Tour Guide Mike Query

[tjkraz]

I don't understand why mattr555's previous post would have caused TGM to discontinue his site access with no notice.

1. When posted it wasn't advertised as a "Tour Guide Mike Touring Plan"

2. Several posters in that other thread chimed in to say that it did NOT represent Mike's advice.

3. Unless there's more to the story, there didn't appear to be any malice on mattr555's part. Did the post violate the user agreement? Yeah, it probably did. But the post wasn't intended to cause any harm to Mike. Again, assuming there aren't unknown details where, it sounds like a fairly innoscent mistake.

mattr555: Any chance a spam blocker might have caught messages that Mike might have sent to your email address? I've traded messages with Mike in the past, and he seems pretty up-front in his dealings with visitors to his site.

 

[DisneyLisa]

According to TGM, he did send a notice. He's concerned that you may not have received it & has asked that someone post it on the DIS for you. Here it is:

From: TourGuideMiKE [mailto:info@tourguidemike.com]
Sent: Tuesday, April 05, 2005 8:37 PM
To: (Guest's email address removed for privacy)
Subject: Your TGMiKE purchase has been refunded in full


Dear (First name removed for privacy):

There are only five bullets on the purchase page that have to be checked off as understood. One of them is bolded to help it stand out from the others:

<<I agree that respecting one's privacy should work both ways. I will not share any planning advice or tips in the TourGuideMiKE AVP with the non-paying public via posting boards, message boards, the Internet, news articles, printed material, etc. I understand that all content, and all written interaction between TourGuideMiKE and myself, is © TourGuideMiKE, L.L.C.>>

I am sorry to read in a very popular, public forum that you were disappointed with your purchase, and I am happy to refund your money as promised in our satisfaction guarantee. Your credit card has been refunded in full, and your email address has been removed from our records. You should see the credit in 2 to 3 business days.

I wish you a wonderful, memorable, magical vacation to Walt Disney World!

Sincerely,

Michael J. Hewell
TourGuideMiKE.com

He also posted the following:

He then wrote me the next day with a polite question about why his account was not available. I wrote:

Dear (His name):

I wrote you the message below to the email address we had on file with your AVP (email address provided here -- the same one he's written me from):

And I provided a copy & paste copy of the above letter.

I have never heard back from him -- didn't think I would -- and I'm sorry if he didn't receive both of my emails. I'm certainly not responsible if his email carrier is blocking my emails, or if he's not reading them.

mattr555: I believe you innocently posted the touring info seeking advice from DISers (easy to do) but it was probably the following post by you that prompted him to refund your membership:

The plan is only slightly modified from one provided by Tour Guide Mike. Looks like that was $20 wasted. Glad I checked.

 

[Nik's Mom]

Sorry to hear that some of you were not satisfied with the TGM site. I know for my family and many others, it has been very useful. But I will not resort to bashing someone because they have a different opinion. To each his (or her) own.

 

[Alice Sr.]

Just MHO, we all have one, that's what's great about debate!

The sad thing is, this is not the debate board.

 

[Alice Sr.]

According to TGM, he did send a notice. He's concerned that you may not have received it & has asked that someone post it on the DIS for you. Here it is:

He also posted the following:


mattr555: I believe you innocently posted the touring info seeking advice from DISers (easy to do) but it was probably the following post by you that prompted him to refund your membership:

Thanks for posting, I think this clears up all that went on. Hopefully all will be well for all involved.

(edit) I tried to include the entire post as a quote because I think it is important but apparently it was to large to copy through)

 

[NewEnglandDisney]

N.E.D. You still did not answer my question. TGM and the Unofficial Guide both provide similar information though in a different style and they do make money off of other Disney fans. Is just that you don't like TGM our are you consistent in your disdain for companies that make money from Disney Fans? If you are consistent they you should be equally as unhappy with www.touringplans.com.

On another note I think they can copyright a specific touring plan meaning that if you got the information there you are obligated to use it under the terms of thier agreement. That doesn't mean they are the only ones that can come up with that plan. They don't have a patent just a copyright. If another organization or person came up with the same plan indepentantly TGM would not be able to do anything.

My apologies - I missed your question. I replied to someone else and not yourself.

If you'd like to search my posting history, you will see I feel the same about Unoffical Guide charging $20 for their iteneraries as well.

I don't see your point - you aren't debating anything I said, just trying to brand me a hypocrite for whatever reason. People seem to have a real problem taking things at face value sometimes. I don't like people who try to make money off of other Disney fans. I just don't think it's right. I don't think it's right when TGM does it, I don't think it's right when UG sells their single tour plans for more than they sell their book for (guess their books aren't selling well enough - Passporter must have really kicked their butts), and I don't like it when people like Jim Hill charge for tours of things they don't own.

On another note, I'm even more unimpressed by TGM's unprofessional behavior by asking people to post actions taken to a paid account publicly. That's personal account information that TGM has shared with others, and further has requested that someone else post it here. If someone wished, they could make a legal issue out of that - much more than whatever supposed incident occured here (especially since it wasn't a direct copy/paste).

Again, if someone needs itenerary help - contact me. I'll help for free. So will hundreds (thousands?) of people around here. We can help - and we don't expect to charge people for it.

N.E.D.

 

[Pedler]

My apologies - I missed your question. I replied to someone else and not yourself.

If you'd like to search my posting history, you will see I feel the same about Unoffical Guide charging $20 for their iteneraries as well.

I don't see your point - you aren't debating anything I said, just trying to brand me a hypocrite for whatever reason. People seem to have a real problem taking things at face value sometimes. I don't like people who try to make money off of other Disney fans. I just don't think it's right. I don't think it's right when TGM does it, I don't think it's right when UG sells their single tour plans for more than they sell their book for (guess their books aren't selling well enough - Passporter must have really kicked their butts), and I don't like it when people like Jim Hill charge for tours of things they don't own.

