Beaver is solid, pro-level gear. If you're looking for quality, they're top notch. It's a "clone" of the Acorn, but with much nicer coin mechs and (in my opinion) product wheels. They're really nice for higher-end locations where presentation is key. If you're looking just to dabble in the bulk business though, check out the Oak Vista. Super durable, very reliable, and roughly half the cost if you're buying new. Good luck!

Here's the word from the top!

I replied that I'd like the TVF back in any capacity- whether it's on the "Vendiscuss.net/com/org" domain or not. Wherever it is, it's still the TVF.

It sucks that someone would attack the TVF in this manner, but at least the place is still out there in some capacity, and I'm really hoping that Steve will bring it back up.

Yes, I did tell him in the email that the Facebook page was shut down, but he didn't comment on it specifically. Still no "new" word on it beyond what's posted above though.

I'm still hopeful that the site is just "hacked" or something. I mean, the Twitter is still up (https://twitter.com/VENDiscuss) so there's that still drifting out there. In the event that the place were to close down, I'd be interested in keeping the place alive by any means necessary- I'm totally open to collaborate with you guys on this one should it come to that.

I'm at performavending@gmail.com- contact me anytime.

Thank you.  That's good news then.  I did wonder if maybe some previously banned member(s) pulled this off somehow but that's only because I didn't think this was simply a random happening.  What surprised me was the facebook deletion, which I figured was more difficult to pull off - maybe I was wrong.  I didn't know you had previous issues with the forum in the past but I know some wierd stuff has happened in the bulk vending forum which Steve probably takes more personally than what happens in the other sub-forums.  Thanks again for the update.

The "rebels" and I (if you can call us that even) were for the most part on good terms with the TVF. While several of us weren't welcome at the TVF proper, everyone knew full well that the BVF was never going to surpass or challenge the TVF in the world of vending- we just wanted a site where we could still talk vending that wasn't totally dead and broken. Had Entervending been about a year earlier, we probably all would have stuck here, but at the time VendingChat was pretty much terrible- well, you know how it used to be. No one I know had any ill will for the TVF even when we were "fighting" when that whole Chcicken fiasco came down.

I haven't heard anything back from Steve today, but that's not entirely unusual- our email schedules are all over the place.

EDIT: Okay, I'm on the phone now with an associate of mine who is far more tech savvy than I am, and he managed to look up the TVF's IP address (where the domain name connects to, in laymans terms- the physical address of the server) and sent it my way. Paste this (50.63.202.16) into your browser and it'll take you right there regardless of the domain name. As you can see, the TVF is indeed down.

What kind of contract? I've got a couple real basic outlines, but they're by no means airtight.