2015.11.29 What the F.....

I couldn't make this up if I tried.....

Ken Whitman has brought back the d20Entertainment website just so he could shill for more money. At least he is being honest for once that if you give him money this time you'll get "nothing"......

.....and I love the misinformation that "most proceeds" will go towards, well anything. I'm sorry, but if the man can't provide backers with a $16.92 book they paid $100 for, how is giving him $5, $10, $50, or even $100 more going to make it happen?

If you have to actually think about that question, the answer is "it won't".

2015.11.30 Edit

If this wasn't bad enough on its own.......if you actually did want to give Ken Whitman more money for "nothing"......there is a $4.93 shipping and handling fee for Ken Whitman to send you nothing.....

2015.11.29 SSDD: Ken Whitman Doubles-Down on Trying to Scam Some $$

The last few days have been a flurry of comments, some from our hero of the decade Ken Whitman. The summation of Ken Whitman's comments pretty much sum up the cycle of bullshit we've come to see from a man of his caliber: "I'm awesome, the people I've taken money from are whiners, and I'm slowly working on these Kickstarters....you just need to be patient."

Now I realize that calling this a "cycle of bullshit" shows my bias, so yet again dear reader, please assume everything I post here is a flat out lie and do the research yourself. Use the links in the sidebar to read the Kickstarter comments (with an emphasis on Ken Whitman's "updates"). Go through the "Ken Sez" page and follow those links back to the original source.

I think the average person will inevitably come to the same conclusion.

Case in point:

Ken Whitman has re-opened his D20 Entertainment online store to "sell" books that don't exist. To date not one soft cover of the KODT: 20 Years of Covers has been seen in the wild. They just don't exist. I'm pretty certain, but cannot say with 100% accuracy that the same goes for the "limited edition" leather-bound hardcover.

This is truly a "Caveat Emptor" situation because if you pay for one of these products, you are throwing your money away. Where the hell is the FTC when you need them?

2015.11.25 Reports that Ken (Whit) Whitman is Leaving Atlanta for Las Vegas

The last couple of days here have been interesting, to say the least. Our hero of the year managed to check in twice with comments, both of which I think were attempts to....heck, I don't even have a clue what is rattling around in Ken Whitman's big head. Definitely not any scruples.......

The first is a jab if there ever was one:
"Whit Whitman is a good name. Just saying!"

The second one.....well, this one was a doozy. Ken Whitman tried to defend having a game store sell a bunch of his "limited edition" resin:
"Perhaps , all the unpainted resin models have shipped, and all the painted ones are defects or damaged?"

You don't have to go far to find out that plenty of folks never got their ships, and some who did got broken and incomplete ships......

For whatever reason, Ken Whitman, or "Whit Whitman" as he's trying to call himself now, thinks that keeping on the move will give him enough breathing room to take potshots at those he duped. While I cannot substantiate these rumors (so assume I'm 110% wrong here) I've heard Ken, er...Whit Whitman was living out of a truck in order to evade process servers and the law. Bedding down in Atlanta might not have been good enough and allegedly Whit Whitman is heading off to Las Vegas.

At this point I'm not certain we can take anything Ken/Whit Whitman says as truthful, but this last bit at least came from him:

"Atlanta has been fun, but after Thanksgiving, I am headed to Vegas baby! I will let you know about my awesome new plans once I am settled."

Of course I only think this might be some subterfuge because there were no spelling errors in the post.....

2015.11.16 Much More of Ken Whitman's "Limited Edition" Resin Spotted in a Retail Outfit

You would think that by now, more than three months after starting Not Another Dime (For Ken Whitman) that I wouldn't be surprised by Ken Whitman's shenanigans, especially when you factor in all the things I've heard 2nd hand but can't get enough background info to share......

.....but I continue to be amazed. Last week there was a bit of a brouhaha over Noble Knight Games carrying some KoDT 20 Years of covers books and some resin from the Spinward Traveller Kickstarter.

The TL;DR version is Ken Whitman sold Noble Knight Games books and resin ships that (arguably) had already been bought and paid for by Kickstarter backers, stiffing not only the backers, but Noble Knight Games because he shorted them $700+ in product. Instead of recouping some of their losses Noble Knight Games decided to take the high road and eat a $2500 investment by giving these tainted products to some of the Kickstarter Backers.

Now I've always assumed that Ken Whitman wasn't on the up & up when it came to these items. Complaints about Kickstarter Backers getting stiffed abound and I suspect that we are only seeing the tip of the iceberg here because Ken Whitman sold a lot of product via his website and there is no oversight there. We know the KoDT books were pretty cheap to produce and there is no telling how many of the "limited edition" and softcover books he sold. Nobody has seen the $250 leather-bound or $50 softcover books in the wild.

