“Sharper Image is the last company in the whole country I would have allowed him to even speak with,” Kaufman said. “We all know their reputation. They went bankrupt. Their name makes you think of a niche item that costs a lot of money, and that’s not what Nubrella is.”
A 60 dollar sunshade strapped to a hat isn't niche?
Any period of history can involve outrageous headgear. Even things we consider classy can change in a heartbeat. Fedoras used to be cool. Now they're weird and neckbeard-y.
I wear an Outback Trading Co. oilskin River Guide hat [0].
I don't care if it looks cool, because it keeps my glasses dry in the rain, and the sun out of my face the rest of the time. If I want to be fashionable, I can wear something else, but mostly I just want to be comfortable.
That looks fit for a different purpose. One of the reasons I wear a full-brimmed hat is to replace both sunglasses and umbrella, and the mesh portion of the Tilley that you linked allows rain to pass through the crown. The Wanderer [0] is likely closest to what I would wear.
It's a bit more expensive than what I already have, but it looks like they have a lifetime replacement guarantee and a 2-year insurance policy against loss. All other things being equal, I'd rather pay less up front and take greater care with what I bought.
The overlay "Wake up with today's top stories" has a "Close" link at the top, you can click it and read without signing in: http://i.imgur.com/UMewFHE.png
A rather non-obvious close, so parent comment is correct.
The popup does not have an obvious bold "close" or "X" in the right hand corner or the bottom right, it has a very light grey close in the upper left, and also does not respond to clicking outside the modal dialog.
Man with bankrupt company files lawsuit, more at 11.
He's not claiming anything that the producers won't readily admit, so this should be fairly straightforward. He seems to have some merit to his claim that re-runs should show the original air date, other than that everything he claims is laughable.
In Germany's equivalent 26 of the 35 announced deals during the show didn't work out. Usually due-diligence but I can imagine in some cases that wasn't even started. I counted 114 presentations (19 episodes, 6 presentations average). So 26 actual investments is a 20% ratio.
So the guy sues them, settles for $20k, sues them again for a different reason, and has the audacity to say he wants to appear on another episode and think there's even a chance of that happening?
I think it made sense in just a settlement- 'you want to keep rerunning that episode over a decade after it was recorded and aired, let me at least show "now."' I can see how such a product with such limited circulation could be completely overwhelmed by Shark Tank reruns/promos in marketing even though it's wildly out of date.
I'd love to hear the shark's side of this but I am not surprised to hear someone say that the show doesn't accurately portray the deals. Having participated in televised 'reality shows' (Robotica, Battlebots) it is clearly entertainment value rather than the putative subject matter that the producers are interested in. Mostly its little stuff, like the gift basket from Robotica was said would include "New Balance Running shoes" but instead had some fairly poorly made off brand shoes (the box said "Quolity Shoes" (yes with an 'o' instead of an 'a' in Quality). My wife and I agreed that it felt like the producers were trying to produce a show "experience" with props for the "contestants."
But from the article there must be more since the guy sued and then settled for $20K? What did the contract say? And the licensing stuff is pretty crazy in TV (so many people want to be "on TV" it really is amazing).
> so many people want to be "on TV" it really is amazing
I've never understood this. I have no desire to be on TV. It feels like I'm in the vast minority, but I wonder if it's just a matter of those that don't want to be on TV aren't, and based on their personalities are also less likely to have their views propagated by popular media?
I think that's part of it, but also I think that most people overestimate the benefits of the average experience of televised 'fame', and underestimate the risks.
I've always been of the opinion that all reality shows are produced with actors, or aspiring actors. None of the people are everyday, average folks. This view was reinforced after watching a few seconds of this Battlebots show which you speak of. Either that, or the producers hunt down and look for TV-suitable people from the average crowd. All those people who "want to be on TV" are in that category.
So Shark Tank people are definitely real. The sisters who made Coffee-Meets-Bagel were on the show and a friend met them at some startup event in Silicon Valley before their app took off. Also a friend of mine has been on the show as well.
