seen from contracts and this is just a suggestion. if you don't agree with it, cool. you can always take it and change things around so it suits you.


SCHEDULE 3

FEATURES

[COMPANY NAME: ITEMS BEING ORDERED]

Note from SeaGlass: Here is where you go crazy with tail and/or accessory features and all the amazing stuff it has depending on what the purchaser ordered. Recommended that the tail maker provides FULL NAMES OF MATERIALS they will be working with here, and what the purchaser will be receiving such as “smooth seams” or “seamless tail”… any special features they’re getting with the tail and that the add ons are made out of, what kind of scales you will have, stuff like that. Depending how many features you have, this page can end up a few pages long, or only half a page. It's pretty cumbersome and redundant if you already have an FAQ on what kind of features your tail has but... *sigh* this is to confirm the purchaser has read everything over and by signing this page they are absolutely certain of what they are getting, no questions asked.

Initials of the buyer needs to be at the bottom of the page.


Initials here



SCHEDULE 4
TAIL DESIGN AND PURCHASER ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
1)DESIGN:

Company to Insert Tail Design here in the above space.


2)PURCHASER ACKNOWLEDGEMENT:

Initials here	UNAVAILABILITY OF MATERIALS: All selections made are from the Vendor’s standard and upgrade samples. In the event of unforeseen unavailability and/or discontinuation of materials, the Purchaser shall be provided written notice of a reselection period of [NUMBER OF DAYS] from the time of receipt from the Vendor. If the Purchaser is unable and/or willing to exercise their right of reselection, the vendor shall select and install the items deemed of equal quality as necessary and the purchaser shall deem all selections acceptable.
Initials here	LATE CHANGE REQUEST(S): All selection documents, once submitted to the Vendor shall be deemed final and shall not be changed by the Purchaser. Should further requests be made by the Purchaser, it will be at the sole option of the Vendor. Should the request be accommodated, it will be subject to a labour fee of [COST]. note: most of the time i have seen the tail maker add extra things without a fee so this part is completely optional.
Initials here	COLOUR VARIATION: Variations in colours, shades of colours, and textures of materials may occur in finishing materials such as silicone, neoprene, latex, glitter, sequins, and paint. Material will be as close as possible but not necessarily identical to the sample image displayed due to variances in manufacturing.
Initials here	SILICONE/LATEX: Is any here an expert on any of these products who would like to add to this section?
Initials here	NEOPRENE:
Initials here	FABRIC:
Initials here	GLITTER:
Initials here	SEQUINS:
Initials here	MONOFIN:
Initials here	All upgrades, options, and prices are subject to approval by [COMPANY NAME]. I acknowledge that i have verified the accuracy of all colour selection codes/names/ types etc, indicated on the sales order. [COMPANY NAME] is not responsible should the information not record the selection of the purchaser correctly. This choice is irrevocable and authorizes [COMPANY NAME] to create. note: this part is highly questionable because i think it should be recorded and it's someone's tail.. but, i added it in anyway. you can remove it.

I understand and accept the disclaimers listed above.

Item(s) Ordered: ________________________
Purchaser Name: ________________________
Purchaser’s Signature: ________________________

Date: ________________________


SCHEDULE 5

Colours and Options

1) The Purchaser acknowledges the requirements for selecting colours, upgrades, and/or extras as further defined in Schedule 2, Paragraph 3.

2) The Purchaser acknowledges that due to the status of construction of the Tail, the range of upgrades and extras may be limited and may be subject to the Vendor determining, in its absolute discretion, what can or cannot be made available.

3) The Purchaser acknowledges that the responsibility for reviewing all information provided by the Vendor is incumbent upon the Purchaser.


Purchaser Name: ________________________
Purchaser’s Signature: ________________________


SCHEDULE 6

SAFETY AND USAGE


Upon receipt of the Tail, the Vendor is not responsible for any drowning related accidents, or death due to misuse of the Tail, and as such will not accept refunds.
Proper care and safe usage will be included as part of the Tail Care Guide.
NOTE FROM SEAGLASS: I’m honestly not sure what else to include in this section. if anyone has anything they want to add, be my guest.

[SeaGlass Siren]

Yeah sorry sea glass I wasn't trying to undermine your hard work good on you for doing it

it's all good raina (y)

[Seatan]

Tl;dr.

