eddhead

I am American and was able to validate my account without providing an SSN. I would not do it.

great album, lousy production.

Thanks for the advise. I was last there about 15 years ago myself, when it was still under British rule.. i am curious to see how much it has changed. Anyway, i will definetly check out Kowloon. Looks like a great site... Thanks!

No way. Actually, of the two of us (she and I) , I am the lucky one here. She may not get it, but she puts up with it.

This response makes the most sense to me, i.e. there is etiquette,there is style, and there is preferance.. three differnent considerations. Etiquette constitutes the formal and classic rules of the road. Think Emily Post. Style = trend.. what is in vogue at the moment. Individual preferance is self-explanatory Following Ethan's post, I did a bit of research and posted the result. I say a bit because the level of available guidance on etiquette was surprisingly and disappointingly low. Still I was able to find stuff from Emily Post, GQ, Some grad school sites tutoring students on interview etiquette, and a few other sources. Basically, etiquette (which you are free or not free to follow) would dictate that: -Only dress watches be worn in business situations or with a suit with no accompanying jewlery -No watch be worn in formal sitauations, i.e. black tie. The reason for the latter is that at a formal affair is is considered inappropriate to measure the passage of time, i.e... the best i could come up with as an analogy was the 2004 US presidential debate when GW Bush glanced at his watch in the middle of a point being debated by Kerry. Not good form As far as dress watches are concerned the indications I found were only that they be small, thin unobtrusive with a minimum of dials. Interestingly and surprisingly (at least to me) , I was not able to locate a preferance for strap vs. metal band (intutitively I would have thought a leather strap was appropriate). In fact one site tutoring grad stutents on interview etiquette actually sited a picture of a business man wearing a metal band watch..as an example of a dress watch. i think it was gold but i cannot recall. Not to say that they're correct.. that is just what I found. I for one an looking forward to finding out more about this from Ethan. Doesn't necessarily mean I will abide by it, but it is something I feel I should at least know about.

thanks for the response gentlemen... looks like i may be in some trouble here.. the g/f is already rolling her eyes

I will be vacationing in Hong Kong from 4/20- 4/28 and may do a side trip to Taipei which I believe is a 40 minute or so flight. Any suggestions on watch shopping?

Thank goodness... maybe now we can all go about our business...

Fair condition??? Wow!!

you guys are all sick... impressive, but sick...

Ok so what movie? "... you';re going the wrrrooong way....!" "uh-huh, uh-huh.. how does he know which way we're going!!!" see you're on-line now Pug.. happy trails!!

If you shake it real vigorously, and trwrill it around on your index finger 3 x over your head, the time reverts to the atomic energy clock time in you local zone... I don't know how they do it but it is true!!

There is no doubt that The Chinese Govt is being pressed by the WTO, US and other foreign govts to crack down on counterfeiting and is slowly beginning to respond. Eventually they will succumb, but it will take some time. Interesting article here: http://www.iht.com/articles/2004/12/02/rfake_ed3_.php and more recently here: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/chin...napiracy12.html

Thank goodness we seem to be through with this "Will Fool" non-sense...All that "jibber jabber" from you namby-pambys!!

Funny, I was thinking about this just the other day. I remember when Japanese manufactureres first began to export Hondas, Datsuns and Toyotas to the US in the mid 70's. The cars were junk... my friends mini-bike had bigger wheels than those cars. Didn't take long for them to get competitive did it? Now they feature luxury lines like Accura, Lexus, and Infinity... really an amazing step in a relatively short amount of time. Still going from manufacturing proficency to design creativity is a long way to go. As Ryannon said, only time will tell.

They are not the same product, at least according to the dealer of the $165 PO i spoke with. There are supposed to be several differences including on the bezel although I am told they are being worked on and improved. The movement is rreal ETA however.

oh lord....

My point simply stated is that you stand a real chance of winning the battle and losing the war. No one is justifying the dealer misrepresentations which clearly need to be dealt with, but a lot of the members are becoming disenfranchised with the level of discourse taking place and are losing their enthusiasm for this place. You may be justified in terms of your outrage.. and you can take solace in being right on the pricinple when we lose the participatin of our fellow members and friends. p.s. it may interest you to know that I have had little dealings with the dealers in question.. and I do feel strongly about supporting the smaller dealers.. back even to the point paying a bit more and waiting a longer time for delivery... That was a personal choice I made a while ago because of quality of service and because keeping competitors on the field is important to me. This is not about me continuing to buy from the big 4. I just do not want to lose my virtual friends and colleages and see this place fall apart over because of what we are turning into. I enjoy the interaction too much for that.

