alt Hacker NewsTell HN: An update from the new Tindie team
Received by email tonight about two hours ago:
Dear Tindie Community,
My name is Gongyu Su, and I am writing on behalf of the new Tindie ownership team.
First, we sincerely apologize for the recent downtime and the disruption it caused. We understand that many buyers and community members were left without clear information during the transition, and that this created frustration and concern.
Tindie is now owned by EETree LLC, a Washington State company. Our team took over Tindie because we believe it remains an important platform for makers, hardware creators, engineers, and independent sellers around the world. The recent transition was more complex than expected. Tindie runs on an older technical framework with many connected services, and the migration from the previous operating environment to the new one took longer and caused more disruption than anyone wanted.
We know this was not the experience the Tindie community deserved.
Our immediate focus is to stabilize the platform, resolve payment and order-related issues, and support sellers and buyers through the transition. If you have an order-related concern, please contact Tindie support so the team can review your case directly.
WHAT WE ARE FOCUSED ON
Stabilizing the platform
Restoring reliable access for buyers, sellers, and the community.
Resolving open issues
Working through payment, refund, and order concerns case by case.
Investing for the long term
Renewing attention, support, and improvements for the community.
We also want to be clear about our long-term intention: we did not take over Tindie to let it fade away. We took it over because we believe it deserves renewed attention, investment, and support.
Tindie has always been more than just a marketplace. It is a place where independent creators, makers, and hardware enthusiasts can share useful products, tools, kits, modules, and ideas with the world. We want to preserve that spirit while improving the platform step by step.
Over the coming weeks and months, we will share more about our plans and will listen carefully to feedback from sellers, buyers, and the broader community.
Thank you for your patience and continued support. We know trust must be earned through action, and we are committed to doing that.
Sincerely,
Gongyu Su
On behalf of the Tindie Team
Comments
Personally, I trust EETree LLC, a Washington State company, a digital powerhouse to the information super highway foster technological innovation and progress to digital future bridging to the electronic divide.
I can't think of a worse first impression for the new owners of a marketplace that relies on buyer and seller loyalty than taking down the entire platform for weeks without any clear timeline or reasoning.
It also gives the impression that they have no idea how to set up a staging environment or seamlessly migrate to a new backend with a double write approach. Just spells trouble all around.
It's not clear to me WHY it was taken over.. Were there issues with the previous owners?
Also WHO are the new owners? The "About us" page has ZERO info on them. I wouldn't touch the new platform with a 30foot pole, so I guess it's time to find a new alternative marketplace.
Edit: on https://www.linkedin.com/in/gongyu/ it claims that the company name is "EEree LLC", in the email it's magically "EETree LLC"
Found this statement from Alexander Rowsell, Tindie social media manager and editor of the Tindie Blog (link expires in one day):
https://privatebin.net/?db6418554d9d5728#3NjbsSUYzw227zG5P1k...
> Our team took over Tindie because we believe it remains an important platform for makers, hardware creators, engineers, and independent sellers around the world.
How does this even explain why they "TOOK OVER" Tindie?
The lack of clear communication and transparency around this whole issue has been appaling. I've moved to Lectronz and will wipe out my store on Tindie as soon as they resolve payouts.
Nobody seems to be using the word "bankrupt", but I'm getting the impression that's what happened here? Sudden un-announced sale?
This is probably a good reminder that the EU-based alternative https://www.lectronz.com exists!
This is the kind of statement that gets made when everything is awesome.
context?
Scam or spy?
[flagged]
>and the migration from the previous operating environment to the new one took longer and caused more disruption than anyone wanted
I mean, this is unacceptable by any metric. Downtime for a platform like this means lost revenue. If Amazon was down for weeks at a time how do you think that would affect them as a retailer? So at this point I can't imagine what the mystery purchasers are getting, certainly not a steady revenue stream? I can't imagine the user data is that valuable for such a niche market focus. Over the coming weeks and months, I will be delighted to observe more embarrassing fumbles from your nameless owners, and whoever you are because I suspect your given name is false as well.
EETree LLC seems to be a shell company owned by EETree Info & Tech Limited in China (https://www.eetree.cn).
I'm not sure what that means as far as payment processing etc, apparently sellers were all cut off with money owing and still have no explanation.
Also the AI-generated blog post on the Tindie site (under the name/account of assumedly-previous staff?), and the post above that says absolutely nothing about what's actually going on...
It looks from the outside like a Chinese tech blog just randomly bought Tindie, broke the site while moving it to their own servers, and now are trying to figure out how to run it?