I'm an artist, not a "vendor". I don't sell a product, I create art on commission.

If you want a tail I make, you might have to wait until it's done. It's done when it's done.

Extenuating circumstances happen all the time. Deal with it.

I'll update when I can. I answer every email and post images when I can.

If you want to pinch pennies, there are plenty of tailmakers less expensive than me.

If you want to hold my fins to the fire and expect me to sign some "contract", you can swim on by.

READ my FAQ. READ my Payment page. It's all spelled out, simply. I accept PayPal and they have protection plans for both buyer and seller.

If I sound arrogant, sorry, but mine is a new and evolving business. I can't make the jump to doing to full time just yet, so I have to keep my day job. There may be setbacks. If that's not your cup of tea, I'm sure Mertailor will take your money, because he's all about volume sales. He told me himself.

And no, you just can't go out and get a loan like it's a loaf of bread.

I'm sorry for every person who has been screwed over by an unscrupulous tail maker/scammer, and hope they all get their money back for shitty tails or no tails at all. But to require tailmakers to agree to terms that are untenable just isn't going to happen. You can't make them. The only way to get a good product is to do your research, dig into reviews, choose well, and don't cheap out and expect high quality.

I'm trying to build a reputation as a quality tailmaker, and you can ask anyone who has placed an order with me whether or not I have good communication and customer service. Hell, I've even given away my entire process on this very website and now there are many mers making their own tails using my process when I could have kept it all to myself.

So, am I on a tear? Yeah, maybe. Will I have to come back and apologize for some of this? Probably. But I am offended by a lot of these proposals in that it's so heavily one sided.

See, I'm probably going to have to come back and apologize too because I am SO angry at this forum right now, and I know that posting while pissed doesn't lead to good things, but I wonder if people even HEAR what I am saying?!?!?! What I am SAYING is that anything that is PROMISED should be given. Period. End of story. Pearlie, you just stated that you tell your buyers exactly what they are gonna get: that you let them know there might be delays and that you as an artist do this and that--AND THAT IS 100% FINE. BECAUSE THAT IS WHAT YOU SAID YOU WOULD DO. AND THAT IS WHAT WOULD BE IN *YOUR* CONTRACT!!! This whole thread has NOTHING to do with people who do EXACTLY what they say they will and EVERYTHING to do with tail makers who promise a bunch of shit and don't come through. THEY are the ones who need to be stopped! I know, for example, that if you get a Merbella's tail that you will likely have a year or so of wait time. SO I CHOOSE NOT TO BUY A MERBELLA'S TAIL. That is MY choice as a consumer because Raven doesn't pretend she'll get a tail to me next month and then make me wait a YEAR when she promised a month. You KNOW going into it that you will have a wait. So as a consumer I am able to choose NOT to purchase a tail from her. She is AMAZING, but the wait would drive me nuts. Unfortunately the last time I checked the tail makers that really give you an honest lowdown are in the minority---it seems like every other new tail maker these days ends up screwing people over. And THOSE are the people--the ones who are making promises they CAN'T KEEP that need to be held to a certain standard. And I am tired of the fact that you can't DARE to imply that the great and holy tail makers need to meet any certain standards lest you get smacked on the back of the hand by people. Raina, how about you let Raven talk for herself if she wants to talk? I'm guessing that it's NOT WORTH HER TIME since she is once of the people who does what she says and people have the freedom to choose if they want to buy from her if they wish. This thread doesn't even really apply to her. It's a way to try and protect INNOCENT PEOPLE who have been scammed over and over. But how dare we bring it up. Also, Pearlie, you are one of my favorite people in the world, but I don't see how you can go from being so ANGRY at these terrible tail makers who rip people off to being angry at the idea that all tail makers need to have a LEGAL responsibility to give people what they promise. It's like people are taking the idea personally, when all anyone is trying to do is protect people from getting SCREWED.

So yeah I'll probably have to come back and apologize to so we can be all nicey nice or whatever--but right now I feel like this whole forum is being really selfish, worrying about how the idea of coming up with a legal contract might affect them when, in truth, you have 100% ability to turn people away if they have demands that you're not interested in meeting and this contract might very well HELP people who are dealing with scammers. It's not an attack on honest tail makers--it's a belief that people should GET what they PAID MONEY for and were PROMISED. But heaven forbid we try and help people out by giving them some idea of a contractual, legal structure that might help keep them from being royally screwed over.