That said, your hypothesis for "TV-Suitable" people isn't far off. A classmate from college went to audition for some reality TV show and basically said the producers look for certain traits such as how dramatic a person is, etc. My friend who's been on Shark Tank is definitely a charming and likeable guy (he's also a genuinely very nice guy).
Speaking as someone who was on a reality TV show with my sister ("Sugar Showdown") I can tell you this is absolutely not true. We are everyday folks, not aspiring actors, as were the other contestants.
True. And it's also not terribly unusual to vastly overestimate the "fame" value of a brief appearance on a TV show, and underestimate the risks of allowing yourself to be exploited for entertainment by billionaire media corporations and billionaire investors.
Who would want a pair of running shoes from a gift basket anyway? There's little chance that they're going to fit right. If they were women's dress shoes it would make a little more sense, they're designed for fashion not comfort. Still, I don't think that's missing out on too much.
Robot competitions have to make producers extra nervous. How do you hold one of those and not end up with a whole bunch of contestants that are nerdy or too ugly for TV?
We made some "One Minute Movie" robot reality TV spots at the Stupid Fun Club, about Empathy [1] and Servitude [2], written by Will Wright, who also participated in Battlebots with his daughter Cassidy and their vegetative robot Super Chiabot [3].
The one minute movies never ran due to contractual problems between NBC and SAG. We used hidden cameras, and the humans were real unsuspecting people, but I'll admit it's true they didn't accurately portray the everyday lives of actual robots in the real world: the robot's injuries and Professor Johnson's phone number were fake, and the robot waiter was fired.
The point of NBC's one-minute reality shows was to tell short entertaining two-part cliffhanger stories, which NBC would broadcast as interstitial programming at the beginning and end of commercial breaks, to compel people to keep watching TV and submit to more advertisements. [4]
But the point of Will's stories and performance was to explore how people interact and empathize with robots, discover what their beliefs and expectations are, and probe to test how easy humans are to fool or convince to play along with real-time tele-robotic wizard-of-oz man-behind-the-curtain mumbo-jumbo. [5]
"That the women are deluded seems evident; for Mr. Park assures us, that the dress of Mumbo is suffered to hang from a tree at the entrance of each town; which would hardly be the case if the women were not persuaded that it is the dress of some supernatural being"
I'll never participate in Shark Tank.. one of two investors I'd even consider taking an investment from on that show, doesn't even appear in the majority of the episodes. That would be Chris Sacca.. I think he's brilliant.
I remember seeing somewhere (can't remember if it was online, or on the show) where the Sharks talked about how a lot more goes into the deal then the little snippet of them talking that is shown on TV. Obviously that makes sense, as the info from the little snippet is often superficial. The exposure for the company presenting their items is probably one of the best parts. I would think if you are set to capitalize on that then you have a good shot of doing decently, even if the Sharks don't back you (although this guy even has problems with that).
Sounds like this guy just struggled with his business and it basically ran into the ground.
This man is pathetic. All deals on Shark Tank are subject to due diligence. Many deals don't go through after the show.
The worst part is "let me go back on the show and tell everyone the improvements of my product". Absolutely laughable. He thinks he's entitled to a product advertisement on Shark Tank -- he's also got one and now he wants another.
This guy is a joke. Having said that, if it's true that they faked the update, including high-fiving Daymond John, that's pretty pathetic. But this guy agreed to film it and fake it, so...
I like things that help battle the elements, but this isn't my cup of tea. It appears that he's also kickstarted the thing about three years ago (only to ~$10,000 in funding) and people are complaining about not receiving the item: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/36197580/finally-the-wo...
My current system of dealing with rain in the Pacific Northwest is combining a well made rain jacket with a wool baseball cap (Ebbets Fields makes some) - it solves the problem of wearing glasses in the rain pretty well. There's probably some really niche uses for the nubrella, but there's other solutions already (camera rain covers, waterproof phones/phone cases/etc).