Will Fool is out at the moment. Please leave a message, well, preferably underneath this one...

Ok, so I will try it.. but just once.. Tee-Jay, I think you need to be very carefull with the hard line position you are taking here. I am not condoning false advertising and 'little white', black, or othewise lies. I am also not entirely comfortable with the establishment of a 'cartel' but I am equally not sure that cartels are unethical. Certainly, they are not consumer friendly, and pose a threat and should at least be fully transparent, but I am on the fence with respect to what to do about it. My larger concern is in relation to a TJGladeRaider post on another thread. If we are not carefull we are going to begin losing valuable members soon. Historically this has been a place watch enthusisats come to to discuss watches first, and dealers related matters second, but lately it has been the other way around, and it is not fun for people anymore. We all benefitted from the comradarie, friendship, and exchange of ideas and I worry about those things being at risk . We are like a virtual community here and I think we enjoy each others virtual company. Cllearly these are issues that needs to be addressed and I give both Pug and Edge credit for having the guts to raise it. My fondest hope is that we look at them, work them out, and move past them as friends, That means we have to be sensitive to the realtionships and friendships some of the members have with the dealers in question or we will tear this place apart. On another thread, a few of our more respected members have already expressed dissatisfaction with the virtoral and rhetoric expressed here and as a result have indicated a reluctance to continue to post. We could begin to lose members.. valuable contributint members... if we are not sensitive to the relationships that have been established between these dealers and our community these many years. Do we need to police the place? For sure. But let's be reasonable with our actions. To the dealers: On the surface this thread would appear to be a push back on the establishment of "cartel", partnership, loose affiliation, whatever. And while this is important, for least several of the posters I believe that for many, the overriding issue ontinues to be a lack of closure over issues rasied in the "little white lies" thread. The level of noise around here would substatially drop, if you took acountabilit for using terms like ETA 2836 etc to descibe an ETA CLONE movement, admitted that it constituted an error in judgement and stipulated it will not happen again. It seems to me that the people hurting the most over this are the same ones you worked so hard to foster relationships with ... it is a personal thing with them.. they trusted you and they feel like you let them down. But it is not something that cannot be overcome..... it would be a shame to jeopardize all those relationships you worked so hard to nurture over this... especially when they are still salvagable.

Very well said.

I agree with Bill's sentiments which I think are the result of the forum's focus seemingly shifting away from the watches themselves and toward the dealers and their practices. This place is principally designed to be a virtual hangout for watch enthusiasts with a secondary focus on ancillary matters such as the dealers. , Lately the ancillary has become the primary. Still, I do not agree that have not seen reasoned discourse on the other thread. Sure there were some uncivil posts, but by and large, I thought it took a lot of guts for first pug than edge to speak out the way they did and raise issues which have to surface. The existance of a potential cartel threatens the livlihood of our smaller dealers (who also happen to be our fellow members) which in turn potentially impacts our options as consumers. At least one smaller dealer has told me they were not able to get a particular popular watch because its supply had been cornered by the large dealers. And i had to wait a good 6 weeks to get it from another of the smaller dealers. So there does seem to be evidence of at least a loose affiliation of larger dealers if not a cartel ...to be honest with you, I have suspected as much for a while now. And I cannot honestly tell you that I think it represents anis unethical practice,( I am trying to fiigure that out) but if it does exist, it really should be disclosed. As to the positive feedback from the many happy clients.. it is there... just read the dealer review section I am sorry, I do not mean to pi$$ on the parade, and i agree 25+ pages is excessive. Also agree there was a lot of unnecessary incivility and innuendo that frankly made me wince. But I do not see how the topic itself can be ignored, and I think there is also some good discourse on the thread.

congratulations!! My g/f and i are contemplating a move to Chicago.. from NYC.. we're debating where though... i want to go downtown, she wants to go northwest... ahh the trials and tribulations...

that is really terrific! good for you two.