Rob Feinstein

Robert Feinstein is the owner and operator of RF Video (a professional wrestling video tape & DVD distribution company), who were best known as the videographers of Extreme Championship Wrestling. Immediately following the closing of ECW, Feinstein founded the Ring of Honor wrestling promotion.

Biography

RF Video

RF Video was started by Rob Feinstein, along with his friends Doug Gentry and Gabe Sapolsky, in the early 1990s and began as an outlet for hand recorded "fan cam" videos of wrestling events from smaller companies throughout the United States. They would tour with Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW), setting up their own booth at events to sell their videos and other memorabilia and give out "updates" listing other pieces for sale through their mail order business. Eventually RF Video became large enough to open full time kiosks in shopping malls stocked with some of the more popular videos and the option to order from the catalog through the kiosk instead of mail, phone or internet.

Performer

While touring with ECW, Rob began appearing on ECW TV with the Blue World Order as a parody of Syxx of the New World Order. As part of the parody he carried a hand held camcorder everywhere (as Syxx had begun doing) and began calling himself by different "number" names, first going with several variations of pi before settling on 7-Eleven. [cite web |url=http://www.wrestleview.com/info/faq/richards.shtml |title= Wrestleview - Stevie Richards FAQ |accessdate=2006-12-22]

Promoter

RF Video opened up their own wrestling promotion, Ring of Honor, in 2002. ROH had the bulk of their original promotion and publicity through RF selling tapes and eventually grew into a respected independent promotion.

In March 2004, following his legal problems, Feinstein publicly resigned from RF Video and ROH, giving control of ROH over to Doug Gentry. In June, controversy arose when it became known that Feinstein was still actively involved in the operations of ROH. There would then be a "formal split" between ROH and RF Video, along with Feinstein officially selling his share of ROH over to Cary Silkin, and ROH would begin to produce and sell their merchindise through their own website. The revelation also resulted in the cancellation of an upcoming show in Maryland less than a week before the scheduled date; When Maryland promoter Dick Caricofe, who was allowing ROH to use his wrestling license, heard that Feinstein was still involved, he pulled out of the show, which forced it to be moved to a Philadelphia suburb. Ring of Honor has since not returned to Maryland. There was also temporary heat between Ring of Honor and Total Nonstop Action Wrestling which resulted in TNA's contracted wrestlers, two of whom (AJ Styles and Christopher Daniels) were top wrestlers in ROH, leaving Ring of Honor until the summer of 2005.

RF Video's own Doug Gentry was the head booker for Pro Wrestling Unplugged. Contrary to rumors, RF Video did not purchase the company in 2005.Fact|date=February 2007

Perverted-Justice incident

In March 2004, Rob Feinstein was caught in an internet sting designed to catch sexual predators (set up by Perverted-Justice.com). Feinstein, who believed he was talking to a 14 year old boy, told the boy he was 22 years old (he was actually 31), claimed to be a wrestler with Pro Wrestling Guerrilla and eventually asked the boy if he could meet him at his home later, having implied in the chat that he was considering the boy's offer for sex. [cite web|url=http://www.perverted-justice.com/index.php?archive=RFWrestling|title= RFWrestling at Perverted-Justice|accessdate=2006-12-22] When Feinstein arrived at the home, he was met by a news crew. Although no formal charges were ever brought against him by police, the incident proved to be disastrous publicity for both Ring of Honor and Feinstein. It caused a temporary split with Total Nonstop Action Wrestling, the cancellation of an upcoming show in Glen Burnie, Maryland [ [http://www.rohwrestling.com/shoponline.asp?point=moreinfo&catid=&id=283&pRange=0&iCurrentPage=1 "Survival of the Fittest"] ] , and eventually resulted in Feinstein selling his share of Ring of Honor.

References