CGL Speculation #7 Options

[Fuchs]

This can certainly be considered a "witchhunt" if guilt is cast on anyone who appears to support Coleman for any reason. Righteous anger has a way of misplacing itself.

There's a difference between casting guilt on people for supporting Coleman, and questioning their judgement for supporting Coleman staying involved with CGL.

[Method]

In deed.

[Fuchs]

And of course there are moral and ethical issues with supporting someone who has co-mingled over 700K while authors and partner firms are not paid their due.

[Method]

Guess it depends on your definition of support. You can support them with the expectaion that they change their ways.

[lehesu]

And of course there are moral and ethical issues with supporting someone who has co-mingled over 700K while authors and partner firms are not paid their due.

And some people would say that there are moral and ethical issues with not doing everything you can, no matter how unpleasant, to try and make it right to those individuals.

[Fuchs]

And some people would say that there are moral and ethical issues with not doing everything you can, no matter how unpleasant, to try and make it right to those individuals.

Yeah, like selling your house, or taking a loan with it as collateral to pay back the money you took. Or forcing your partner do either to pay those individuals.

[darthmord]

And some people would say that there are moral and ethical issues with not doing everything you can, no matter how unpleasant, to try and make it right to those individuals.

I would be one of those people. I make a mistake, I own up to it in its entirety regardless of the consequences to myself. Why?

Because I was raised that doing so is the honorable and right thing to do. To do anything less was to disgrace myself, my associates, and my family.

It does bother me to see people shirk the rules, break laws, violate customs, etc and get paid for it or otherwise benefit from such actions while those who do the right thing get slapped down.

[MJBurrage]

Again it needs to be understood that L. L. Coleman cannot be punished the way some people want without destroying IMR/CGL in an ownership fight.

If R. Bills wants to save his company, and its licenses with Topps, he has to reach an amicable agreement with Coleman that also satisfies Topps. However we feel about Coleman that fact will not change.

There is a vast range in-between "letting Colman get away with it" and "send him to prison now while seizing his house". Being accused of being in Coleman's camp merely for acknowledging that there are shades of grey, not just black and white is annoying.

[emouse]

This can certainly be considered a "witchhunt" if guilt is cast on anyone who appears to support Coleman for any reason. Righteous anger has a way of misplacing itself.

It's possible to support someone who has reformed without condoning what they've done before.

Confirming that LLC has reformed and made up for past deeds will require watching the books in a way that wasn't being, but should have been done before.

Whether or not LLC does reform and make right, IMR has to do the same for the freelancers.

So far IMR has taken a step in the right direction, but they still have a long way to go.

[emouse]

Again it needs to be understood that L. L. Coleman cannot be punished the way some people want without destroying IMR/CGL in an ownership fight.

I mentioned it a while back. The 'easiest' way to remove LLC is probably, once his obligation gets paid down enough, to declare the remaining sum as 'payment' for his share of the company, both removing his obligation and his ownership role at the same time.

However, doing that will probably take time and require LLC's cooperation.

[Kid Chameleon]

Of course. But as I laid out above - the letter does not succeed in increasing trust and confidence where it needed to. Those who trust Randall Bills based on such a claim they can't verify nor quantify for lack of names would likely have trusted him anyway without the claim, since trust in him and his judgement is needed to trust the "titans" claim without any names. But those who do not trust Randall Bills (that much) will not start to trust him (more) based on the "titans" claim. Mabye they'll trust him less for the lack of proof for said claim, and the questions it rises. So, it was a bad move.

Did you poll all the freelancers or just some?

[Fuchs]

Did you poll all the freelancers or just some?

What for? A claim that cannot be verified cannot serve to increase trust in the one who makes it. That's simple logic. If you trust Randall because of something he says which you have to trust him to believe it... well, it all means you trust Randall because you trust Randall.

If you trust Randall beause he stated something which you could verify, then that's a different story. Hence why naming someone, or having them publically stating their support, would have helped build trust. And why the lack of such confirmation makes one question the claim itself, if one does not already trust Randall.