@dang, this actually was pretty confusing to me as well. Being that we're all on a tech/hacker forum, I also thought that "Newton inventor" meant that he invented the "Apple Newton."
This man is pathetic. All deals on Shark Tank are subject to due diligence. Many deals don't go through after the show.
The worst part is "let me go back on the show and tell everyone the improvements of my product". Absolutely laughable. He thinks he's entitled to a product advertisement on Shark Tank -- he already got one and now he wants another.
This guy is a joke. Having said that, if it's true that they faked the update, including high-fiving Daymond John, that's pretty pathetic. But this guy agreed to film it and fake it, so...
I am not speaking about this case in particular, because I have no idea what happened, but in general things like this must happen all the time even if the show is "authentic."
I think a lot of diligence and deal details have to be worked out. They ask who else own shares but they don't even go through a cap table.
I know the sharks have been disappointed when entrepreneurs turned out not to be "serious" and just show up for exposure.
This person may have been scammed, but it is also possible that one red flag ended the diligence. ("Wait? how much debt?!")
The thing that remains a mystery is this follow up episode. But that makes no sense on both sides. How do you get pressured to do a follow up episode if you never saw an investment?
Everybody who watches this show knows the Sharks can pull out of the deal later on. I enjoy the show, even though I realize a lot of it has to be staged. However, I don't like how they force the people to make a decision within minutes, but the Sharks can research the product some later and pull out if they want to.
I've only watched a couple of episodes, but it seemed like the deals they offered were pretty terrible. Granted the products weren't great but when the deal is "<paltry sum> for a 51% stake in the company" I was like "Who would take that?" And of course they did.
I guess Shark Tank is where you go when all normal investors have already turned you down.
The thing is that either side can pull out of the deal after the show. I've heard that some of these pitches and discussions can go on for an hour or more and television edits it down to 15 minutes.
>Everybody who watches this show knows the Sharks can pull out of the deal later on.
This is a show is on ABC which is over the air broadcast TV. The most mainstream there is. I guarantee there are a ton of people who don't know the nuances of reality TV.
> Nubrella is currently out of cash, Kaufman said, and potential new investors won’t bite, assuming the “sharks” and Sharper Image backed out of those deals because of some hidden defect in its product or business plan.
Be careful who you deal with, and force them to act sooner rather than later. When dealing with the Sharks I don't know if you really can force them to act and cut a check, they can just say they will and run re-runs, potentially screwing your future investment opportunities.
Mark Cuban said in a Howard Stern interview that about half of the deals made on the show fall apart during due diligence. So it's not particularly surprising that he never got his $200k. The only "fraud" I see here was perpetrated on viewers, if indeed they later aired a show (that this inventor voluntarily participated in) with an entirely fictional narrative about making a deal with Sharper Image.
Shark Tank probably has an innocent explanation, and the truth is probably somewhere in the middle. But my BS detector went through the roof when he suggested that as a settlement for his lawsuit, he would accept being allowed to go back on a show that he claims is a fraud. This makes him sound like nothing more than a desperate, failed business owner that is attempting extort his way back onto the show for the free advertising it offers.
It sounds to me that he is lying... A lot. He accepted a settlement and now is suing again because that wasn't enough? He doesn't want people to think his item is niche and expensive... But it is. He raised the price from something already expensive to "I think I'll just carry around a tent". When you improve something, normally you improve defects and make it better, so it should cost around the same price. Why double the price for something a little better? This guy seems to not know how to run a company at all.
I don't agree with that at all. It's up to him to set the price for his improved product, whether it's 10% more or 100% or 1000%. It's unfair though when an old version of his product is presented at an old price point using present tense verbs on TV. Of course viewers are going to think it's a bait and switch when they try to buy it. It harms his business.
If his product improved enough to price it so much greater, he should have versioned his product. If his "improvements" were just a farce and he just wanted to increase the price, then it is a bait and switch. Either way, this boils down to him being bad at business.
