All Typecodes

Digitalfire Plainsman Dispute Timeline

Events June 10-26, 2026.

June 10: A letter from Wilson Laycraft was received. It required the transfer of PlainsmanClays.ca and PlainsmanPotterySupply.com (with offer of $1000) in order not to seek damages for losses associated with catalog unavailability June 3-5, goodwill and reputation. It revoked from Digitalfire "any license or permission express or implied for the use of its trade names, registered trademarks, logos, images, and all other intellectual property, and is no longer authorized to use any Plainsman content or represent Plainsman in any capacity on any platform."

June 12: I notified Plainsman lawyer that Digitalfire billing had been in error (the entire $1500 should have been for their Insight-live.com managed account). I clarified that the outage at PlainsmanClays.ca was a product of their redirecting the home URL without notice, that customer support requests have not been directed to me since 2021 (see WaybackMachine contact page), asked for details of the June 3-5 outage, and acknowledged Plainsman's request that I not represent myself as acting on behalf of them.

June 13: I removed all but one post from a Plainsman Clay page made on my personal Facebook account in 2014.

June 15: I put a banner on Digitalfire.com that it would shut down June 26 because I was unable to comply in the short time frame.

June 16: Letter from Wilson Laycraft adding request for the Plainsman Facebook and YouTube accounts.

June 17: I posted that a GoFundMe had been set up by a supporter and reported on its status.

June 17-22: Made posts asking people to please stop bashing Plainsman and answered all emails with the same request.

June 18: In answer to "Plainsman further requires that DigitalFire remove any documentation or data of DigitalFire from Plainsman’s premises; and that all documentation and data of Plainsman in the possession and control of DigitalFire be downloaded to Plainsman" I made a post that Digitalfire source material was in danger of being lost.

June 18: Plainsman confirmed, through a lawyer, that they had secured the domain names, that I had ceased operating on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and considered the matter complete. And said “Plainsman wishes to clarify that, contrary to the statement posted on Digitalfire.com, it has not requested the shutdown of the website Digitalfire.com. Plainsman agrees that Digitalfire.com is a valuable resource to the pottery community that should remain available. Plainsman is not seeking the removal of any of the articles or blogs from the DigitalFire.com web site. Mentions of Plainsman Clays in blogs or articles, for example noting that a project was made using a Plainsman product, is a reasonable use of Plainsman’s name and Plainsman is not seeking to remove all such mentions of its name.”

June 18: I made a post that PlainsmanClays.ca product documentation site had gone down.

June 26: I helped them recover login to a Google account registered to the now invalid email tony@plainsmanclays.com.

June 27: I messaged GoFundMe donors that if I do not transfer the money they will get a full refund and succession plans will continue.

June 29: Refund initiated and the process completed July 11.

Prior Events:
I have not been an employee or had a contract with Plainsman since 2003.
For the past decade, Digitalfire billed them $1500/month for my full-time services to them and thousands of customers. For the previous remote work decade, $500/month.
I did not sell the pottery I produced in the lab/studio for the past 4 decades; I gave away or smashed thousands of pieces.
April 2024: The manager fired my wife and me as the plant and office janitors, a job we held for many years (because of ongoing objections to being surveilled).
May 2024: The manager asked for my key and gave me 5 minutes to leave the building (for refusal to separate the lab from production).
Mar 1, 2025: I shared, with edit privileges, a GoogleDocs Insight-live MSP agreement (as a result of a meeting with the chairman of the board). No response.
Jan 12, 2026: I shared a GoogleDoc titled “Plainsman/Digitalfire Overlap”, clearly outlining overlaps to resolve and offers to help. No response.

Related Information

Resolution Achieved!

If you already sent, get 4 years Insight-live credit

This picture has its own page with more detail, click here to see it.

I posted this on June 19.

I need goodwill with Plainsman. I know you have been passionate about this whole affair in the past few days. I underestimated how much. Some were so passionate that they have caused trauma with Plainsman staff, we must undo that. Having goodwill with the company I partnered with to make Digitalfire is so important and will make me so happy. We both "pulled the dragon's tail" over misunderstandings.

I consulted Plainsman before posting this, and they requested I add: Here is the biggest one: Digital Fire is not at risk and never was from Plainsman.

I need goodwill, especially if you put staff under stress, and you can help me get it. My first idea was to fill their office with hundreds of bouquets of flowers, but now I realize that's too much environmental impact. I'll credit you 4 years of Insight-live if you already did (this statement was added after I realized this was not a wise request).

Thank you sooo much!

This picture has its own page with more detail, click here to see it.

Thank you to the hundreds of messages I am getting every day for support. Yikes. I can assure everyone I am not retiring; I am just getting started. I cannot believe the offers of help I am getting from coder/potters, lawyers, negotiators, designers, etc; there are so many of them. And how many countries. This is amazing. Messages from countries where potters and industry rely on Digitalfire because ceramic fabrication information is either kept highly secretive, despite a large manufacturing sector, or simply doesn't exist, really moved me. And an offer from a Google engineer to help. Or even a suggestion to move the dark web! Information on how to change licensing to clarify reuse. Advice from human rights experts on the importance of freedom of information. How to organize team coding. How to automate translation. Many offered physical server resources and hosting. Others offered new tools they have developed to integrate into Digitalfire. And so much more.

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