Rick Hinderer sent Cease and Desist to Youtuber for saying the steel was soft in his knife?

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Too much here to read every post, but a couple of comments.

1. Before I sold out and went into marketing/management, I'd spent most of my life working in and running materials testing labs. IT IS NEVER AS SIMPLE AS CALIBRATING THE EQUIPMENT AND RUNNING THE TEST. I won't waste time going down the rabbit hole, but folks who believe that fallacy run labs that go out of business. Quickly. And in debt. Sometimes big debt.

2. I'm soundly on RHK's side in this. Social media has such a long reach that you have to vigorously defend your business reputation. Tony at Everyday Commentary had to walk back his joking about the scuffle between Microtech and Kershaw and retracted a bunch of stuff in a settlement. It's not about 7000 followers, it's about retweets and shares and likes that allow bad information to spread like wildfire.

3. I think I'm going to go and buy that Hinderer Skinny I've been wanting. If I can find one...
 
Murdamook said:
Was it Nathawut(sp)? I know a lot of Poboy Emersons made their rounds until Ernie decided to come out and condemn it. It’s just so weird to me. I have an AD20s and I really enjoy it, but spending another $500 reblading it and putting new scales on it just seems weird. I’d prefer to just get the real thing from Demko.
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I believe that might be him. NathCustoms? I think? I mean, the knives themselves were spectacular, but yeah, the admins said that he had to go, and that was that. Also, they weren't Po'Boys, these were completely different knives physically. Like, different pivots, liners, everything.
 
Hackenslash said:
Too much here to read every post, but a couple of comments.

1. Before I sold out and went into marketing/management, I'd spent most of my life working in and running materials testing labs. IT IS NEVER AS SIMPLE AS CALIBRATING THE EQUIPMENT AND RUNNING THE TEST. I won't waste time going down the rabbit hole, but folks who believe that fallacy run labs that go out of business. Quickly. And in debt. Sometimes big debt.

2. I'm soundly on RHK's side in this. Social media has such a long reach that you have to vigorously defend your business reputation. Tony at Everyday Commentary had to walk back his joking about the scuffle between Microtech and Kershaw and retracted a bunch of stuff in a settlement. It's not about 7000 followers, it's about retweets and shares and likes that allow bad information to spread like wildfire.

3. I think I'm going to go and buy that Hinderer Skinny I've been wanting. If I can find one...
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Exactly what I've been saying. I myself was made aware of this situation when a slipjoint/GEC guy I follow posted about it. I was like "Wait, what? Hinderer content?" and then got dialed in pretty quick.
 
fonedork said:
I would argue that letter is a judicially binding admission by Hinderer that if this Kim guy takes down his posts, agrees in writing to cease and desist, and posts that scripted apology, Hinderer will be made whole. Leaving no room for him to demand money.
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Technically, not true.

Even if Kim retracts the disputed statements and promises never to make them again, Hinderer could still sue for any monetary damages arising prior to Kim's agreement to do so.

Hinderer is unlikely to take such an action if Kim will agree to "cease & desist" since what Hinderer mainly wants is to get Kim to stop "talking trash" about him & his knives; notwithstanding the fact that such damages are difficult to prove.

However, if KIm agrees to do as Hinderer asks AND if a bar and/or waiver from suit is included in a settlement agreement (as his lawyer should insist upon) THEN there would be "no room for Hinderer to demand money" based on Kim's disputed actions, as long as Kim abides by the agreement.
 
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Lots of people want to be the one to take down the kings of the knife industry… justified or not.

I’m in favor of the cease and desist. Give them a wake-up call to let them know actions have consequences and that if they want to go down that path (and potentially lose) to be prepared to suffer them.

People have been buying (and using.. HARD) Hinderer knives for many many years. How often has anyone heard of issues with their blades?
 
Well now we are all curious, enlighten us. What are the missing components?

Hackenslash said:
1. Before I sold out and went into marketing/management, I'd spent most of my life working in and running materials testing labs. IT IS NEVER AS SIMPLE AS CALIBRATING THE EQUIPMENT AND RUNNING THE TEST. I won't waste time going down the rabbit hole, but folks who believe that fallacy run labs that go out of business. Quickly. And in debt. Sometimes big debt.
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Murdamook said:
Was it Nathawut(sp)? I know a lot of Poboy Emersons made their rounds until Ernie decided to come out and condemn it. It’s just so weird to me.
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Emerson wasn't against Poboy modifications. He was against Poboy modifications made to look like the CQC-6.
 
Quiet said:
NathCustoms
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Nath Customs isn’t Russian Quiet, he’s from the Philippines or one of those I believe.
‘I contacted him while ago, asking about regraind. He’s price was higher than most of US based modders, what stopped me was the mailing of my new blade there. He does lots of Emersons blades but I’m positive he’s not based in Russia.
 
POCEH KOCEB said:
Nath Customs isn’t Russian Quiet, he’s from the Philippines or one of those I believe.
‘I contacted him while ago, asking about regraind. He’s price was higher than most of US based modders, what stopped me was the mailing of my new blade there. He does lots of Emersons blades but I’m positive he’s not based in Russia.
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I greatly appreciate the clarification! I had thought he was Russian, because you'd see so many of his knives on Russian knife pages. His stuff was definitely not cheap, that's for sure.
 
