Intellivision Amico’s trademark changed to ‘abandoned’

[Rev]

2 hours ago, Matt_B said:

Maybe they could partner up with one of the companies who makes consoles for the North Korean market?

 

Maybe SouljaBoy can take over Amico project.  They may be relabeled crappy consoles, but at least SouljaBoy delivers! (Sometimes)

[Rev]

Soula can just relabel this handheld and call it: Amico Pocket.   Leave the good Intellivision name off of it. 

 

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/soulja-boy-updates-fans-on-delayed-400-game-console-after-being-labeled-a-scammer/ar-AA17fNM9

[roots.genoa]

2 hours ago, SteveTheColecoDude said:

 

Should be simple, I'm sure he's a very close friend of Tommy's.

Worst case scenario I can find the email address of Jacky Cheung. 😎

[MattPilz]

15 hours ago, Buffalo Biff Burgertime said:

Maybe they can partner with Jackie Chan.

(Off-Topic) Thanks for posting that picture! I was able to play on that system at Midwest Gaming last year and then could never remember the name of it. The history was fascinating as it was one of the Famiclones used as a decoy educational machine that just so happened to play all the otherwise barred Famicom games. The one I tried even had a variant of BASIC on it so was pretty capable with that full keyboard.

 

I do wonder what celebrities would had endorsed Amico. We can look back at the many @CurlyQ creations to imagine an alternate universe where it happened. 😀

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Flojomojo]

On 2/21/2023 at 3:44 PM, Cebus Capucinis said:

Remember, somehow "at any time" doesn't mean "anytime you ask for it," just like "100% refundable" doesn't mean you get all your money back - or something like that, I honestly stopped paying attention months ago. 🙄

@jerseystyle beat me to it ... just because they COULD and SHOULD have refunded everyone, doesn't mean they DID. 

17 hours ago, SegaSnatcher said:

Is he doing his best Tommy impression now?    

They're going through a "quiet period," said Phil, over a year ago. 

 

@MattPilz I'm a little ambivalent about those photoshops. On the one hand, they're whimsical and some of them are funny ... but on the other, they feed the fantasy/fraud that characterized this whole project. The "artist" has not been straight about whether he has been on Intellivision's payroll. I've definitely seen this kind of image used for promotional purposes in the many spam emails Intellivision used to mail out. 

 

It's been a little emotional roller coaster for me. At first I thought it was funny and a little ridiculous, then I found it infuriating that AtariAge would double down on supporting obvious jackass @Tommy Tallarico, then it was funny again when he got his propaganda outlet yanked out from under him, and now it's mostly sad that this just doesn't seem to die. 

[rayik]

59 minutes ago, Flojomojo said:

At first I thought it was funny and a little ridiculous, then I found it infuriating that AtariAge would double down on supporting obvious jackass @Tommy Tallarico, then it was funny again when he got his propaganda outlet yanked out from under him, and now it's mostly sad that this just doesn't seem to die. 

It’s dead. The simple explanation for the “quiet period” is there is nothing at all happening.  It’s been dead for over a year.  I do not expect to ever see an “official” cancellation as that requires somebody actually doing something. Which no one is. 

[Flojomojo]

Just now, rayik said:

It’s dead. The simple explanation for the “quiet period” is there is nothing at all happening.  It’s been dead for over a year.  I do not expect to ever see an “official” cancellation as that requires somebody actually doing something. Which no one is. 

They still owe people money, so something could come out of that. 

Just one lawsuit so far, discussed at 1:07 of the final regular CUPodcast: 

https://amicogames.com/post/709630434767699968/the-stupid-avoidable-intellivision-amico 

His defense is pretty weak sauce, seems unlikely to win if he fails to pay up or settle. 

[rayik]

For folks owed $100 it is impractical or most likely impossible to sue. Even in Small Claims the Court has to have jurisdiction over IE. There won’t be jurisdiction unless you live in a State where IE does business. If you can get jurisdiction, sue, IE defaults by failing to Answer and default Judgment is entered, all you will have is a piece of paper saying IE owes you money. Good luck collecting. 

[MattPilz]

5 minutes ago, rayik said:

For folks owed $100 it is impractical or most likely impossible to sue. Even in Small Claims the Court has to have jurisdiction over IE. There won’t be jurisdiction unless you live in a State where IE does business. If you can get jurisdiction, sue, IE defaults by failing to Answer and default Judgment is entered, all you will have is a piece of paper saying IE owes you money. Good luck collecting. 

