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PaperclipPerfector  19hr ago (text post)   2691 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of June 8, 2026

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Alright, lets talk about the LEGOs.

In case you have been living under a rock, here's the story so far:

  • Elderly man has $200,000 LEGO Star Wars collection.

  • Elderly man enters into a consignment agreement with the local Bricks and Minifigs franchise.

  • Said franchise undergoes a messy ownership change mediated by Bricks and Minifigs corporate. The new owners stop honoring the previous consignment agreement and refuse to give the LEGOs back.

  • Elderly man's son gets the runaround trying to get his father's LEGOs back. Corporate tells him to deal with the franchise owner. The franchise tells him to deal with corporate.

  • Frustrated, the elderly man's son turns to YouTuber Reckless Ben. The resulting video goes viral.

  • The situation escalates into a wild goose chase as Reckless Ben attempts to serve legal process onto the store owners, aggravated by encounters with the suspiciously hostile American Fork, Utah police department (oh yeah, both the new franchise owners and the Bricks and Minifigs CEO are Mormon)

All of this is complicated by the fact that Reckless Ben is, well, reckless. He wears hidden spy cameras. He uses false pretenses to get into situations and locations. At one point he gets arrested for stalking. Despite this, it's hard not to root for him. He seems to have the franchise owners dead to rights for conversion (aka stealing), and Bricks and Minifigs corporate seems at best lackadasical that one of their franchises is defrauding counterparties, and at worst complicit.

I don't see how Bricks and Minifigs survives this as a company. This story is everywhere and nobody is on their side. This is not a particularly lucrative buisiness to begin with, and right now their name is mud. They did, finally, two weeks later, sort of admit that they were wrong and that Brian will get his LEGOs back. It's been radio silence from the principles since that last message went out. I would be surprised if we've heard the end of this saga.

I don’t see how the company fails because of one unusual incident like this. There aren’t that many options in lots of markets for LEGO buy/sell/trade, and few people are trading in hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of sets.

That said, I always got the sense that BAM was on the low-end of third-party LEGO retailers and most of their smaller competitors are more liked in their particular markets.

Since BAM is just a franchise and doesn't own many stores, there's a possibility that a large number of their franchisees go indie. Or a competitor brand comes up to try to capitalize on this event and sign on former BAM stores to their brand.

Not saying this will happen, but I guess if they screwed up their handling of it maximally it could be the start of something bigger.

The real villain here is the Universal Commercial Code. It turns out that a consignment agreement isn't a consignment agreement. If you attempt to enter into one, what you have actually done is transferred title of the goods to the consignee and retained only a security interest in them. So if the consignee then loses his inventory to a creditor, the creditor gets the consignor's goods free and clear and the consignor has only a worthless debt owed by the bankrupt consignee. All 100% legal. You can avoid this, if you're a commercial lawyer, by filing a form (UCC-1) which declares your interest in the goods; this gives you a security interest superior to the other creditors. Of course, random people doing a one-time sale of whatever would never know to do this. Presumably this law was written by banks or other creditors.

This doesn't seem right:

(A) the merchant:

(i) deals in goods of that kind under a name other than the name of the person making delivery;

(ii) is not an auctioneer; and

(iii) is not generally known by its creditors to be substantially engaged in selling the goods of others;

(B) with respect to each delivery, the aggregate value of the goods is $1,000 or more at the time of delivery;

(C) the goods are not consumer goods immediately before delivery; and

(D) the transaction does not create a security interest that secures an obligation.

This case likely fails on Aiii and C. It seems like the ucc rules are in general meant to apply to b2b suppliers consigning inventory, and not random people consigning their collections of shit.

The courts are apparently very reluctant to consider A(iii).

I don't think people realize how risky mom-and-pop shops are as counterparties. FinnaSkipTown LLC can just shut down and not give you your money, stuff, or services at any time.

The real villain here is the Uniform Commercial Code. It turns out that a consignment agreement isn't a consignment agreement.