But with reruns, they should include a disclaimer that says the original date and that prices may have changed.
So if someone runs across an old Craftsman add for a $2.00 philips head screwdriver that's $5.00 today, even though it hasn't changed (if anything it's probably cheaper to produce), they're dishonest?
Does Shark Tank not follow the example of the UK show Dragon's Den that inspired it in discussing costs of manufacture and wholesale prices? Can't see how anyone can reasonably consider it a "bait and switch" if, after watching a programme in which someone has discussed making a product for $5, selling it wholesale for $15 and expecting it to retail at $30, they then find a different price again for the current version. Getting more revenue out of consumers is literally the point of a show about entrepreneurship.
I worked on Shark Tank. It is a lie (but not unlike almost every other TV show) with just enough truth to keep "suspension of disbelief" aloft. It was designed that way from the beginning. Almost all TV shows are designed this way. The "lie" is called entertainment. The subject of "high stakes" investing is ready-made for TV, but no investor can adequately research a business in the 15 minutes it takes to shoot each pitch.
Is Mark Cuban's claim that he funds approximately half of the deals he makes on the show in the ballpark? I also remember him saying something about the each pitch actually taking up to an hour, that is then cut down for TV. But you're saying it takes 15 minutes to shoot each. Which is it?
That's my take as well (plus Mark Cuban actually said it takes much longer than you see on air). I don't want to call anyone a liar, which is why I asked the questions I did. For all I know he did work there. But it was certainly a suspect comment.
Between pitches, production takes long breaks where Mark Cuban and the other talent have nothing to do, but sit and wait.
TV production is not very exciting. Post-production even less so. A lot of sitting and waiting. A lot of looking through useless footage to try to find the juice.
I have worked in TV for over a decade. I am leaving Santa Monica to move to Mission Bay in San Francisco in November. I hope not to work on another TV show for the rest of my life, but God laughs when we make plans.
The pitches can be shot between 15-60 minutes each. These are ballpark figures, keep in mind, and I am sure that some pitches have taken longer. The point is, there's not enough time to make an informed decision.
Production wants to shoot them as quickly as possible, as they are renting very expensive studio space and paying the talent for every shoot day.
Shark Tank is very efficient as far as TV shows go. Some shows, like Big Brother, shoot 100 minutes for every 1 minute aired. Shark Tank is probably closer to 3-5 minutes shot for every 1 minute aired. It's more like a scripted show in that regard. Certainly, all the pitches are memorized and practiced well in advance.
Someone asked my credentials. I worked on Shark Tank for one season as an editor. I have add'l credits on The Voice and Sarah Palin's Alaska for Mark Burnett Productions. I also worked for 10 other production companies on about 25-30 shows for ABC, NBC, CBS, FOX and SHOWTIME. Some of them I don't remember. Some of them I would like to forget, for example, Famous in 12: http://www.tmz.com/category/famous-in-12/
Any comments on that one in particular? I wasn't a fan of Palin politically but I saw a bit of the show and she did seem to genuinely love Alaska and want to share it.
SPA is a show that I had a lot of influence over. My editing work on the first show was mentioned in a New York Times.
Sarah was very protective of her family's image as it was airing close to the time when one of her daughter's was having or had just had a child out of wedlock.
She had good reason to be protective, but this made it difficult to produce an entertaining TV show. So, the show wasn't really a show until it got to post. The executive producers were really worried.
I remember, one of my fellow editors became frustrated with his supervising producer. He threw a stack of papers into the air and slammed the door in his face.
Also, there was a scene where Sarah'a other daughter had a boyfriend over. The boyfriend wanted to go upstairs to her bedroom. Sarah wouldn't allow it, and she demanded he come back down. We edited it so that he never came back down and that she was calling her daughter's name... as if they were up there naked or something... That is where the "lie" is most evident. When there is a clear departure from the truth, but all of TV is a lie, based on excluding the boring parts. Do I feel bad that we changed what really happened? No. That was probably the most memorable moment of the entire season and drove viewership way up for the entire season, resulting in a more satisfying product for viewers.