Yep. Those and all private investors from Fig/Republic are pretty much out of luck with no chance to recover the losses. It's even baked into the agreements on the investment sites and disclosures that there is no guarantee it will launch or be successful.

 

For Intellivision the bigger fish are the internal and external loans they borrowed against totaling millions of dollars, with interest. Will be interesting to see how all of those debts pan out as they continue reaching maturity. The only recourse from Intellivision might be to administratively dissolve, file bankruptcy and hope that there aren't too many other personal agreements that make their individual staffers liable for repayment like Tommy is currently experiencing. Although if we take Phil's word, and I tend not to given his history of speaking untruths, maybe they really are racking in 6-7 figure licensing deals that will be enough to pay off the important debts if they know how to prioritize funds.

[roots.genoa]

11 hours ago, Flojomojo said:

It's been a little emotional roller coaster for me. At first I thought it was funny and a little ridiculous, then I found it infuriating that AtariAge would double down on supporting obvious jackass @Tommy Tallarico, then it was funny again when he got his propaganda outlet yanked out from under him, and now it's mostly sad that this just doesn't seem to die.

If Tommy doesn't check AtariAge on a regular basis, his notifications must look like this now:

[jhd]

15 hours ago, rayik said:

It’s dead. The simple explanation for the “quiet period” is there is nothing at all happening.  It’s been dead for over a year.  I do not expect to ever see an “official” cancellation as that requires somebody actually doing something. Which no one is. 

 

My father owned and operated a successful small business some 25 years ago. He eventually decided to retire and shut it down. All of the outstanding accounts were paid, leases terminated, assets sold, etc. 

 

Rather than formally dissolve the corporation, however, his lawyer told him to just stop making the annual registration filings (and payment); after a period of time the company would be automatically struck from the registry -- which presumably it eventually was. 

 

I do not know the rationale behind this recommendation, but possibly Phil has received similar advice from his legal team. 

 

As correctly noted above, as long as the corporation exists it can (theoretically) be sued, but if it has no assets then there is no point in doing so. 

[Tommy2D]

11 hours ago, jhd said:

 

My father owned and operated a successful small business some 25 years ago. He eventually decided to retire and shut it down. All of the outstanding accounts were paid, leases terminated, assets sold, etc. 

 

Rather than formally dissolve the corporation, however, his lawyer told him to just stop making the annual registration filings (and payment); after a period of time the company would be automatically struck from the registry -- which presumably it eventually was. 

 

I do not know the rationale behind this recommendation, but possibly Phil has received similar advice from his legal team. 

 

As correctly noted above, as long as the corporation exists it can (theoretically) be sued, but if it has no assets then there is no point in doing so. 

This is just a guess but maybe it's easier to resurrect a business that's "lapsed" as opposed to formally dissolved? 

[Matt_B]

I suspect that, with Intellivision, it's not so much a case of them having no assets but some highly overvalued ones. The Amico R&D was, as of around this time last year, valued at $9.5 million for the StartEngine campaign, for instance.

 

With the true value being rather closer to zero, it's probably better to let the company get driven into administration, so someone else gets to put a price on it all.

 

[MrBeefy]

19 hours ago, roots.genoa said:

If Tommy doesn't check AtariAge on a regular basis, his notifications must look like this now:

I wonder if he's still holding onto his two shits waiting for me to be stupidly positive over the console he was too innept to get out the door?

 

It can't be good for Tommy "Two Shits" to hold onto it for that long.

[+Biff Burgertime]

On 2/22/2023 at 3:54 PM, MattPilz said:

(Off-Topic) Thanks for posting that picture! I was able to play on that system at Midwest Gaming last year and then could never remember the name of it. The history was fascinating as it was one of the Famiclones used as a decoy educational machine that just so happened to play all the otherwise barred Famicom games. The one I tried even had a variant of BASIC on it so was pretty capable with that full keyboard.

I first heard about it in this video:

 

It was one of those fun moments where hobbies unexpectedly crossed. I was watching this channel to learn about an unfamiliar part of the world, he was one of a few travel vloggers I was following at the time. One day I open YT and to my surprise there's Jackie Chan... holding a Famicone?! Instant click! From there I did some Google Fu and read about how devices like this were marketed as "educational" to circumvent China's video games ban.

