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TokyoHobby.net, wwiiguns.com, TokyoCentral Hobbies BEWARE


wildstallion

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Oh man... Damage control.

 

"One could to ask people if these two sites have anything in terms of competition. Yes they are competing sites both in terms of user pull and advertising sales. It was also interesting how did all the images disappear from RR related news posts (when we still kept mailing them in) when everybody else had theirs and how Arnies users news submissions about latest RR news were never published in the main page while others did get the time of the day. I understand not giving competitors coverage if it is commercial site with commercial interests but supposedly it is non profit.

 

You can also headover to other British forums and ask the same question there if they see Arnie "objective". I've seen discussions of quite different tone. "

 

Well, ASR wouldn't always call ASP "objective," would they? And as I recall Arnie has posted news from RR in the past...

 

"I agree that he has reasons to attack Tokyo Hobby, but everything else is going over the top. Again IMO, it is not how mature website owner with consirable reach should do whatever happens to be the matter. "

 

Bring out your dead! Bring out your dead! Sorry... Got carried away with immaturity...

 

http://www.renegaderecon.com/forum/viewtop...8b5b9c11b5d99b9

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So why isn't he quick to post about a faulty dealer? Keep in mind that he's still a new information website. So, if he posts about "this dealer is faulty" or "don't buy from this dealer" how do you think that would effect his advertisement sales? The reason why I posted that previous post was because I simply felt that knowing the web, people will quickly jump to conclusions, and in this case, time and factual information is the only way to come to a propper conclusion.

 

As for his response on his own message boards. It would be upsetting to see yourself being accused of such things. Even more so from the person who runs a competing airsoft information website. Honestly, I don't blame him for his response.

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"we have had and have association with the person who Arnie痴 Airsoft is accusing."

 

They are very passive about this whole fraud matter yet mainly concerend with their name mentioned on the article. He percieves as an "accuse" by Arnie against RR. It seems they are understanding whole point of this. This is not about bashing RR. This is to find any relationship so we can find this scum. RR sems fail to see this.

 

I have questioned what would be his position on this situation. Let's see how he response.

 

http://www.renegaderecon.com/forum/viewtop...p?p=21869#21869

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Excellent article and investigation. FAL is definitely on the ball with this one, and its really incredible how RR is handling this; instead of actually defending itself, most posts boil down to motive and attacks on arnie (although I imagine they're calling them counter-attacks).

 

Also, either this person can't read english very well or is intentionally misunderstanding arnies article. I wouldn't be surprised if it was the former as the responses have featured some very bad english and a lot of confusing grammatical errors, "It is to be said right here and now that what we elect to do and with who we choose to associate is in on our final judgement and not in accordance with our competitors."

 

That bad english is strange too considering the average quality of their posts.

 

The case was built upon linking several small bits of information that could have, independently, just been chance, but as a whole are very strong. If RR wants to vindicate themselves they should address each issue clearly and seperately instead of generalizing, "We choose these people and services as we see fit."

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Well they've said that they've put the banners adverts from JapanAirsoft on hold and that they do have a current association with whoever's behind TH, which pretty much backs what I said. Perhaps the folks behind Recon were just taken in? I dunno.

 

I still think there's more too it. There's no explanation as to how they too have a website designed by someone in Finland (where this all sadly started) and hosted at the same company as the other TH websites. That's a coincidence that just doesn't wash easily to me.

 

All I know at the moment is that they've never replied to any emails about the situation now or in the past. I checked and double checked what I put up before it went online, I put double the effort into finding some clear reason why RR weren't linked and I couldn't find anything.

 

True posting anything negative about anyone is always a touchy business but I've been very careful about what I've said about it all. All I've said is that I'm pretty sure RR have close ties with TH and have stated my reasons why.

 

Like most have said, none of this ever would have come up if there weren't so many people with orders that never arrived that post on here and privately.