Also, once Sarah saw the show, she got it. She had the ability to tell us to change anything she didn't like. She didn't want to change that scene or many others. It was gold.
She does love Alaska. Todd, her husband, seems like an awesome guy. They are a pretty normal family, thrown into the limelight by John McCain.
When I was on Shark Tank our pitch took a little over an hour. Granted we had a complicated audio requirements that took a while to set up, but the pitch lasted a long time.
The beginning 1-minute pitch is memorized, but everything after that when sharks are asking questions is totally free-for-all.
I was surprised and impressed by the professionalism and the speed of the production team. They had it down to almost an assembly-line.
Speaking of sharks that tanked, were you lucky enough to work on a reality show called "Love is in the Heir" [1], about a self proclaimed princess of the Pahlavi dynasty in exile?
The only thing that takes 15 minutes in television is airing 15 minutes of television. A rule of thumb is that each minute of edited television takes about nine minutes of shot footage if you're in a hurry. I'm suspicious, but not overly so.
Source: Former ENG photographer, production intern, technical director, occasional live broadcast director with an emphasis on sports. (Just tossing it out since people are demanding credentials; I'm not bothered if you believe me or not.)
Edit: Since the guy showed up and backed himself up and I immediately got downvoted, it's worth pointing out that I was actually somewhat standing up for the person and not accusing him of lying unlike the other commenters in this thread. I was suspicious, but not enough to question someone's integrity like other folks in this thread.
I can imagine that only Mark Cuban has access to that information as they are private companies. Mark definitely seems to have the entrepreneurs interests more in mind, but they are all "sharks."
Do you trust a "shark" who claims to have your best interests in mind? If they are good at what they do, yes. All the way up to the time they don't have your best interests in mind.
I met a writer a decade + ago who wrote for two of the most popular "reality" shows at the time. This individual confided in me everything on the shows was scripted and rehearsed. Everything. The NDA's prevent contestants and workers from disclosing such information, apparently. Studios loved them because, back in the day, they didn't have to pay "scale" to these people who weren't actors at all.
The thing that made me realize the lawsuit is frivolous is that his basic contention here seems to be that he didn't realize that the show would be replayed over and over for years.
Have you not watched television in the past decade? They're still re-running shows from the 50s! Why would you assume they would throw away the free-at-this-point old episodes? Does ANY non-news show do that?
I learned that many of the entrepreneurs on the show aren't even true applicants. A friend of mine works for a small company that's experienced rapid growth and a lot of publicity - there is a team at Shark Tank's production co that are aggressively trying to get them on the show.
The sad reality is that it's not even about applying and catching a break anymore... I'm not surprised.. it's TV.
Ha... I live in Waltham right on the edge of Newton and I think I saw the guy and I assumed it was just a new fangled baby Bjorn. At the time I just assumed the baby wasn't attached.
If I lived somewhere else it probably would have made a bigger impression on me but I honestly see weird devices all the time in the Boston area (particularly fairly bizarre recumbent bikes and skating devices particularly as you approach Cambridge).
Not incredibly surprising but this guy seems pretty shady, and I'm sure we're not getting the whole story.
Everything on television is at least a little bit fake. If I'm being completely honest I enjoy ST just to see the pitches and check out interesting new products. I couldn't care less what happens after the show. I bet a lot of viewers are like me.
I worked for one of the Sharks specifically in dealing with their Shark Tank investments. It is not a lie. The verbal agreements on the show are just that. This founder is saying things out of spite because his deal fell through in due diligence, which in my experience is 100% on the founder almost all of the time. Founders will hide things like law suits, giant piles of debt, etc thinking that the Shark teams won't find it. Or sometimes the product has serious flaws that the founder wasn't transparent about on air.
I stopped working for the shark before "Beyond the Tank" came out so I can't speak to the sharper image thing.
this is basically how all business works. nothing is real until the money is in the bank. and until it is, there's a million things to go wrong. it can still go wrong after, too, it's just less likely.