 

 

For more info: http://www.hardcoregaming101.net/jackiechan/jackie3.htm#Subor

 

[MrBeefy]

 

[Cebus Capucinis]

On 2/22/2023 at 3:14 PM, Flojomojo said:

They still owe people money, so something could come out of that. 

Just one lawsuit so far, discussed at 1:07 of the final regular CUPodcast: 

https://amicogames.com/post/709630434767699968/the-stupid-avoidable-intellivision-amico 

His defense is pretty weak sauce, seems unlikely to win if he fails to pay up or settle. 

For the record, his defense of "duty to pursue borrower first" may be an actual thing (very unlikely), depending upon the way the guaranty agreement was written.

 

They're pretty RARE, especially for UCC Article 2A leasing agreements, but I have negotiated guaranties in the past for clients to have a provision that states that the lender must exhaust certain remedies against the borrower before going after the guarantor. (Those circumstances are NOWHERE near this situation, as in those cases the companies that were borrowing were FLUSH with cash and had a reserve account set aside for the full balance of the loan and used a deposit account control agreement as additional security).

 

If the lender skips the line and goes to the guarantor before taking those steps, the suit can be dismissed and the lender told to go after the borrower first (though usually what happens is borrower just gets joined to the action). However, often executives or directors of companies - or at least affiliated people - are the personal guarantors for businesses. Lenders absolutely LOATHE doing the "exhaust remedies" route because usually that means the personal guarantor gets wind of what's going on and poof goes the backup money source. (Usually moving finances is a default under the guaranty, but at that point who really cares if you're defaulting). The lender NOT being able to skip the line is unlikely here.

 

One, it's unlikely that was successfully negotiated here - IE had zero creditworthiness and TT would be the deep pockets, so to speak, so there's little chance a lender would accept a redline to a form doc with the bog standard boilerplate "unlimited, we can go after you the moment the debt hits default" provision removed. If that language is in the agreement, there's a good chance the argument is completely pointless.

 

Second, even if there were some requirement like that, their lien was only on the leased equipment they provided (I believe. Not completely sure and too lazy to look up UCC-1 statements, but for 2A equip financing that's very, very standard).  In that situation, the finance agreement will allow the lender a remedy of entry into the property without judicial process to compile the collateral and dispose of it, usually via sale. The lender - ALREADY did that here. They got their stuff, they sold it, the decreased the principal balance of the loan. If TT's argument (presumably it is, but answers to complaints are always low on details) is they should have SUED IE first, that's an easy one to get around - our remedy was to get our stuff and sell it, we did that, there's still X balance remaining and it's a recourse lease (because it wouldn't ever be non-recourse), suing IE would be pointless, so we go for the guarantor. (Not to nerd out too much, but it probably doesn't even dismiss the suit, because the lender can just join IE as a co-defendant and problem solved).

 

The "lender was negligent in administration" is just throwing darts at the wall for affirmative defenses. I'm sure it ends up in a reply most of the time, but it's an incredibly unlikely argument to win as it seems, frankly, pretty stupid other than in egregious cases (which I'm sure this isn't).

 

Maybe his other defenses have some water to them, beats me. I didn't want to read the whole filing, so I just looked at those two.

 

So, yeah, at least based on those two arguments, TT's probably going to have to cough up some scratch to cover the deficit vs. repossession of the collateral.

 

I'd also add, while not uncommon, the fact that a sheriff served the papers is a bit unique for a highly populated area. Usually that doesn't happen unless other attempts via process servers have failed, so wonder if he was ducking service (purely speculative on my part).

 

(DISCLAIMER: I was a litigator for only a hot second in my life and now would rather be kicked in the groin than do a trial. Grain of salt for everything except the "sometimes this is in a document" stuff).

[Rev]

 

[Rev]

Intellivision got the furniture in Feb 2021.   
 

Then Intellivision states the furniture was sold about 1 year later, Feb 2022. 
 

Which logic dictates for it to be sold in Feb 2022, it would of had to be repossessed, moved, auctioned off, which takes time. Maybe repossessed in Dec 2021 or Jan 2022? Maybe earlier? Who knows. 
 

 

The Amico unboxing video was released on March 22 2022, and it shows some of the repossessed furniture in the background. The office looks abandoned even at that point. So when was the unboxing video filmed? Late 2021-ish possibly.   They sure waited a long time to show that.  Maybe part of the  crowdfunding grift Startengine that ended early. 
 