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What ticks me off is their complete whitewashing of this. They make a concession then try to attack Arnie's Airsoft and the man behind it (you, Arnie), and then they link to a bizarre and rather vitriolic discussion of Arnie's on ASCUK... Renegade Recon seems to be sticking its head in the sand and hoping they can discredit the report, but there's too much to cover up...

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http://www.renegaderecon.com/forum/viewtop...p?p=21881#21881

 

Let's see what he is got to say. I'm quite disappointed actualy. I was expecting more than that from RR. It's not like trying to help the community. I found that they are actualy bit ignorant to the community and RR smells more like buisness than a community area.

 

Just out of curiousity, do any of you guys seen RR promoting other retailers through out their reviews/articles/news? I never seen anyother than airsoftshop.com, japanairsoftguns.com.

 

EDIT: Is there anyone taking or will take legal action against this vast Fraud case? Because if not, we are going nowhere with these information.

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Just an update to this:

 

On 2nd April 2005 Renegade Recon stated clearly that they "...have had and have association with the person who Arnie’s Airsoft is accusing." (source). RR have stated themselves that they do have a current association with TokyoHobby.

 

Update: A futher comparison between the site code on both Airsoft-Finland.com ( http://www.airsoft-finland.com/userlist.php ) and RenegadeRecon.com ( http://www.renegaderecon.com/index.php ) again turns up striking similarities. The term "all good things" appears at the start and end of the HTML code inset as a comment. On Airsoft-Finland.com you find at the start of the site code "

 

------

 

In my own opinion the RR site is designed and influenced by the same person that backed Airsoft-Finland.

 

Airsoft-Finland was an information portal in Finland that reportedly started a retail operation and reportedly closed rather untidily leaving unhappy employees and unhappy customers. I'm sure one of the Finnish readers will fill in with more exact details.

 

One chap in Finland detailed a rough history to me:

- ImpactStore (a physical retail outlet in or around 1999) was opened in Jyväskylä in Finland.

- ImpactStore was closed and TokyoHobby was opened in Finland which had both internet and a physical presence.

- TokyoHobby then closed in Finland

- Airsoft-Finland (later called AFK) was then started. It is reported that the backer (MN) moved back to Japan to run things from there.

- Finnish workers ran the AFK shop until the end of 2001, when the store closed

- TokyoHobby-Japan started in or around mid 2001

- RenegadeRecon.com started in Feb 2002

- WWIIGuns was registered in March 2004

- JapanAirsoft was registered in Feb 2005

 

It looks pretty clear to me that the current portal and the new shops are a continuation of the same pattern by the same persons or person.

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In my own opinion the RR site is designed and influenced by the same person that backed Airsoft-Finland.

 

Airsoft-Finland was an information portal in Finland that reportedly started a retail operation and reportedly closed rather untidily leaving unhappy employees and unhappy customers. I'm sure one of the Finnish readers will fill in with more exact details.

 

One chap in Finland detailed a rough history to me:

- ImpactStore (a physical retail outlet in or around 1999) was opened in Jyväskylä in Finland.

- ImpactStore was closed and TokyoHobby was opened in Finland which had both internet and a physical presence.

- TokyoHobby then closed in Finland

- Airsoft-Finland (later called AFK) was then started. It is reported that the backer (MN) moved back to Japan to run things from there.

- Finnish workers ran the AFK shop until the end of 2001, when the store closed

- TokyoHobby-Japan started in or around mid 2001

- RenegadeRecon.com started in Feb 2002

- WWIIGuns was registered in March 2004

- JapanAirsoft was registered in Feb 2005

 

It looks pretty clear to me that the current portal and the new shops are a continuation of the same pattern by the same persons or person.

 

A few details:

 

-Miki started IS in -98. First it was a mail order company and the guns were stored in a garage in Jyväskylä. He opened the physical store in Jyväskylä later.

-In the year 2000 he opened another physical store, located in Helsinki. I can't remember whether it was already called TH, or was it still IS. I know the guys who worked in both stores, and they have said MN spent most of the time in Japan.