Basically I have low expectations of Ken Whitman's business sense and a high expectation of his ability to scam and steal. Even then Ken Whitman's ability beat the spread on these expectations pops up now and then.

A week ago, as the Noble Knight Games drama was unfolding, one of Ken Whitman's supporters posted this picture online. See anything familiar?

There, on the bottom of the display case at the physical store for Troll and Toad is a bunch of Ken Whitman's Traveller resin. I can make out painted & unpainted Beowolfs, unpainted Scout Ships, unpainted Gazelles, and a bunch of some ships I'm not familiar with.

Here is a link to the picture on Facebook (until it gets pulled).

Now these were all "limited editions" and I find it hard to believe that Troll and Toad would naturally corner the market with at least 12% of all these "limited edition" Beowulfs. A quick search of the online store doesn't show these models available.......but this is a recent picture.

There is a helluva lot more resin here than what Noble Knight Games had.......

2015.11.23 Edit
In response from a comment, here is the webpage for Troll and Toad, and the link to the "official" Facebook page:

Note the address........

2015.11.22 THIS is the Reason Not Another Dime (for Ken Whitman) Exists

I know a lot of people probably just read the articles here and don't see the comments. Part of that can be explained by the fact I don't use post breaks. The only way the comments can be viewed are if you click on the post titles to read just that post.

This blog has but one purpose: to document Ken Whitman's shady business dealings. While the original intent was to be somewhat fair and neutral with regards to Ken Whitman, after a while all this does alter your perceptions of the man. Hard not to see Ken Whitman as a con-man.

I'd argue that one of the people most hurt (on so many levels) is Jolly Blackburn, creator of the Knights of the Dinner Table.

Jolly Blackburn has left a new comment on your post "2015.11.20 Request for Assistance" (emphasis is mine, not Jolly's):

"Well I woke up to yet another email from one of Ken's 'friend's maintaining Ken 'means well' and doesn't set out to fail. I want to make it clear what happened with these books in this latest revelation. While a lot backers were complaining about not receiving their books, Ken took the books he had in hand and SOLD them to Noble Knight. We've been compiling a list of backers who never got their books. Almost all of them are European addresses. Now Ken charged $100 for these books. For those in Europe he had them prepay $40+ in shipping. So that's $140 per book (less the $17 or so to print them) he pocketed. THEN he sold them for (Im guessing $25 to $50 each) to NK for further profit.

Nice work if you can find it I guess.

I don't want to hear that Ken "means well" any more. Sorry, I'm a little annoyed with these most recent revealation. Learning he had the books in hands and just didn't send them out is a jaw dropper.
When someone says this guy "means well" they are acting as an enabler to allow this guy to do this sort of thing to the next person in line."

2015.11.20 Request for Assistance

We got an email this morning requesting some assistance reaching out to folks that might have gotten scammed out of some resin ships from the Spinward Traveller Kickstarter:

"I'm working with Noble Knight Games to try and get the KODT books to backers that did not get them.   I have access to Jolly and the KODT KS comments but NKG wanted to know about the Traveller ships and if they are safe to sell them or if backers are missing them.

I do not have access to the Traveller KS comments to ask if backers are missing ships.   I know from reading every post in this blog that you have several different contacts and sources and wondered if you knew a backer from the Traveller KS that could help us find out any backers that did not receive their Traveller ships so we can try and get this product to the correct backers.  Its all honor based but if I can and Aaron at NKG can ... we want to try and get this product Ken sold that he was not supposed to into the right hands.   Thank you for any help you can give.
Tom Anders @ Impact! Miniatures"

If you haven't received your Beowulf ship.....the Kickstarter only shows 27 names who should have gotten the ship, but we know how "good" Ken Whitman was with names, numbers, and promises, please post to the Kickstarter comments, use the email contact form on this page, or contact Tom directly.

2015.11.18 Ken Whitman Screws Over Businesses as Easily as his Customers

So about those items over at Noble Knight Games....

.....it appears that they've been screwed over just like everyone else has by "our boy" Ken Whitman, who has fled from Kentucky to Georgia and allegedly "changed" his name to Whit Whitman.

There is a HUGE thread over at the KenzerCo forums that were set up specifically to allow Ken Whitman to "be more responsive to backers and keep them updated", but....of course....Ken Whitman couldn't be bothered to actually take advantage of this above & beyond effort by KenzerCo to allow the then-failing Ken Whitman to "turn things around and move forward".