Source

Generally, if the consignee under such a consignment arrangement files for bankruptcy relief, the consigned goods are property of the consignee's bankruptcy estate. Accordingly, 11 U.S.C. §362(a)(3) prohibits the consignor from picking up the consigned goods after the filing of the bankruptcy.

The typical consignor is relegated to the status of a general unsecured creditor.

There are numerous requirements and exceptions to the foregoing rules. Many transactions that have often been referred to as "consignments" are not deemed to be consignments for the purposes of the foregoing rules. For example, transactions involving goods "consigned" to auctioneers, goods delivered "on consignment" to what generally everyone knows is a consignment shop, goods "consigned" to a merchant for resale, for any delivery where the aggregate value of the goods is less than $1,000, and goods that were consumer goods (i.e., goods used or bought primarily for use for personal, family or household purposes) in the hands of the "consignor" are definitely not consignments. These transactions are, or may be, "true consignments" (in the usual sense), but the drafters of UCC Article 9 consciously chose not to have Article 9 apply to them. Moreover, if the goods will not be delivered, at least in part, to a merchant for resale, there can be no consignment under Article 9. Similarly excluded are transactions that may be designated as "consignments" but that, in reality, are transactions that secure an obligation (other than the "consignee's" obligation to return the "consigned" goods). When in doubt about whether the Article 9 consignment rules apply, the "consignor" should take all steps necessary both to create and perfect a purchase-money security interest in the "consigned goods."

I would expect Lego sets to fall under the "consumer goods" exception, though.

Presumably this law was written by banks or other creditors.

Source

Prior to the UCC, it was generally held that the consignee's creditors had no claim against the consignor if the consignee's assets were inadequate to satisfy their respective claims. This was so despite the fact that the consignor was not required to record the transaction or to give notice that he retained title to the goods. The basic reason for ruling in the consignor's favor was that title had not passed to the consignee and the creditor could not secure an interest in, or attach, any goods to which the debtor did not have title. This decisional law placed a creditor of the consignee in an unfavorable position, particularly if he had relied on the consignee's possession of consigned goods and failed to ask for proof of ownership. It was difficult for a creditor to discover a consignment because the consignor was not required to give notice in order to protect his interests. For example, if a consignee presented his goods as collateral for a loan, the creditor who relied on the consignee's possession would have no protection if the goods involved were consigned.

This problem did not exist under the 1952 Code, since section 1-201(37), at that time, included all consignments as security interests. Under the present [1962] Code, however, the question of intention is all-important and presents a difficult problem of legal and factual determination.

I was so onboard with this whole thing until I got to the part with the youtuber running around comitting crimes and being obnoxious while trying to "help." With friends like these, who needs enemies?

Orders of magnitude. There's a world difference between being reckless and loose with the law and committing a couple of misdemeanors to make a more interesting video, versus stealing a few hundred thousand dollars and siccing corrupt police on anyone who tries to stop you. On a legal/moral framework the youtuber's case would be stronger if he actually followed the law the entire time. On a pragmatic level nobody would have noticed or cared if he wasn't a memer who makes viral videos that millions of people want to watch.

LEGOs

Obligatory note that "LEGO" is not supposed to be pluralized

Proper Use of the LEGO Trademark on a Web Site

If the LEGO trademark is used at all, it should always be used as an adjective, not as a noun. For example, say "MODELS BUILT OF LEGO BRICKS". Never say "MODELS BUILT OF LEGOs". Also, the trademark should appear in the same typeface as the surrounding text and should not be isolated or set apart from the surrounding text. In other words, the trademarks should not be emphasized or highlighted. Finally, the LEGO trademark should always appear with a ® symbol each time it is used.

I don't give a damn what their lawyers say. It's Legos, and they can go pound sand with their trademark.

If a Danish company wants to tell me how to use English plurals, they are welcome to put their flag on the moon whenever they want.

Best they can do is Hans Island

If I had any inclination at all to care what Lego thinks about the proper usage of their trademark, I lost it when they canceled Bionicle.

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