I like mine

I purchased my clock ages ago and enjoy having it.

I have a few of the other nelson designs. I recall a slew of us who post here jumping at the chance to own reasonably priced replicas a few years ago.

I am content that this ball clock is in the spirit of the origninal and is fairly priced from the historic maker.

Asterisk
I have not seen that one online... Is it made of plastic too?

Company Identity vs Pandering
This kinda bugs me. Not because it's a knock-off, but because Howard Miller was all set leaving production of the Nelson clocks behind and moving into the (I presume, lucrative) grandfather clock market. Which is fine...Except that then the Nelson clocks became popular again and Howard Miller is now kicking themselves and trying to back-pedal. Although I do love the meta-aspect of it being it's own knock-off. What was the song Tom Arnold sings about being his own grandpa? :)

The asterisk is metal
The asterisk is metal

Ball Clock's evil twin
Thanks for hipping me to this thread, Woody.

Thought this might give you all a chuckle (or a groan):

I went to the Howard Miller plant several years ago in a vain attempt to find a part for one of my Nelson clocks. This was right around the time that Vitra had begun production of their first 4 repros. While waiting in their offices (clock-in-hand), I received quite a few comments from employees passing through: "Haven't seen one of those in ages." "Those are collectible, you know." etc.

Eventually, I was led to a parts counter in the back of the factory, where after an extensive search, they informed me that I was out of luck. Oh well.

Because of the earlier fuss made over my clock, I stopped back in the office, and asked if they'd ever considered reproducing any of the Nelson clocks. Mid-Century collecting was hot, and the new Vitra clocks showed that there was definitely a market for overpriced repros. I even offered my own collection of originals, as reference. They politely sent me packing, essentially saying that that was all in the company's past. Pretty ironic for a company that makes so much of the "heritage" of its grandfather clocks.

Well, a decade later it seems they finally joined the bandwagon. When I first saw their new production ball clocks, I emailed them to ask about the proportional differences from the original. They replied that it was done intentionally, so that originals would not be devalued. Wish they could have seen my eyes rolling.