"Artists Beware"

eta: update post here: http://artists-beware.livejournal.com/507048.html

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WHO: skullgrrl, deadthingsgrrl, custom cranium, cephalobot

WHAT: Trade: I sent her a box of supplies in exchange for other supplies and a doll.

WHEN: The first emails I have are dated March of 2010. I received the box of supplies from her in mid 2011 (I think around April, I know it was after my March advice post which is linked below). I don't have an exact date as I no longer have the box the stuff was mailed in and my memory fails to give an exact date. I have yet to receive the doll.

PROOF: ( Collapse )
I have posted here twice for advice on this situation, without posting anything specific:
http://artists-beware.livejournal.com/406878.html
http://artists-beware.livejournal.com/433860.html

I thought about doing that again because I like to give people the benefit of the doubt and I've been a bit hesitant because of the possibility of upsetting her local fans, but I am not sure what else advice could be given and I've had enough; I am tired of having to send multiple messages just to get a response from her, and getting yet another excuse why it isn't done.

In December of 2009, Plui/Belialchan posted a journal on her deviantART page saying that she and her mother had been wrongfully evicted from their home, cutting all of their sources in the process. She goes on to say that they have no family that would have been willing to help them, their bank accounts were drained completely, their lawyer ditched them before they were able to go to court, and Plui and her mother had been sleeping in their car, selling most of their remaining possessions to a pawn shop and looking jobs to attempt to sustain themselves.

(Original journal entry HERE.)

And as such, Plui opened up her commissions in her journal, explaining her situation and hoping for some help. She offered her original commission prices, plus a free pencil sketch to anyone that helped her cause. She wasn't asking for donations, she was looking for work. Seems like a good reason to help out someone in need, right?

Plui quickly gained over 30+ commission orders (before I stopped counting, anyways), as well as a few months later in May 2010, she posted another journal about a doujinshi she recently published, and got another high number of orders for that.

However, it is now August 2011, and Belial seems to have disappeared altogether from the internet. There are countless inquiries on her page from people who have not received their commission/book from her. It apparently seems that Plui took their money, and then stopped replying to people. Absolutely nobody can get into contact with her, and all of her online accounts have gone inactive.

After she posted about her book orders in May 2010, she went inactive for about 3 months, then returned to her deviantART account on August 19, 2010 and submitted 5 completed commissions. Any attempt to get into contact with her is useless. Any email, comment to her pages, private message, etcetera goes unanswered, and other than the 5 commissions she posted, none of her commissioner/people who bought books from her have gotten what they paid for. Even today her deviantART page still continues to be swamped with comments from fans and commissioners alike asking where she is, or if anyone else had gotten their commish.

A lot of people seem to think that this was a scam; but perhaps it didn't start out as one? Plui has such a high reputation in the art community, so many people believe that she wouldn't tarnish her name by doing that, but it's been over 18 months, and close to nobody has gotten their artwork.

Does anyone know anything at all about what happened to Plui? Was this perhaps a scam? Or has something maybe happened to her?