On another note, I'm even more unimpressed by TGM's unprofessional behavior by asking people to post actions taken to a paid account publicly. That's personal account information that TGM has shared with others, and further has requested that someone else post it here. If someone wished, they could make a legal issue out of that - much more than whatever supposed incident occured here (especially since it wasn't a direct copy/paste).

N.E.D.

Hi Ned,

I did not mean to lable you a hypocrite and I apologize if it appeared that way.

With regards to TGM asking someone to post the information here notice that all of the user information was removed. He felt that this was the only way to communicate the information to the user as e-mail did not seem to be getting through.

Now that I am aware of your disdain for organizations that attempt to sell tour planning information on the Internet I understand the nature of your postings.

BTW I personally think it is ok to have a service that charges for information on the Internet. The benefit of it is that it is easy to access on all in one place. Some consumers will prefer the services and some will prefer to use places like DIS. Some will be like me and use both. Its ok for all of them to exist and let the marketplace decide what will survive.

Once again I do apologize if my posting offended you. That was not my intention.

Pedler.

 

[nataliesdaddy]

I subscribed for TGM about 2 weeks ago and everything was fine for the first couple of days. Then i found I could no longer log in and a message displayed saying my account had expired. I emailed the suggested info email address to query this but have so far received no response. I then noticed today on my online banking that half of the registration fee has been refunded to me.

Since I have received no response from TGM and am unable to query this on the TGM forums, does any other TGM member have any idea what has gone wrong here?

I went back and looked at your itinerary from TGM - I would say it is doable in that order - just not in that time frame - you will probably take an additional hour to do the outline assuming you were going in June - during a major holiday that plan won't happen - during off season that plan is east to do.

 

[nataliesdaddy]

If I had not already studied the heebee geebee's out of Disneygoing back two three years I would say that TGM would be a very helpful tool, the UG also. But as I have planned like a banshi, studied fast passing, ride loading, weather and crowd patterns for the times of year we go ... well both the UG and TGM would be a bit redundant. There are some things in them that are quite helpful. I have not been to every restaurant in WDW so reviews and what not are nice. Seeing other people's way of touring is nice.

I do run into a good idea from time to time that I had not thought of. Or an idea that triggers other thoughts and questions that I can ask concierge about.

As to best days - I have heard people say that TGM and UG utterly do not agree - but actually they concur more often then not.

 

[Michelle2]

I didn’t copy Mike's site verbatim nor copy and paste, and I have to agree with the previous poster that facts cannot be protected by copyright. I did not use Mike's words, layout, writing style, or images. Mike makes $94 an hour, its not like the guy needs the money from the website. I'm not saying his advice isnt worth anything but to me, it seems a little anal to be scouring opposition forums looking for alleged plagiarised posts. If that floats his boat then I say live and let live. No hard feelings Tour Gimp Mike.

I know that TGM has said on his forums that he does not look at DIS boards and other boards because of how personal it can be, (and there are so many threads about TGM --is he worth it, is he not?) and from that post matt, I can totally see why I don't know him, have no affiliation with him, and cannot speak for him, but I bet he didn't see your post, I'll bet someone informed him of it --JMHO. So I think it is kinda mean to generalize and call people names...I don't want to be flamed, because I have a right to my opinion too, but it sounded a little bitter and harsh.

 

[kutchyone]

Can’t we all just get along? I have said this over and over everyone is entitled to their opinions.

Matt, from what I have read from both you and Mike he did inform you that he had cancelled and REFUNDED IN FULL your membership fee. Also, either you or someone posing as you responded to that e-mail questioning the reason why. Maybe you got the message after you had posted this thread. If that is true then it would have been nice if you had posted another message in this thread stating that you received an e-mail from TGM regarding the cancellation of your membership. I enjoy this site and my membership to TGM and consider both to be a great asset in my DW “arsenal”.

NED, I hear your opinion about the disdain you have for those making money off of other DW fans but I happen not to agree with your opinion. I see no difference between purchasing that information via internet as opposed to travel books. It is the same thing in my humble opinion. Thankfully we have the right to our own opinions in this country along with the right to make a great living doing something we enjoy that is perfectly legal.

I’ll let you all know how the TGM touring tips/plans work out for me and my family after our June trip. Looking forward to sharing the information with all of you.

 

[bigcrit]

According to TGM, he did send a notice. He's concerned that you may not have received it & has asked that someone post it on the DIS for you. Here it is:

He also posted the following:


mattr555: I believe you innocently posted the touring info seeking advice from DISers (easy to do) but it was probably the following post by you that prompted him to refund your membership:

I'm sorry but I totally disagree with the way this was handled!

1. Mike could not prove that this person is one of his clients. Most posters are quite anonymous here. I know in hind-sight he was a customer of Mike's but Mike could never be sure he was unless he was able to makle contact -He obviously never did. How anyone could just find a post on another board and than "guess" at who it was while still charging them money is ridiculous.

2. According to TGM's emails. I'm not sure if the person is being cancelled for sharing Mike's info or because Mike read on another forum that the person was un-happy. After reading the posted itineray. I can safely say nothing was shared of Mike's own intellecual property was shared. Mike does not have the right to edit what others say on other forums. If a person wants to talk about touring Disney on another forum. Mike does not hold exclusivity over that persons right to talk about Disney. If Mike didn't get a direct request for a refund than why did he give it? To be generous? I think he is justifying his questionable actions. Sorry Mike, but you are wrong.

I just felt like the real issues were not addressed here.