[DireRadiant]

Trust and verification principles applied in a non uniform manner can be viewed as discriminatory.

[lehesu]

Again it needs to be understood that L. L. Coleman cannot be punished the way some people want without destroying IMR/CGL in an ownership fight.

If R. Bills wants to save his company, and its licenses with Topps, he has to reach an amicable agreement with Coleman that also satisfies Topps. However we feel about Coleman that fact will not change.

There is a vast range in-between "letting Colman get away with it" and "send him to prison now while seizing his house". Being accused of being in Coleman's camp merely for acknowledging that there are shades of grey, not just black and white is annoying.

This.

LLC does not appear willing or able to make the immediate restitution that a bunch of people on this forum think he should. Given how he has managed to position himself in relationship to the company, it seems the only way to make things "right" requires working with him for the foreseeable future, no matter how unpleasant. The people calling the shots are in the untenable position of being expected to redress wrongs AND pursue justice in regards to internal theft. It doesn't appear, to me, that you can have your cake and eat it too.

[Fuchs]

Trust and verification principles applied in a non uniform manner can be viewed as discriminatory.

And that's why you verify stuff. Like the co-mingling, which was confirmed. And the amount co-mingled - which was pretty much confirmed as well. And the fact that people went unpaid, which was confirmed as well through multiple sources.

And then you look at the picture verified information gives, and check how much or little the unverified claims from everyone fit in.

Contrary to some opinions you don't need god himself to confirm that Coleman is the anti-christ and CGL made up from his acolytes to distrust either's character or judgement - what we do know what he did and did not (paying, mostly) is enough to justify that.

[Fuchs]

This.

LLC does not appear willing or able to make the immediate restitution that a bunch of people on this forum think he should. Given how he has managed to position himself in relationship to the company, it seems the only way to make things "right" requires working with him for the foreseeable future, no matter how unpleasant. The people calling the shots are in the untenable position of being expected to redress wrongs AND pursue justice in regards to internal theft. It doesn't appear, to me, that you can have your cake and eat it too.

Depends on the cake. You can redress wrongs (getting money to pay the debts) and pursue justice (make sure Coleman does not profit from his co-mingling) by forcing him to pay everything he took back (or pay everything he owns, if it's not enough to cover the debts), even if it means selling his house at a loss.

[lehesu]

Depends on the cake. You can redress wrongs (getting money to pay the debts) and pursue justice (make sure Coleman does not profit from his co-mingling) by forcing him to pay everything he took back (or pay everything he owns, if it's not enough to cover the debts), even if it means selling his house at a loss.

You show me a viable strategy for forcing LLC to pay without destroying the company, and I might buy this argument. I wouldn't expect TPTB to destroy themselves in an act of sublime justice (if this is even what we really want), so we have to go with the next best alternative, as distasteful as it is.

[DireRadiant]

And that's why you verify stuff. Like the co-mingling, which was confirmed. And the amount co-mingled - which was pretty much confirmed as well. And the fact that people went unpaid, which was confirmed as well through multiple sources.

And then you look at the picture verified information gives, and check how much or little the unverified claims from everyone fit in.

Contrary to some opinions you don't need god himself to confirm that Coleman is the anti-christ and CGL made up from his acolytes to distrust either's character or judgement - what we do know what he did and did not (paying, mostly) is enough to justify that.

Are you claiming I'm an acolyte of the anti christ because you disagree with my statement?

In context that appears to be what you are doing.

[Ancient History]

You show me a viable strategy for forcing LLC to pay without destroying the company, and I might buy this argument. I wouldn't expect TPTB to destroy themselves in an act of sublime justice (if this is even what we really want), so we have to go with the next best alternative, as distasteful as it is.

Oh, I like a challenge.