You certainly should not spend the money before you have it but a first tier investor's term sheet carries a lot of weight . If you don't have hidden problems, good investors don't go looking for excuses to back out of deals. The likely reason the failure rate on Shark Tank is so high is that the prospective deals are chosen for variety and for being interesting rather than being brought by experienced founders or for being highly plausible investments.
i addressed that at the end of the post. i left working with the Shark before that show, Beyond The Tank, (an entirely different program) started. some of my former co-workers actually made an appearance though. i would guess that show is a lot more fake since it's a lot more along the lines of a traditional reality show like Undercover Boss.
121 comments
[ 2.9 ms ] story [ 182 ms ] threadA 60 dollar sunshade strapped to a hat isn't niche?
Fedoras are still cool... if worn with a nice suit by a well-groomed person.
Fedoras worn with undershirts and untailored clothes were never cool in the first place.
I don't care if it looks cool, because it keeps my glasses dry in the rain, and the sun out of my face the rest of the time. If I want to be fashionable, I can wear something else, but mostly I just want to be comfortable.
[0] http://www.outbacktrading.com/river-guide-1497-brn-md
I have this one: http://www.tilley.com/us_en/men/hats/ltm6-airflor.html
Owner's manual is worth a read, if you're unfamiliar: http://www.tilley.com/media/pdf/Tilley-Owners-Manual-EN.pdf
It's a bit more expensive than what I already have, but it looks like they have a lifetime replacement guarantee and a 2-year insurance policy against loss. All other things being equal, I'd rather pay less up front and take greater care with what I bought.
[0] http://www.tilley.com/us_en/men/hats/warm-weather/tilley-wan...
[1] https://youtu.be/JzSMjSxM5Vo?t=4m4s
The popup does not have an obvious bold "close" or "X" in the right hand corner or the bottom right, it has a very light grey close in the upper left, and also does not respond to clicking outside the modal dialog.
Thats enough to consider that a dark pattern.
He's not claiming anything that the producers won't readily admit, so this should be fairly straightforward. He seems to have some merit to his claim that re-runs should show the original air date, other than that everything he claims is laughable.
But from the article there must be more since the guy sued and then settled for $20K? What did the contract say? And the licensing stuff is pretty crazy in TV (so many people want to be "on TV" it really is amazing).
I've never understood this. I have no desire to be on TV. It feels like I'm in the vast minority, but I wonder if it's just a matter of those that don't want to be on TV aren't, and based on their personalities are also less likely to have their views propagated by popular media?
That said, your hypothesis for "TV-Suitable" people isn't far off. A classmate from college went to audition for some reality TV show and basically said the producers look for certain traits such as how dramatic a person is, etc. My friend who's been on Shark Tank is definitely a charming and likeable guy (he's also a genuinely very nice guy).
These two girls twice appeared on Shark Tank. One of the girls used to babysit my kids. The company is still in business.
http://portlandtribune.com/ttt/89-news/129967-lawsuit-prompt...
https://wildfriendsfoods.com/
Being on TV is basically just wanting to be famous. Wanting to be rich and famous is hardly unusual.
Robot competitions have to make producers extra nervous. How do you hold one of those and not end up with a whole bunch of contestants that are nerdy or too ugly for TV?
Well, I'd say that claiming they are getting something that they are not leaves a bad taste in one's mouth, even as a viewer.
The one minute movies never ran due to contractual problems between NBC and SAG. We used hidden cameras, and the humans were real unsuspecting people, but I'll admit it's true they didn't accurately portray the everyday lives of actual robots in the real world: the robot's injuries and Professor Johnson's phone number were fake, and the robot waiter was fired.