So the crowdfunding started and the offices was already abandoned and empty it appears.
 

 

[Cebus Capucinis]

1 hour ago, Rev said:

Which logic dictates for it to be sold in Feb 2022, it would of had to be repossessed, moved, auctioned off, which takes time.

Not exactly. The UCC states that repossession and sale of property is legal as long as it is "commercially reasonable."

 

What happens a lot of the time with equip finance / leases is that in the agreement, alongside the grant of a security interest, you'll have a provision that says "debtor agrees that it is commercially reasonable for lender to get the stuff and sell it within 10 days, and such sale doesn't have to be at the price you'd expect in a fully noticed auction etc. etc." They can even say "we can just choose not to sell it or we can sell it to an affiliate or a party we pre-selected without an auction or bidding process."

 

I'd be shocked if that's not in this agreement in some form, because it's near boilerplate for these agreements. Provided they have that, they could enter the premises, take possession, then give the requisite 10 day notice of sale (or however many, usually it's 10 days as some courts find it unreasonable with less or no notice, though you'll often see these agreements with a provision saying no notice is reasonable), then sell it to whomever they so choose (usually at whatever price they so choose so long as it's "close" to what you'd get for similar goods in a typical sale, but remember that value is not NEW value but distressed asset value, which is pennies on the dollar normally).

 

Provided the equip finance co has logistics in place to repossess quickly (and for the record they all do, most equip finance is really in the business of repossession and resale IMO), they could easily flip it in 2 weeks max.

 

What they're really getting at in that defense is they're trying to argue that the price wasn't commercially reasonable, rather than the conduct. Depending on the language of the agreement, it might be fine, but typically what you're trying to do in making that defense is say "hold up, this wasn't even what you'd get from a ready, willing, and able buyer on the market for goods of this type."

 

The counter is that it's used office equipment sold on a liquidation market, so the value is fine. Ultimately that gets into spending tons of money for experts to appraise the stuff, analyze the market, and come up with an opinion as to whether the price was reasonable - which for $180k in stuff, going to price you out of your argument in legal fees. (The strategy here is to make it expensive enough for the lender that they'll settle).

 

Practically, they'll throw a bit of fees at it and probably settle somewhere around $65-100k for it. TT will have to cough up some dough. (Prediction hat off).

[Rev]

2 hours ago, Cebus Capucinis said:

Not exactly. The UCC states that repossession and sale of property is legal as long as it is "commercially reasonable."

 

What happens a lot of the time with equip finance / leases is that in the agreement, alongside the grant of a security interest, you'll have a provision that says "debtor agrees that it is commercially reasonable for lender to get the stuff and sell it within 10 days, and such sale doesn't have to be at the price you'd expect in a fully noticed auction etc. etc." They can even say "we can just choose not to sell it or we can sell it to an affiliate or a party we pre-selected without an auction or bidding process."

 

I'd be shocked if that's not in this agreement in some form, because it's near boilerplate for these agreements. Provided they have that, they could enter the premises, take possession, then give the requisite 10 day notice of sale (or however many, usually it's 10 days as some courts find it unreasonable with less or no notice, though you'll often see these agreements with a provision saying no notice is reasonable), then sell it to whomever they so choose (usually at whatever price they so choose so long as it's "close" to what you'd get for similar goods in a typical sale, but remember that value is not NEW value but distressed asset value, which is pennies on the dollar normally).

 

Provided the equip finance co has logistics in place to repossess quickly (and for the record they all do, most equip finance is really in the business of repossession and resale IMO), they could easily flip it in 2 weeks max.

 

What they're really getting at in that defense is they're trying to argue that the price wasn't commercially reasonable, rather than the conduct. Depending on the language of the agreement, it might be fine, but typically what you're trying to do in making that defense is say "hold up, this wasn't even what you'd get from a ready, willing, and able buyer on the market for goods of this type."

 

The counter is that it's used office equipment sold on a liquidation market, so the value is fine. Ultimately that gets into spending tons of money for experts to appraise the stuff, analyze the market, and come up with an opinion as to whether the price was reasonable - which for $180k in stuff, going to price you out of your argument in legal fees. (The strategy here is to make it expensive enough for the lender that they'll settle).

 

Practically, they'll throw a bit of fees at it and probably settle somewhere around $65-100k for it. TT will have to cough up some dough. (Prediction hat off).