[Seatan]

also i forgot to add the rest of the schedules in last night so now that i'm reading the whole thread over, it really does look one sided so i'm super sorry if it seems that way.
.

It doesn't look one sided, SeaGlass. You are trying to help people, and I think you have done an amazing job. No tail maker has to sign any contract they don't want to, and it is very helpful to people to have some idea of what a contract could look like. Ignore haters and focus on the fact that having an idea of what a tail buying contract could look like might save someone's hard earned money in the future and make their tail dream come true.

[Seatan]

*sings in the style of hozier* aaaamen! Aaaamen! Take me to church!

3 well known tail makers actually have messaged me about this thread thanking me for saying something. They found it insulting and ignorant .

Why can't we just say what the real issue is here? Mertailor who is a Russian roulette when it comes to tails but people keep throwing Money at him and hell never in a million years sign anything like this... And tail makers who bite off way more than they can chew cuz they see mertailor getting rich and they think they can get rich too while magically maintaining better quality, more output, non stop emails, and it just never ever ever works.

Let's stop acting like the problem is with anyone else. Its not like merbellas or finfolk lie about their wait times, refuse to fix issues, delay for no reason at all, change their TOS every other day, call clients liars, or steal money.

I'm sorry people can't handle the fact the best tails on the market take a long wait times and no time for hand holding. If you can't handle it take a chance on someone else but don't freak out when you decide to save a few bucks on someone with a horrible reputation.

CALLING THREE WELL KNOWN TAILMAKERS: Why don't you contact me, who started this thread, or SeaGlass, who is writing the contract if you have some major complaint? Raina is awesome, but she does NOT speak for this entire community! I would like to hear from YOU instead of from Raina telling me that SHE has been contacted, like somehow we are a less important part of this community and she is the telephone to the mermaid world--not true! Everyone on this forum is equally as mermaid as Raina and deserves to hear things directly, not second hand. I find it pretty "insulting and ignorant" to call someone "insullting and ignorant" behind their back to someone they don't even know rather than to their face.

And Raina, I'm sorry that you feel you have to defend Raven at every single moment of the day when she doesn't need any defending. This isn't an attack on Raven. It was never an attack on Raven! It's in response to the posts where YOU and everyone else here who "sings hosier" and crap about tail makers on another post RIPPED PEOPLE APART for the HORRIBLE WAY they treated customers and mooned over how sorry you were that this happens. This is also not against Mertailor. I get it--you hate Eric. The guy is an ass. But there are SO MANY MORE people who rip people off with tail making than Eric. This entire thread is about people GETTING WHAT THEY ARE PROMISED. It is NOT about Merbella's. It is NOT about Mertailor. It is about giving people who are buying tails from new tail makers an understanding of what a contract to protect BOTH SIDES could look like. And I am SICK of being smacked down.

EDIT: You know what, I'm taking a few days off. I feel SO disrespected by this whole thread, especially the "roundabout behind the back" talk from whoever these three well known tail makers are. I am not represented by someone else. I am a mermaid myself. If anyone ever has anything to say to me, please, say it to ME, don't say it to someone else for them to present to the mermaid world second hand. I have no representative but myself. So if you want to say how INSULTING and IGNORANT I am, say it to ME, not to RAINA.

[AniaR]

I can't even with you honestly. Good luck with this. It'll never happen or work and all you do is end up insulting people and alienating. You wonder why the tail makers don't post? This crap right here. Entitled mermaids who think they know how to run a tail making business and feel the need to constantly express how it could be better . I'm not defending anyone, I'm referencing the tail makers I know. Not sure if you noticed but I have loads of opinions from being around since before 95% of tail makers started. Mess off with suggesting I'm talking on others people behalf. These are my words, my thoughts. Its like you think claiming that will some how defeat all my points.

Peace out.

[Seatan]

I can't even with you honestly. Good luck with this. It'll never happen or work and all you do is end up insulting people and alienating. You wonder why the tail makers don't post? This crap right here. Entitled mermaids who think they know how to run a tail making business and feel the need to constantly express how it could be better . I'm not defending anyone, I'm referencing the tail makers I know. Not sure if you noticed but I have loads of opinions from being around since before 95% of tail makers started. Mess off with suggesting I'm talking on others people behalf. These are my words, my thoughts. Its like you think claiming that will some how defeat all my points.