The point of NBC's one-minute reality shows was to tell short entertaining two-part cliffhanger stories, which NBC would broadcast as interstitial programming at the beginning and end of commercial breaks, to compel people to keep watching TV and submit to more advertisements. [4]
But the point of Will's stories and performance was to explore how people interact and empathize with robots, discover what their beliefs and expectations are, and probe to test how easy humans are to fool or convince to play along with real-time tele-robotic wizard-of-oz man-behind-the-curtain mumbo-jumbo. [5]
"That the women are deluded seems evident; for Mr. Park assures us, that the dress of Mumbo is suffered to hang from a tree at the entrance of each town; which would hardly be the case if the women were not persuaded that it is the dress of some supernatural being"
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXrbqXPnHvE
[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXsUetUzXlg
[3] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DrArvRG2yQA
[4] http://www.allentownproductions.com/project.php?p=nbc
[5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mumbo_jumbo_(phrase)
Sounds like this guy just struggled with his business and it basically ran into the ground.
I saw an interview with Mark Cuban that was completely unrelated to the subject, but touched Shark Tank briefly and he explained how it worked.
The worst part is "let me go back on the show and tell everyone the improvements of my product". Absolutely laughable. He thinks he's entitled to a product advertisement on Shark Tank -- he's also got one and now he wants another.
This guy is a joke. Having said that, if it's true that they faked the update, including high-fiving Daymond John, that's pretty pathetic. But this guy agreed to film it and fake it, so...
Please leave these out of comments on Hacker News.
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
He is not the Apple Newton's inventor.
I like things that help battle the elements, but this isn't my cup of tea. It appears that he's also kickstarted the thing about three years ago (only to ~$10,000 in funding) and people are complaining about not receiving the item: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/36197580/finally-the-wo...
My current system of dealing with rain in the Pacific Northwest is combining a well made rain jacket with a wool baseball cap (Ebbets Fields makes some) - it solves the problem of wearing glasses in the rain pretty well. There's probably some really niche uses for the nubrella, but there's other solutions already (camera rain covers, waterproof phones/phone cases/etc).
* Rain can come at you from many more angles than just straight down
* Wind will rip apart anything remotely a sail, like the top of his device
* How do I put it on as I exit a car?
The worst part is "let me go back on the show and tell everyone the improvements of my product". Absolutely laughable. He thinks he's entitled to a product advertisement on Shark Tank -- he already got one and now he wants another.
This guy is a joke. Having said that, if it's true that they faked the update, including high-fiving Daymond John, that's pretty pathetic. But this guy agreed to film it and fake it, so...
Funny, when I saw the Nubrella, Sharper Image is the first thing that came to mind.
I think a lot of diligence and deal details have to be worked out. They ask who else own shares but they don't even go through a cap table.
I know the sharks have been disappointed when entrepreneurs turned out not to be "serious" and just show up for exposure.
This person may have been scammed, but it is also possible that one red flag ended the diligence. ("Wait? how much debt?!")
The thing that remains a mystery is this follow up episode. But that makes no sense on both sides. How do you get pressured to do a follow up episode if you never saw an investment?
I remember seeing something in a magazine a decade or so back about a Japanese person who did something very similar.
I guess Shark Tank is where you go when all normal investors have already turned you down.
This is a show is on ABC which is over the air broadcast TV. The most mainstream there is. I guarantee there are a ton of people who don't know the nuances of reality TV.
Be careful who you deal with, and force them to act sooner rather than later. When dealing with the Sharks I don't know if you really can force them to act and cut a check, they can just say they will and run re-runs, potentially screwing your future investment opportunities.
Shark Tank probably has an innocent explanation, and the truth is probably somewhere in the middle. But my BS detector went through the roof when he suggested that as a settlement for his lawsuit, he would accept being allowed to go back on a show that he claims is a fraud. This makes him sound like nothing more than a desperate, failed business owner that is attempting extort his way back onto the show for the free advertising it offers.
TV production is not very exciting. Post-production even less so. A lot of sitting and waiting. A lot of looking through useless footage to try to find the juice.
I have worked in TV for over a decade. I am leaving Santa Monica to move to Mission Bay in San Francisco in November. I hope not to work on another TV show for the rest of my life, but God laughs when we make plans.
