Is there a Kershaw/Kai rep here?

midnight flyer said:
Good guess, though. We actually spoke on the phone once. We traded a few personal emails and he was always pretty cool with me. I was really happy with a couple of Kershaw knives and actually found BF because I was looking for more info on Kershaw.That's how I found the Kershaw subforum.

Thomas was doing this as a sideline to his work duties, thinking he was going to be doing an occasional stint helping out a customer, but he thought BF was going to be a platform to celebrate Kershaw products and discuss them openly. He wanted feedback from users and thought this would be a great place to announce new products, talk about upcoming events, and just about anything Kershaw.

He became the face of customer service. And he didn't understand the constantly demanding behavior and pettiness of the forum participants. He wanted to check the forum every other day or so, and that just didn't do. Folks would join BF just to vent their spleen and demand help from him. If he didn't respond the same day he was burned down here and on social media. Again, no matter how much he explained it, he was not customer service, just the group moderator. He wore a few hats, but getting new screws to some bonehead that took their knife apart and lost or stripped them wasn't one of them. That never stopped anyone from hammering away on him on social media, sometime for the most petty and insignificant things. I never blamed him for leaving and thought while he was here he was a paragon of patience.

Take a look at the thread going on right now on the sale of Cold Steel. Rampant speculation about LT's motives of selling, accusations of immoral behavior, outright dishonesty on his part, hypothesizing that LT/Cold Steel is involved in some long term scheming, wild speculation about what has and will be happening, and now the folks participating in that thread are actually turning on each other. (It seems a lot of threads wind up with folks here at one another's throat if the thread go long and they are full of smut, rumor and hearsay.) That happened a lot on the old Kershaw subforum... Thomas finally said, "who needs this crap?"

Robert
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Sorry, but hard disagree. There were certainly trolls, but he consistently engaged and escalated disagreements with forum members, regardless of the forum they occurred in. I'll grant that he was deeply passionate about Kershaw products, but it was to the point that he took complaints as personal attacks.
 
Oh look, another thread where the former KAI forum mod (who left in a huge emotional rageout) is painted out to be a saint by people who received free knives*, and the blame laid at the feet of Bladeforums members who were just "complainers" again. God, it's the same beat every time. Poor Thomas. Poor KAI. BF people are so mean.

Just trash. Thomas was antagonistic towards anyone who said anything even remotely critical about KAI products. It was nonsense.




* Heh, probably just a coincidence :rolleyes:
 
The Mastiff said:
Yeah, Thomas was a good dude to us regulars in the Kershaw sub forum. My guess is he has a low tolerance to getting trash talked by people just trying to annoy him while doing extra work he wasn't getting paid for. Just a guess though. :)

I had to do something similar once when I was adminning a forum for a guy as a favor. When you are the focus of emotions for everyone having a bad day it gets tiresome. Not everybody can be like Sal at Spyderco.
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Yes, but he was acting as an official representative of the company. It wasn't a favor, it was his job.

As a manufacturer rep/mod you got to play the role of CS rep here on "your" forum, or disallow customer service or negative discussion entirely in it. He did neither and got bent outta shape about it, and, if I recall, threatened members OUTSIDE of the KAI subforum for expressing negative opinions about KAI.
 
Insipid Moniker said:
Sorry, but hard disagree. There were certainly trolls, but he consistently engaged and escalated disagreements with forum members, regardless of the forum they occurred in. I'll grant that he was deeply passionate about Kershaw products, but it was to the point that he took complaints as personal attacks.
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Yup. And the escalation outside of his forum as fine....his thinly veiled threats to take action (whether he could or couldn't) were not.
 
midnight flyer said:
Take a look at the thread going on right now on the sale of Cold Steel. Rampant speculation about LT's motives of selling, accusations of immoral behavior, outright dishonesty on his part, hypothesizing that LT/Cold Steel is involved in some long term scheming, wild speculation about what has and will be happening, and now the folks participating in that thread are actually turning on each other. (It seems a lot of threads wind up with folks here at one another's throat if the thread go long and they are full of smut, rumor and hearsay.) That happened a lot on the old Kershaw subforum... Thomas finally said, "who needs this crap?"
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CS has a rep moderating the thread in the Cold Steel forum. That mod could shut that thread down at any time. Again, that's nobody's fault but their own.

The Cold Steel thread/threads in General? CS can't do diddly about those and they shouldn't be allowed to. That's for BF mods to decide, not CS ones.

If not this place starts turning into other forums from the past, where free expression across the board was limited by certain powerful supporting makers/manufacturers.
 