You can read through the many posts and what you'll find is a lot of frustration from the fans & backers and far too much apologizing from folks that are not Ken Whitman. Personally, I'd just skip ahead to page 22 (or so) to where the conversation goes to the interaction between Noble Knight Games and Ken Whitman. Since you can read what is a copy of a 1st hand account there, we'll just provide this one highlight:

"We've decided not to sell these after more information has been presented to us. Regardless, we are now out around $2500 with Whitman (including both ships and books) including $755 outstanding directly."

So what you have here is basically a company that paid $2500 for product and was shorted $755 worth of said product. Because of Ken Whitman's general fuckery they've decided it was in their best interest to "write off" the investment of books and resin ships as "goodwill" instead of recouping what they can to cut their losses to the minimum of $755.

Seriously, how bad does your supplier have to be that you'd rather take it in the shorts to the tune of $2500? Think about how much extra product Noble Knight Games has to sell above & beyond their norm to make up that shortfall.

If you are in the market for any games, please support Noble Knight Games. Not sure they have what you want? Use this link for an advanced search. Let's show them some love!

2015.11.18 "Limited Edition" Books Spotted in the Wild for Sale

The ability of Ken Whitman to try and make a buck by screwing people over continues to amaze me.

We've covered the KoDT: 20 Years of Covers book before, a couple of times actually. We learned that Ken Whitman isn't actually making the books himself and they only cost $16.92 to produce......but backers could buy this "limited edition" for only $100, but only until February 5th, 2014.

The thing is there are people who have never gotten their hardcover book and nobody has seen the softcover version out in the wild yet.

If you are one of these people, don't fret.......Noble Knight Games has 17 on hand at a "steal" of only $71.96!

I know there are only 17 because the system will tell you if you try to order more than they have....

Now I wouldn't rush to blame Noble Knight Games because they probably didn't know about Ken Whitman. This......this is the reason this blog exists, to help get the word out. I've heard that Noble Knight Games is taking appropriate action with this inventory.......but as of the time of this post the books are still available for purchase.

2015.11.18 EDIT
We are aware that Ken Whitman has also provided Noble Knight Games with some resin ships, but the quantity seems to be small and it is unknown if NKG acquired them from the Kickstarter, d20 Entertainment Store, or other means. If we get some more detailed knowledge about those ships then we could post about them.

2015.11.09 Ken's been busy, now playing "Whit" Whitman, the Comedic Oaf actor?

It appears after an unusually long period of silence, (possibly while busy raising cash for his big move to Atlanta by marrying some folks in Kentucky after becoming a minister...), Ken Whitman's become very busy lately.

From erasing his Wikipedia entry, to moving to Atlanta, GA (which appears to be, in reality, Duluth, GA, according to various sources), to getting into some acting gigs, all in his new digs in around the Duluth/Atlanta area, Mr. Whitman's been pretty active, lately.

Pretty active in all ways except producing all the films & related outstanding products he collected cash for.

2015.11.01 Ken Whitman Update

1st off a bit of an update as to why this blog has gone a bit dark as of late....

...there has been a little bit of news this last month, but nothing you couldn't get from keeping up with the assorted Kickstarter comments.

Several weeks ago I was accused by someone whose opinion I care about as having a "campaign to wreck Ken Whitman's life". This is pretty far from the truth, but that doesn't matter.....the fact that this is the perception I'm leaving does.

When the Not Another Dime Blog was setup there were actually three "authors" established, but only one ("me") has contributed here. This isn't a condemnation of the other guys....if anything they've just bee spreading the same message elsewhere so good on 'em. Just for me the price to pay for keeping folks updated is generally more than I'm willing to pay. I've already been personally screwed over by Mr. Ken Whitman and I'm not wanting to give him the power to continue to do so.....

2nd, I have heard some rather disturbing rumors, that have already partially come true. If the rest of what has been sent to me does pan out.....and for several reasons I hope they don't. At best I'll make one last post and completely walk away from this endeavor....

.....because it would be that disturbing......

The "partially true" part was confirmed a few hours ago when Mr. Ken Whitman posted on all "his" Kickstarters the following comment "update":
"Hey everyone, sorry for not posting sooner. Due to personal problems, I moved to Atlanta. As soon as I get settled I will make more updates. Take care."

I suspect the "personal problems" are directly related to his Kickstarter endeavors since it seems that several state AG offices are looking into his operations. Of course that is speculation, but it matches with what I've been informed about and the comments from those Kickstarter patrons that feel they'd been scammed by Ken Whitman.

3rd, and this may not be important, Wikipedia is considering deleting the Ken Whitman page. I got a head's up from one of this blog's readers and if you happen to be a Wikipedia editor you might want to chime in here.