POCEH KOCEB said:
Nath Customs isn’t Russian Quiet, he’s from the Philippines or one of those I believe.
‘I contacted him while ago, asking about regraind. He’s price was higher than most of US based modders, what stopped me was the mailing of my new blade there. He does lots of Emersons blades but I’m positive he’s not based in Russia.
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Thailand. His work is also some of the best I've seen. I'm lucky enough to own two Emerson framelock conversions.
 
I agree, his work is very clean and I love it. He’s very busy (understandably) but he spends time with you, working on your desired outcome. One day I’ll have some of his work.
 
DeadboxHero said:
Well now we are all curious, enlighten us. What are the missing components?
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I'll try to keep it short with a few simple bullet points.
1. Experienced Technicians. There are many elements to any test procedure that require finesse and talent. The more physical the test procedure, the greater the need for skilled operators, like the hardness test in question. Sure, anybody can press the "start" button on a spectrometer and let the host PC do the work, but even with equipment like that there's a sample prep element that can be highly skewed if prepared slightly irregularly.
2. Data Review. All test data is stupid, dumb numbers. A trained engineer/scientist/manager needs to evaluate the data. I've seen so much data come from experienced technicians that's utter BS because it takes a high level review to determine if the data falls within the realm of norm for the test, or is even statistically significant. We used to call that "passing the Ho-Ho test."
3. Sample Integrity. We may be experiencing this issue with the knife in question. There needs to be a "chain of custody" to establish sample integrity. You need to accurately identify the subject material, know where it came from and properly classify it to administer testing in the proper scope. Contaminated samples have wreaked havoc on multiple industries. There are many instances where the method of testing is determined by proper identification of the sample material.
4. Quality Assurance and Calibration. It's not just enough to calibrate the equipment performing the test, you need to calibrate (or verify) the calibration equipment. There are lab standards for a broad spectrum of physical tests and they need to be verified or replaced as the calibration materials drop out of date. Even standardized weights and feeler gauges have to be re-verified of replaced on a regular schedule.
5. Quality Systems. There needs to be a process to address non-compliance, whether of test materials, equipment or technicians. Peer review is critical to periodically "refresh" the lab processes and root out failures. Shared, round robin samples need to be evaluated and graded for your lab's performance against a pool of other professional labs.
6. Continual Training and Development. Test methods are always changing and new methods are added while others retired. ASTM, AASHTO, NIST and EN publish new, revised methods each year. A lab must always train and retrain staff to insure the latest, accepted methods are complied with. There are a lot of famous failures in the private lab business that derive from a 2-year old method being run in error.

This is really just the tip of the iceberg, but I am highly skeptical of social media personalities who buy a piece of equipment, read a test method and think they can report accurate results.

Sorry for making everyone's eyeballs bleed...

Edit: I want to add that if anyone wants to do their own testing at home to learn and understand, I fully support that. The difference comes when you state it as "fact" via social media, you damn well better have everything mentioned above in place or you will loose any challenge that comes as a result of your claims. No lab operates without a generous liability insurance policy either...
 
I'm just writing as a guy who'll never carry a Hinderer, and in fact has an Opinel #6 in the RFP, but the more I think about this, the more it's a big whatever.
The fact that Brian's a "professional" probably makes this cease and desist a fairly typical legal business matter.
I also happen to believe that Brian doesn't have much ground to stand on to say that Hinderer knives are of 'sub optimal' hardness.
 
Quiet said:
You'd think since it was so much better, he'd have his own knives, and be making enough money to own a company putting a great product on the market instead of just doing reblades for other companies' products. 🤔

Also, Spyderco is one of the "Old Guard" and I know this dude's blades aren't better than what Spyderco is doing.
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You might be right, but I don't know how you know this, especially considering you haven't handled (or care to handle) the comparison. But you might be right.
 
Hackenslash said:
Edit: I want to add that if anyone wants to do their own testing at home to learn and understand, I fully support that. The difference comes when you state it as "fact" via social media, you damn well better have everything mentioned above in place or you will loose any challenge that comes as a result of your claims. No lab operates without a generous liability insurance policy either...
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Yes to all of this post- but particularly this ^^^.
Professionally testing products brings the potential for liability.
It gets particularly tricky if someone's taking data and offering his opinion, because the two can become conflated.
 
sgt1372 said:
The "burden of proof" is on Hinderer but there's no way to know at this point whether Hinderer can yet prove ("beyond a reasonable doubt," which is the legal standard of proof for a civil action) that:

1) Kim's statements about Hinderer's knives are FALSE (and/or misleading) and that
2) Hinderer has suffered any "damages" as a result.

So, it's premature to "conclude that "this doesn't seem like something Hinderer is likely to win" at this point.

Also, even if Hinderer cannot prove any financial damages, he could still "win" by obtaining an INJUNCTION vs Kim prohibiting from him making any statements proven to be FALSE (or misleading statement) about Hinderer's knives AND, if Kim violates the injuction, he could still be slapped w/civil penalties as a result.
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The civil standard is "preponderance of evidence." "Beyond a reasonable doubt" is a criminal standard.

A injunction merely prohibiting future statements may be a "win," but it would be a massive waste of money and do little or nothing to address past statements. Were I the client that got that result, I would not consider it a win. I know you used the term "win" in quotations; I am just clarifying.
 
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