I met Thomas many times at Blade and he was always awesome. A dope cat to talk to, and chill with in the Pit. I’m proud to call him a friend. It’s easy to pop smack about someone online, but when it’s face to face I guess it’s not so easy...but whatever, I’m sure he’s doing well at KAI as they continue to kill it. As far as a KAI company rep being here, nope and I don’t think it’s needed really. The KAI subforum was a cool place to hang but it’s ended as all things do eventually so no biggie.

Call me a fanboy, brown noser, watevs, don’t matter to me, I’ll keep doing me and keep stuntin and strutin with a KAI product in my pocket.
 
Thomas was and is a great guy in my book. Met him numerous times, had a few drinks together, talked about many things other than knives. Always a gracious person.

Unfortunately the subforum came to an end like most good things do sooner or later. Met a ton of great people in there and still talk to quite a few of them today.
Still carry mostly Kershaw and Zt knives myself. Still highly recommend them for price, materials, and craftsmanship.

As far a sub reopened here, i highly doubt it. Try their social media is my guess. Unfortunately Covid has phuqerd up a lot of things for a lot of people. Have some patience and they'll take care of you.

Best,

Justin
 
I've also spoken with Thomas once or twice over the phone. He's a good dude as far as I'm concerned.

Also kinda handsome...
 
Insipid Moniker said:
Sorry, but hard disagree. There were certainly trolls, but he consistently engaged and escalated disagreements with forum members, regardless of the forum they occurred in. I'll grant that he was deeply passionate about Kershaw products, but it was to the point that he took complaints as personal attacks.
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That's OK. I remember him as being very sensitive at times, and just as bad as the trolls that go under his skin. And if he was having a bad day... sheesh. I try to ignore the personal attack threads as they have a tendency to go on and on as people really seem to enjoy getting their cute, snarky two cents in on a flame war. They are quickly devolved off topic.

I am disappointed to hear that Thomas gave away free knives. Guess I wasn't a big enough fan (or butt hurt enough) to merit one...

All I know that I can speak of is what I read when the forum was active, and when he and I emailed back and forth. To me, (no doubt someone will correct my opinion) he was absolutely the wrong man for the job of moderator. I quit participating a while before it closed as it was more of a battle ground than an fun or informative forum. Who has time for all the online bickering?

I never mind anyone that disagrees with my opinion or doesn't have the same personal experience. I seem to be at odds in life with a few folks. I don't mind at all a thoughtful or informative response.

But the self righteous blast of caustic diarrhea spewed on the screen calling out folks as liars (but not the balls to do it outright... come on Oswald... take the shot!! ) for their own personal experience or bashing them for their opinion gets a little old. Simple lack of respect for one another, which seem to be the norm these days just about everywhere. Surprised to see it so much here on BF, but now I write it off the trolls as plain old cyber-bullying. They don't merit a response.

Robert
 
metsfan said:
I met Thomas many times at Blade and he was always awesome. A dope cat to talk to, and chill with in the Pit. I’m proud to call him a friend. It’s easy to pop smack about someone online, but when it’s face to face I guess it’s not so easy...but whatever, I’m sure he’s doing well at KAI as they continue to kill it. As far as a KAI company rep being here, nope and I don’t think it’s needed really. The KAI subforum was a cool place to hang but it’s ended as all things do eventually so no biggie.

Call me a fanboy, brown noser, watevs, don’t matter to me, I’ll keep doing me and keep stuntin and strutin with a KAI product in my pocket.
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This is a line that I consistently hear about Thomas and I don't fully understand it. I don't think he is or was a bad person, I think he was a bad moderator. I would have no issue with saying that to his face because I genuinely don't see the insult there. You can feel free to tell me to my face I'm a bad welder or a poor systems analyst and I promise I won't be offended and will, in fact, agree with you.
 
Insipid Moniker said:
This is a line that I consistently hear about Thomas and I don't fully understand it. I don't think he is or was a bad person, I think he was a bad moderator. I would have no issue with saying that to his face because I genuinely don't see the insult there. You can feel free to tell me to my face I'm a bad welder or a poor systems analyst and I promise I won't be offended and will, in fact, agree with you.
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Sir, I think you nailed it. Loved the last couple of sentences... I feel the same!

After seeing the way Thomas handled things on the KAI group, I honestly wondered a few times if there weren't underlying issues with him personally. He had no "steady hand on the tiller". He was so hot and cold at the end of both his attempts to moderate I honestly thought he was bipolar.

Robert
 
Sounds like, aside for thomas, the rep, there needed to be a ball busting forum moderator.
 
It would be nice for a different person to give it another go..:thumbsup::D:thumbsup: Times change and people move on..;)
John
 
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