-I applied to work for him in spring 2001. The TH Showroom store wasn't opened until mid-July. TokyoHobby Japan was launched at the same time.

-I ran the TH Showroom store until 18.12.-01. The store in Jyväskylä was closed earlier.

-The name was then changed to AFK. Both physical retail stores were closed, and MN's footman ran AFK as a mail order company. I won't give out the name of the footman, because he's clearly just a foolish teenager without comprehension of MN's crimes.

 

-Sale

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I still think RR is a good website in general and they do have a some well written and informative articles. They also always seem to be the first with pictures of new airsoft guns which is cool. Regardless the Tokyo Hobby connection is still a bit disappointing.

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There's certainly an interesting amount of similarities emerging between this group of sites. Whilst the running of different outlets by this individual is one issue, of greater concern is the emerging possibility that Renegade Recon is being run with somewhat ulterior motives beyond providing another point of discussion for the international airsofting community.

 

If this is the case, suffice to say I will be deeply dissapointed, and would like to express my sympathy for the majority of members of RR who are attempting to make it what I feel is a worthwhile community site. While there is nothing wrong with a site having allegiances to different stores / firms etc, they should always make this clear for members or risk a questioning of their validity as they do now face.

 

That said, for now I'm going to try and remain optimistic/sceptic/extremely naive about the similarities, and hope there's nothing in them beyond shared hosting and a familiarity with the owners of the site. That is, after all, all we know for sure for the time being...

 

Edit: However I do find it hard to view RR in such a manner when they start adopting the usual 'warning shot' approach of trying to scare off such enquiries with threats of legal action. As far as I am aware, no slanderous action has so far been committed, and every 'official' comment made here so far has been substantiated.

 

Whatever turns out to be the case in the end, good work in finding this Arnie, even if it was by chance. :)

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Okay, so we know a whole bunch about the problem. But is there anything we can do about it?

 

I myself am waiting for my TH order, 7 months and counting, and I would really like to get it. I'm sure others are waiting too. Can't we figure out a way to end the problem once and for all?

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  • 2 weeks later...

I'm from Finland.. It's impossible to say how many cheated airsofters are here.. Me and few of my friends have ordered twice from Airsoft-Finland.com. On the first time, we got what we had ordered: 2 socom -springers (but these were non-hop up versions), three mp5 a3 springers and a m3 super 90 -shotgun, which was supposed to be m3 shorty.

the sea-transport was supposed to take 8 weeks, but it took 6 months.

They sent us new socoms, and everyone was happy. Our next order was a bit more expensive: Vsr-10 G-Spec, mp5k a4 PDW and mp5 k a4. The order came a bit more on schedule, but there was no PDW. Mikio has replied to none of our letters.

 

If I remember correctly, mikio held a shop called ImpactStore here in Finland, but because the employees were unable to get their salary (thx to Mikio), the store was closed. The store had also problems when trying to get the money back. They usually made it up by offering other guns or accessories etc..

 

I read the text, and I was shocked to know, that there's even more internet-sites, hosted by Mikio.. The sisasivu refers to sisäsivu, which means "inner page", and it's definetly finnish. The etusivu_reuna_vas.gif was translated correctly.

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the mans a Virtual Terrorist He must be taken down(Locks & loads his H&k USP)

 

no really, Someone should warn INTERPOL(International Police) About this growing scam. for those of you who dont know what interpol is its a global police orginazation that works with local police agencies, and is present in almost every country in the world, Interpol also operates a Financial crime unit that specialy deals with situations like this: http://www.interpol.com/Public/FinancialCrime/Default.asp

 

so please anyone who has been ripped off or scammed by this man please write something to Interpol or some sort of law enforcement agency so we can all bring this sucker off the airsoft market

 

Btw: By some miracle i found this post on google right after coming nearly close to ordering from Tokyo hobby.

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