BJD sweatshops?

Sharnofshade, what evidence do you have that these particular companies outsource their casting to Chinese companies? Or that their wait times are caused by "bulk orders from China being shipped to the doll company before they can ship to you"?

 

Soom in particular had a case of dolls being cast at the Chinese company being sold by third parties on eBay or taobao (ie, not officially through Soom - Soom made no money off those sales, and they were essentially bootlegs done by the Chinese company doing the official casting work for Soom). I can't recall the details around Iplehouse (I believe it was something similar, I think a Chinese recaster got hold of an original mould that had been thrown out due to age/overuse), and Volks/Fairyland may just be rumours.

No one is going to get 'proof' of BJDs being made in sweatshops, because companies are well aware of how negative the press is for that. If you want to believe that BJDs as a product are entirely ethically made, no one will be able to talk you out of it. Personally, I find it very naive, and think it shows a very poor understanding of a) how much expertise sweatshop workers have and b) just how incredibly prevalent sweatshop conditions are in China.

 

Sharneofshade you might read up on libel laws before accusing specific companies of wrongdoing. And if you offer PROOF of BJDs being made in sweatshops (not just cast at a Chinese factory - cause hard as it might be to understand, not ALL Chinese factories are 'sweatshops') then I for one will change my tune. I like proof however.
And you are the one sounding naive in fact.

 

I have not made any claims that could be libellous. "I think it's almost certain" and "X companies are risky" are not actionable claims. Please don't lecture people about the law on the Internet. Edit: And Soom's issue with backdoor bootlegging was posted about by Soom themselves. Information from the company cannot be used in a libel case brought by the company, for obvious reasons.

I'm also well aware of the difference between Chinese labour and sweatshop labour.

Since people clearly have strong opinions about this topic, I'm going to bow out now. I have no interest in being browbeaten by people who have exactly as much evidence for their own opinions as I have for mine (which is to say, nothing but conjecture).

 

@sharnofshade: I don't have a particular strong opinion about this, it's just that I haven't found proof to think there's something wrong with these services. There are casting companies all around the world, even in the United Kingdom, and the ones I know of all have a similar policy, no matter what country they're in.

To me, they are like the resource companies in the games industry. They provide low poly models and other general items for game developers to use. Often, they also create higher resolution character models if a developer asks them too. And all of these resource companies have multiple clients. These companies aren't sweat shops, but they are based in a small niche. And in order to survive, they need to attract as many orders as possible, otherwise they are out of work.

I know that Soom had trouble with backdoor bootlegging, but that still doesn't proof that the Chinese casting company guilty of this was a sweatshop. It just proves that they are violating international copyright law (and that's enough reason to stay away from them).

 

Um, sharnofshade, I just asked what evidence you had for the particular points you made . . . I'm not sure why you went off on me with such hostility. Thank you for the actual information you did post.

 

I doubt it, they're all unique dolls, and it takes a month or more to make them. So, american girl otherwise, is more of a sweatshop. My cousin is obsessed with american girl, and she can order from seattle, and it'll come from Seattle to michigan within three days, and they have a huge stock there. So, American girl is a hypocrite kind of.