The lawsuit response says the furniture was sold around Feb 2022.   
 

 

[masschamber]

2 hours ago, Cebus Capucinis said:

Not exactly. The UCC states that repossession and sale of property is legal as long as it is "commercially reasonable."

 

What happens a lot of the time with equip finance / leases is that in the agreement, alongside the grant of a security interest, you'll have a provision that says "debtor agrees that it is commercially reasonable for lender to get the stuff and sell it within 10 days, and such sale doesn't have to be at the price you'd expect in a fully noticed auction etc. etc." They can even say "we can just choose not to sell it or we can sell it to an affiliate or a party we pre-selected without an auction or bidding process."

 

I'd be shocked if that's not in this agreement in some form, because it's near boilerplate for these agreements. Provided they have that, they could enter the premises, take possession, then give the requisite 10 day notice of sale (or however many, usually it's 10 days as some courts find it unreasonable with less or no notice, though you'll often see these agreements with a provision saying no notice is reasonable), then sell it to whomever they so choose (usually at whatever price they so choose so long as it's "close" to what you'd get for similar goods in a typical sale, but remember that value is not NEW value but distressed asset value, which is pennies on the dollar normally).

 

Provided the equip finance co has logistics in place to repossess quickly (and for the record they all do, most equip finance is really in the business of repossession and resale IMO), they could easily flip it in 2 weeks max.

 

What they're really getting at in that defense is they're trying to argue that the price wasn't commercially reasonable, rather than the conduct. Depending on the language of the agreement, it might be fine, but typically what you're trying to do in making that defense is say "hold up, this wasn't even what you'd get from a ready, willing, and able buyer on the market for goods of this type."

 

The counter is that it's used office equipment sold on a liquidation market, so the value is fine. Ultimately that gets into spending tons of money for experts to appraise the stuff, analyze the market, and come up with an opinion as to whether the price was reasonable - which for $180k in stuff, going to price you out of your argument in legal fees. (The strategy here is to make it expensive enough for the lender that they'll settle).

 

Practically, they'll throw a bit of fees at it and probably settle somewhere around $65-100k for it. TT will have to cough up some dough. (Prediction hat off).

shame it seems like its going to end with nothing but a settlement barely out of small claims court and a handful of pilot and prototype units and a bunch of empty boxes, shame, if by some miracle there are some more test units hopefully the liquidators will sell them, I'd still buy one just because I like odd ball video game hardware, 

on the bright side anyone  looking forward to @awbacon's inevitable video on one of the few pilot units in a  decade or  so?

[Matt_B]

4 hours ago, Rev said:

Then Intellivision states the furniture was sold about 1 year later, Feb 2022. 

 

Which logic dictates for it to be sold in Feb 2022, it would of had to be repossessed, moved, auctioned off, which takes time. Maybe repossessed in Dec 2021 or Jan 2022? Maybe earlier? Who knows. 
 

 

The Amico unboxing video was released on March 22 2022, and it shows some of the repossessed furniture in the background. The office looks abandoned even at that point. So when was the unboxing video filmed? Late 2021-ish possibly.   They sure waited a long time to show that.  Maybe part of the  crowdfunding grift Startengine that ended early.

According to the original lawsuit, they defaulted on the loan in July 15, 2022. This was well after the "unboxing" video was released, so no shenanigans there.

 

I wouldn't be surprised if only some of the furniture was recovered because they'd have also had to vacate their offices and fire most of their employees at around the same time.

[Cebus Capucinis]

26 minutes ago, Matt_B said:

According to the original lawsuit, they defaulted on the loan in July 15, 2022.

If they defaulted in June, that's when the lender packed up the stuff and sold it. You're not going to enforce remedies on a loan prior to it being in default.

 

So IE's counsel is being a little generous here with the "after about one year" - that's actually closer to 18 months of depreciation. That type of imprecision in a document is either bad drafting or intentionally burying the lede, neither of which makes for a winning argument.

 

It would be even more interesting if, as you put it, the lender could only repossess a portion of the collateral at that time, which is another interesting fact that, if true, tsk tsk IE's counsel for leaving that out.

[Matt_B]

Six months is probably neither here nor there when it comes to the value of second hand office furniture. The bulk of the depreciation is going to take place during the instant that it goes from new to old, after all.

 

Also, as far as I can tell, the lawyers are only representing Tommy Tallarico, not Intellivision Entertainment.