Peace out.

YOU are the one who came on representing OTHER people and claimed someone else said that I was "ignorant and insulting." You act as if you own this forum when you are really NO different from the rest of us! You are only ONE little mermaid in this community. You are NOT more important than anyone else. What makes you feel as if when people say something to you, they want you to come on and post it PUBLICLY in a forum? Don't you think if those three people we just have to GUESS at who they were wanted to actually say that to me that they would have done so themselves? What gives YOU the right to speak on the behalf of others, calling people names? YOU were the one who came on here and said something flat out insulting--not claiming it as your own but as representative of "three different tail makers." Well guess what? That HURTS people, Raina. No one wants to hear how they are being talked about behind their backs and left to GUESS who these people are, wondering if they are friends of theirs who are always nice to their face then go and say this behind their backs. Don't you see how HURTFUL saying things like that is? Call me entitled--fine--you are saying THAT yourself. I feel the same way about you sometimes. But please don't TELL ME what OTHERS have said then expect that not to hurt!

So just so you know, I am crying right now NOT because of ANYTHING to do with this thread but rather because I have no idea who might have said these hurtful things and whether or not my friends are truly my friends.

[Starfrit]

... What the hell happened here? I feel like a fairly basic thread exploded into needless drama and ridiculous overreactions...

[Seatan]

A note to the good tail makers out there, especially you Pearlie who I never meant to offend: I am really sorry that this thread went the direction it did. I'm not even sure how it happened. I guess it was just a case of what I was saying not coming off like I meant. All I intended was to try and protect the people who get hurt so badly all the time and it took such a horrible turn for the worst. I didn't mean to attack anyone--I was just trying to promote us working together to make sure that people don't get hurt in the future. I am not against tail makers--I want tail makers to be protected, too! I want everyone to have AMAZING tail buying AND selling experiences, and I just don't want to have to read anymore stories where people spent their life savings on something and didn't get what they were promised. That was ALL that was intended by this thread: to try and protect people from getting hurt. Instead just a lot of people ended up getting feelings hurt, myself included. Not at all what I wanted. The truth is we probably can't protect people, but it makes me feel so helpless to watch people get ripped off by people that I wanted to try. And that was really all I intended with this post.

[Lotus the Mermaid]

I think everyone had good intentions with what they were posting. That's what matters in the grand scheme of things, in my opinion. Things were worded badly and some things were said that shouldn't have been said, but that happens all the time. Especially, online. I think that a lot of good came out of this thread and the discussions that were made. I think we mers tend to avoid serious issues like this for fear of hurting feelings or ruining reputations. I think it's good to talk about them every once in a while. So yeah! Go team~

[Cordelia]

That if we created contracts like real businesses do, all of these things would be covered and BOTH sides would be protected.

One of the problems that I am seeing here, is the "we" in this statement/argument. "We" cannot create a contract for a business to use. It is up to the business owners and their legal teams to provide a contract. Contracts that are drawn up would have to adhere to the laws within their state/country, which is why they would have to personally have a lawyer draft them. Many people starting small (or hobby) businesses may not be able to afford hiring a lawyer. This is something that, as their business grows, they will eventually want to look into.

I don't really see what there is to get all that upset about. Does it suck when someone posts about their terrible experience with ordering a tail? You bet! But as it has been stated before, it is up to the customer to do their research.

And THOSE are the people--the ones who are making promises they CAN'T KEEP that need to be held to a certain standard.

I apologize for adding so many quotes, but while reading through this particular post, the idea of taking a car in to a shitty mechanic popped into my head. There are certain - not small - businesses that I will avoid like the plague in my area for a variety of reasons, the fact that I know a great mechanic not withstanding. The problem in the tail-making world is not a problem that is exclusive to it, nor should it be treated as such.

I think that, as it has been stated before, Mernetwork has a great resource for people to research tail makers: the review section. There are also many other threads and discussions that can provide additional information on some of the lesser known tail makers, whether they are brand new or older and out of the game.

To SeaGlass Siren: I bow to your research skills! While I don't think that we can draw up a contract for a business, the information you are providing can help those who are thinking of starting up their own company and hoping to make it their full-time business. There may be information in those drafts that they just didn't think about from a business owner's perspective, or services they did not think of providing for their potential customers.