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01/06/01 |
THE
NEW AND IMPROVED PLAYMOBIL® HORSE. |
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The
legendary Playmobil Horse, one of the few molds that was left
unchanged for the past 27 years, finally went back to the
drawing board. The result is very different from it's
predecessor, as you can judge from the swapping image below.
This horse will be premiered in set 3111, Naval Artillery. But
we can also expect it will be available through other sets later
in 2001.
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12/28/00 |
NEUHEITEN
JANUARY 2001. |
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January
traditionally is the month in which additional sets are released
from major release in the previous year. In 2001 these will be
complementary sets to the redesigned Pirate theme. The
update will consist of 4 sets:
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3110
Admiral
3111 Naval Artillery
3112 Naval Stronghold / Jail
3113 Soldiers with Sea robber
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The sets will be available in the export
markets in january 2002.
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12/14/00 |
LONG
LIVE COLLECTOBIL ! |
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The
past week we have worked around the clock, so to speak, to
migrate what was left of playmobilcentral to what we hope will
be our permanent home on the web: www.collectobil.com.
By transfering the site to this new domain, we have rounded up a
full week of work, with the intend to meet all the guidelines
that Playmobil will soon release as a solution to the recent
debate about Playmobil® fan sites on the internet.
Don't forget to reset your bookmarks, because we will be
abandoning the playmobilcentral domain in the very near future,
and hand it over to the webmaster at the Playmobil®-Haus.
We hope you will enjoy every visit to collectobil, and to all
the other befriended Playmobil® fan sites that you will find on
our links page!
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12/11/00 |
A
NEW WORLD OF PLAYMOBIL ... |
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Last Friday I traveled to Zirndorf, for a meeting at the Playmobil head office.
The topic of the day would of course be the presence of Playmobil fan sites on
the internet, in a way that would be beneficial to both the community of
Playmobil fans and collectors and the company that produces Playmobil, Geobra
Brandstatter GmbH.
During this three hour meeting, Managing Director Andrea Schauer spoke very
openly about the Playmobil® philosophy and their current relation towards the
internet. The main concern at the Playmobil® head office is the possible
confusion internet sites could cause amongst customers. Fan sites can be allowed
on the internet, but only when they can be clearly recognized as an unofficial
fan outing.
In the last few weeks I have noticed that some visitors were mistaking this site
for the official Playmobil® site. Although it has never been my intention, the
use of original Playmobil® brand material like the logo and the head sign, may
have caused people to view this as the official corporate site. And of course a
dot com domain with the word playmobil® in it was another trigger that may have
led to some regrettable confusion. The combination of these two factors resulted
in Playmobil® requesting to remove this site from public view.
During the meeting, we discussed an outline document that will clearly lay down
the conditions and circumstances under which playmobil® fan sites can be
allowed and supported on the internet. The document offers a number of
guidelines that will allow webmasters to create their fan sites without causing
further confusion towards the general Playmobil® customer. For a brief summary
of the guidelines, go here.
As a direct consequence of these guidelines, Playmobilcentral will soon be
moving to a new domain, and undergo a name change. Most of the current content
will however remain intact and we will continue to expand the number of items in
the catalogue section. We will also be able to keep you updated in our news
section, but we will try to be more careful with the sources and correctness of
the information there. Other great ideas are already under development,
and will be premiered once the migration to a new place on the web has been
completed...
To come to a conclusion: We have set an important step forward,
and my thanks go out to all our visitors and befriended collectors who showed
their support, and to the management at the Playmobil®-Haus, who invited me to
come in and exchange some point of views, although they currently are in the
busiest season of the year, and have a lot of (more) important issues to deal
with right now.
More news soon...
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11/28/00 |
WELCOME
TO THE WORLD OF PLAYMOBIL ... |
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The manufacturer of Playmobil® has asked us by e-mail to take this
site down. Immediately after we received that mail on Friday November 24th, we took action to remove the site from public view.
On the main page, all links to the different sections of the site where
removed, the brand sensitive playmobil® text and head logos where
replaced by neutral graphics, and we left behind a small notice about
our shutdown, and the following cry for help:
"Write in to playmobil®,
and tell them how much you enjoy collecting Playmobil®, and why a
platform like Playmobilcentral is really needed to enhance your
collecting experience. Most important: keep it in a friendly tone. The
person to write to is the head of the Public Relations department at
Playmobils headquarters: Gisela Kupiak
A few hours ago, Frau Kupiak of Playmobil®s German Headquarters called
in, offering us the chance to come over to Zirndorf, so that
we could discuss the situation with the management there. A date
for this meeting has not been set yet, but at least we have made a first
step in bridging the gap between Playmobil® and its community of
collectors and loyal fans... A better understanding between those
two is something I have long hoped to accomplish.
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11/13/00 |
3
NEW PLAYMOBIL AUDIO STORIES. |
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There
is some good news for the collectors of Playmobil audio
cassettes. After years of silence, 3 new stories have been
released by Karussell - Universal. The stories are told in German, for all
international collectors who want to polish up their knowledge
of Playmobils mother language, this is your ultimate Playmobil
language course! The length ranges from 37 to 44 minutes.
More info in the collectors
guide, where we soon will include a section on Playmobil
Audio Books. Thanks to Andreas Männer for the info!
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11/11/00 |
COLLECTORS
BOOK STATUS. |
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Some
fresh news on the Playmobil collectors book. It seems
during the work on this book, Playmobil discovered that some
photos and graphics of items that will be featured, were no
longer available in their archives. There is some logic to this,
as no one could have foretold some 26 years ago that the
Playmobil concept would have grown out to become such a successful
toy
brand. So there was no real reason to keep those graphics around
for so long... This is the main reason for the announced delay
of the collectors book.
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11/06/00 |
THE
GREAT ADVENTURES OF OLIVER DEEG. |
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Oliver
Deeg has uploaded the first installments of his Playmobil
featuring Fantasy-Sage "Das
Schwert Der Macht".
In these photo stories Oliver uses Playmobil figures and
props to tell a great story of medieval Might and Magic.
 
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10/28/00 |
FIFTH
CHRISTMAS ADVENT CALENDAR PREVIEW. |
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After
the Christmas Tree Decoration Set, the fifth adventcalander also
surfaced in VEDES toy affiliates as a prerelease. The advent calendar
has the subtitle "Waldweinacht",
something that translate as Christmas Forest. This Advent calendar
will be released in all markets around Christmas 2001.
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10/24/00 |
CHRISTMAS
TREE "BAUMSCHMUCK". |
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Affiliates
of the German VEDES buying group received their first shipments
of "Baumschmuck" sets. Here comes a set that
enables you to have a real nice Playmobil Christmas experience.
Although only a very small Christmas tree can be fully decorated
with this limited amount of tree decoration.
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10/20/00 |
UPDATED
GERMAN CORPORATE WEBSITE. |
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The German
Playmobil website has been updated and redesigned. Although
this design shows a lot more promise, a few bugs need to be
worked out. Especially the navigation takes a lot to get used
to.
The Good news is that a Playmobil newsletter seems to be in the
works.
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10/10/00 |
MODERN
FAMILY HOUSE HITS STORES. |
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The
last major new release this year is the System-X Family house.
Designed to appeal to both boys and girls, it will in time
replace either the Victorian Dollhouse or the ill-fated Fairy
Tale Castle. The House and five accessory sets are available
from October in non-export markets (GERMANY, AUSTRIA, SCHWEIZ,
NEDERLAND, BELGIUM).
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