Step 1) Randall Forces Loren Out
Here's the dilly-oh - Randall, more than Loren, has the best relationship with everybody in the company. If Randall had the chutzpah to go up to him and say "You're my friend, you'll always be my friend, but you've screwed up bad and you need to step down, I think we can assuage the other owners by giving them your controlling interest in the company." it would have been the morally and economically correct thing to do. Because Randall could literally freeze the company's operations; he has a better relationship with everybody in the company, and the freelancers, than Loren ever had, and Loren can't do shit on his own.

Yes, Loren can try to rip the company apart at that point, but then it would be Loren & Heather Coleman against all the other owners.

Step 2) IMR sells Loren's ownership to cover its debts.
And yea gods does it have a lot of debts. Freelancers, printers, royalties to Topps - but hey, they've got an asset (shares) and they could at least hit the most immediate debts, and then work out a schedule for paying the others off in good time.

Step 3) IMR assures this shit never happens again.
Stricter limitations on who has access to the account, actual bookkeeping practices instituted and followed, more stringent attention to the terms of contracts and accounts payable.

Step 4) A flurry of releases.
Even selling off large chunks of ownership is probably not going to be sufficient to handle all of IMR's debts, so you're probably looking at a flurry of quick releases of e-books and the like to generate some immediate cash in order to cover until, say, printers are paid and the books they're sitting on are shipped.


But that will never happen, because Randall Bills decided his friendship with Loren Coleman was more important than making the difficult but correct decision that it would be better to force Loren out of the company he helped found before he ran it completely into the ground.

[Method]

Is there any evidence that some of things (esp 2, 3&4) are not being done? I think we know that #1 is off the table but how do we know for sure they aren't considering the other options?

[Ancient History]

My understanding of the situation is that despite negotiations to Loren giving up at least some of his ownership to cover at least part of his debt, he has so far refused to do so (and there are other, stranger claims about the ownership issues out there to boot). So #2 is not even really an option on the table at this point. They'd make more money by floating20-year junk bonds aimed at SR and BT fans.

#3 is sortof kindof half-assedly being done - at least they've got some controls on the finances now, even if they're probably still not keeping track of sales and they have Tara, Ghost help us, mailing out the LEs - but it's like shutting the barn door after the cows have escaped, but with the crazy insane stud bull locked inside with a few helpless calves. To whit, Loren is still involved with company operations - and Loren, in my opinion, cannot be trusted.

#4 they wanted to do. The e-book ramp up to generate fast cash was in the works before I left, and is why 10 Jackpointers was printed about one draft too early. With the loss of the people that generally make those e-books happen for CGL, however, I don't know the state of this program, at least for Shadowrun. Hell, Jason was completely ignorant of at least one of the e-books in development, as far as I know.

[Kid Chameleon]

What for? A claim that cannot be verified cannot serve to increase trust in the one who makes it. That's simple logic. If you trust Randall because of something he says which you have to trust him to believe it... well, it all means you trust Randall because you trust Randall.

If you trust Randall beause he stated something which you could verify, then that's a different story. Hence why naming someone, or having them publically stating their support, would have helped build trust. And why the lack of such confirmation makes one question the claim itself, if one does not already trust Randall.

So your claim has no basis in fact but is based solely on your Socratic monologue? Less than impressive.

[Ancient History]

Kid, your problem is you don't know who you're kidding.

Heh. Sorry, I've been waiting to use that line.

Seriously though, I don't think you quite understand what you just posted. You basically said that you acknowledge that Fuchs made an argument based on reason and logic - the foundations of the Socratic method.

[Catadmin]

The 'easiest' way to remove LLC is probably, once his obligation gets paid down enough, to declare the remaining sum as 'payment' for his share of the company, both removing his obligation and his ownership role at the same time.

Actually, it depends on how the LLC Articles are set up. If the LLC was set up without any contingency for removing owners, then it will have to dissolve in order to remove Loren. If there are specific articles addressing the leaving or removal of one of the owners, then those articles will apply.

[kzt]

Trust and verification principles applied in a non uniform manner can be viewed as discriminatory.

And if you don't discriminate between your wife and a drunken stranger in a bar I suspect things will not end well.