Production wants to shoot them as quickly as possible, as they are renting very expensive studio space and paying the talent for every shoot day.
Shark Tank is very efficient as far as TV shows go. Some shows, like Big Brother, shoot 100 minutes for every 1 minute aired. Shark Tank is probably closer to 3-5 minutes shot for every 1 minute aired. It's more like a scripted show in that regard. Certainly, all the pitches are memorized and practiced well in advance.
Someone asked my credentials. I worked on Shark Tank for one season as an editor. I have add'l credits on The Voice and Sarah Palin's Alaska for Mark Burnett Productions. I also worked for 10 other production companies on about 25-30 shows for ABC, NBC, CBS, FOX and SHOWTIME. Some of them I don't remember. Some of them I would like to forget, for example, Famous in 12: http://www.tmz.com/category/famous-in-12/
Any comments on that one in particular? I wasn't a fan of Palin politically but I saw a bit of the show and she did seem to genuinely love Alaska and want to share it.
Sarah was very protective of her family's image as it was airing close to the time when one of her daughter's was having or had just had a child out of wedlock.
She had good reason to be protective, but this made it difficult to produce an entertaining TV show. So, the show wasn't really a show until it got to post. The executive producers were really worried.
I remember, one of my fellow editors became frustrated with his supervising producer. He threw a stack of papers into the air and slammed the door in his face.
Also, there was a scene where Sarah'a other daughter had a boyfriend over. The boyfriend wanted to go upstairs to her bedroom. Sarah wouldn't allow it, and she demanded he come back down. We edited it so that he never came back down and that she was calling her daughter's name... as if they were up there naked or something... That is where the "lie" is most evident. When there is a clear departure from the truth, but all of TV is a lie, based on excluding the boring parts. Do I feel bad that we changed what really happened? No. That was probably the most memorable moment of the entire season and drove viewership way up for the entire season, resulting in a more satisfying product for viewers.
Also, once Sarah saw the show, she got it. She had the ability to tell us to change anything she didn't like. She didn't want to change that scene or many others. It was gold.
She does love Alaska. Todd, her husband, seems like an awesome guy. They are a pretty normal family, thrown into the limelight by John McCain.
The beginning 1-minute pitch is memorized, but everything after that when sharks are asking questions is totally free-for-all.
I was surprised and impressed by the professionalism and the speed of the production team. They had it down to almost an assembly-line.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Love_Is_in_the_Heir
Source: Former ENG photographer, production intern, technical director, occasional live broadcast director with an emphasis on sports. (Just tossing it out since people are demanding credentials; I'm not bothered if you believe me or not.)
Edit: Since the guy showed up and backed himself up and I immediately got downvoted, it's worth pointing out that I was actually somewhat standing up for the person and not accusing him of lying unlike the other commenters in this thread. I was suspicious, but not enough to question someone's integrity like other folks in this thread.
Do you trust a "shark" who claims to have your best interests in mind? If they are good at what they do, yes. All the way up to the time they don't have your best interests in mind.
But 2% dilution aint THAT bad.
edit: no names
Have you not watched television in the past decade? They're still re-running shows from the 50s! Why would you assume they would throw away the free-at-this-point old episodes? Does ANY non-news show do that?
The sad reality is that it's not even about applying and catching a break anymore... I'm not surprised.. it's TV.
That said, I think this guy's story sounds fishy.
If I lived somewhere else it probably would have made a bigger impression on me but I honestly see weird devices all the time in the Boston area (particularly fairly bizarre recumbent bikes and skating devices particularly as you approach Cambridge).
Everything on television is at least a little bit fake. If I'm being completely honest I enjoy ST just to see the pitches and check out interesting new products. I couldn't care less what happens after the show. I bet a lot of viewers are like me.
I stopped working for the shark before "Beyond the Tank" came out so I can't speak to the sharper image thing.
This is pretty much how life works too!