Cancel my bulb order

[coralfarmer]

Hey guys,
if this is the guy who is using steve's tank pic. cancel my order for the two bulbs.
I'm going to order my bulbs thru steve.
I think we should keep it local.

James

[jkreefer]

does anybody know if he used steve pic with permission?

[jkreefer]

If Steve will give us the same price I dont have a problem going with him.

[coralfarmer]

No he did not get permission.
I'm not worried about the price

[northbay-reefer]

I dont think its that big of a deal, once a pix is posted online ... its fair game

[coralfarmer]

When you are advertising your business don't you want to use pics from your own aquarium?
Plus Steve is selling the same types of products. I think it is really cheesy. Show off your own tanks not other peoples.
Truth in advertising. if I did not know any better I would think that it an off shoot of steve's business.

[corndogg]

I emailed steve the minute I noticed this. He is aware of it and will take the actions HE deems necessary. He asked me to keep this under the radar but I had already mentioned it in the other thread. I'm sure Steve would appreciate if we waited for the smoke to clear before we continue to discuss this subject on a public venue. As far as legality goes, his photos are copyrighted and therefore require his permission before they are used.

[corndogg]

On the subject of cancelling our order, I am all for using Steve for the group buy if he can offer a similar deal. I don't think he has access to ReefOptix's supplier for these particular bulbs. Also considering he is a local guy I would feel bad trying to nickel and dime him down to matching the same deal. In no way do I want to speak on Steve's behalf but I don't think he is interested in arranging a group buy where the margins are minimal considering the legwork required for him to track down a supplier.

[Instant Tang]

Had I purchased my Coralife lighting sytem from Steve instad of getting it from Northbay, I could have saved around $200!

I buy my lighting from Steve and, even if his prices were significantly higher (which they aren't), I'd still probably do so.

Give him a chance, I think you'll see his prices meet/beat the local fish store prices...and, you're helping him keep his business going and his doors open!

Robert

[northbay-reefer]

The site wasnt suppose to be up at all(its not on his production server), he has a different site and it wont be using Steve's picture. The guy is just another hobbyist like one of us trying to make a little money and save us some money too. I dont think the pix should have been used at all but I dont think its that big of a deal, the pix was distorted from effect anyway.

This is NOT about buying or not buying from steve, I like his stuff and have bought stuff from him before and will continue that. This reefoptics is something that offer a totally different lighting colors and par that we like to try ... thats it. Give the guy a chance.

STOP making such a big deal out of this, Steve knows about it and will do what he think is right.


Here is what he saids:

Hello, Ok I see we are having a problem with your club and the website that wasn't even suppost to be listed yet. Like I stated before my friend is doing my website for me and he had a picture of a tank and he just put it up there cause he Knew I was putting a picture of tank up there. I don't even know a guy named steve that has a tank like that nor did I know he sells bulbs. If I have offended anyone I will change the picture. I was going to change it every month to match a tank of the month from the photo gallery from what people sent me. I am not tring to steal any kind of pictures and that is why I have put a gallery on the website so people can actually see what the tanks look like with REEFOPTICS Bulbs.


Wes

[spencerinla]

Sorry guys - I am the guy who's helping design his site. If any of you had noticed his site at reefopticslightingdotcom (now down, we just cancelled the account to move servers) which was a very simple page with no buying capabilities - aka his live server.

The site that you had found was on my development server http://server.b_toninc.com/~reefopti/ That site was not to be seen. Heck, the cart didn't even work! Only him and I knew about it. I was gradually sticking ideas out there for him and working on it when we had time in the evenings and weekends.

SOMEHOW the development URL was leaked in a link or from another site, or something - and Google indexed it. Everything went downhill from there. Well, as you can see this has become a problem with the so-called 'copyrighted' picture. When people would Google his bulbs - they would get his original site AND the dev site as results.

I did not mean to affend anyone as that picture I myself had found when googleing images for 'salt water aquarium' or something of the sort some months ago. I pulled the first pic I could stick in between the bars of that tank of the month area so he could see my idea.

I will be removing it this evening from the testing server to satisfy the misunderstanding. If anyone talks to this Steve- the owner of the pic - have him email me with any concerns at spencer(at)batoninc.com

[spencerinla]

I also would like to add that I think this should be kept seperate from his business complex as well as his product quality. Now, I do own the ReefOptics bulbs so I may be a bit biased as a stock-holder :) , but he is a normal hard working guy who really tries to get us all some great deals.

This has nothing to do with his business ethics as it wasn't even a production site or even a site he controlled. If you would look at the length of people knowing of that address - it was just recently leaked. The pages don't even work and we even made up gallery image owners names. Although 'Steves' 180 looks pretty killer, I have personally seen his 235g aquarium and it's chock full or RO bulbs and gives any tank, in comparison, a run for their money. I've even thought of asking why he doesn't put his own on the main page - but I think it's more of a clean/sleek business look he was aiming for.

I hope this clears things up - and sorry for any confusion this has caused.

[Steve Ruddy]

If Steve will give us the same price I dont have a problem going with him

I would love to give you Metal Halide bulbs for $35.00. The truth is I pay more than that for the bulbs myself. If you compare my current MH bulb prices to other sources of the same bulb in most cases my bulbs will cost you less. I offer $6 off any bulb with the purchase of 10 bulbs. Need more? Lets talk!

I dont think its that big of a deal, once a pix is posted online ... its fair game

That's not correct. All of my photos and content at www.coralreefecosystems.com are copywrited. Look at the bottom of any page.

I did not mean to affend anyone as that picture I myself had found when googleing images for 'salt water aquarium' or something of the sort some months ago. I pulled the first pic I could stick in between the bars of that tank of the month area so he could see my idea.

Thank you