Are we comparing one if the largest companies in the world to a small boutique synth company? ;D
Aren’t they making new things? What about for example the DFAM, that was just cloned by behringer?
Indeed, and for the Model D that’s fair. It’s old, it’s been cloned a thousand ways for a couple of decades, and they ceased production
I’m waiting for a boutique manufacturer to clone the DeepMind 12.
On the subject of Benn Jordan’s video, I think it was perfectly reasonable and relevant to highlight B********'s toxic business practices and how it relates to Moog’s demise.
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I’m just throwing this out there randomly, but I remember hearing quite a few people complaining about the QC of their moog instruments over the years. Maybe someone has first hand experience w/ this? Not trying to bash Moog, just curious.
I’ve owned a few Minitaurs and they seemed pretty solid. the only Moog items I own are the original Moogerfoogers and those things are quality all around.
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I’ve owned a couple of DFAMs and both had minor QC issues, but nothing falling off.
Build quality wise they were solid enough, but nothing special, nothing that made them stand out above most of the other stuff I’ve owned.
Not like the Lyras I’ve owned, they are clearly a step ahead in terms of build quality. Solid, and the insides are a thing of beauty.
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Not really, Benn Jordan did. I was explaining why I think that was a bit disingenuous.
Ahh I see!
Also, the problem for Moog is that, unlike Nike, people are not trying to counterfeit their brand or their logo, it’s the technology that’s being copied, which is much harder to protect, especially after 50 odd years.
And almost everything Moog still make is based on that technology from 50 years ago that they can’t protect any more.
As for a system that offers more protection to a picture of a swoosh than it does the sort of technological innovation behind Moog’s products, well that’s a whole different argument.
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I mean they should be able to protect the architecture of for example the DFAM.
But I don’t think it’s economically viable for a company of that size
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And who would have thought that such an esoteric instrument would be plagiarized? It makes no sense
There’s dozens of guitar manufacturers that make “counterfeit” versions of Strats and Teles and Les Pauls. Been going on for decades. Nobody seems to care. Fender and Gibson are just as popular as ever after 70 odd years of making electric guitars using 100 year old tech (magnets & wood)
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Well Gibson only narrowly survived bankruptcy in 2018, but yeah, they survived.
Just like Moog are surviving.
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I think the synth community fetishises the technology over the actual music the instruments make. And to your point, Moog has no new technology to stand on, but apparently an iconic faceplate that is comparable to the Nike Swoosh
I’ve found that focusing on the experience of any product or service tends to confuse people and slow down communication, in multiple fields.
Talk to a musician about how some music makes you feel and they’ll respond by talking about keys and arpeggios. Talk to a programmer or a designer or a product manager about what a user thinks, feels or does on the system or what they want to happen in their lives, and the “makers” will respond by talking about design patterns or code libraries. Interestingly, the only venue I’ve seen seen the makers talk about the effect on the consumer is TV Chefs, and only occasionally.
Steven Pressfield’s “The War Of Art” actually recommends focusing on the technique (which is closer to fetishising technology than it is deliberating over the effect on the consumer). Pressfield basically suggests that focusing on the practice of art helps avoid spooking the muse, and keeps you more in flow.
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Yeah, and maybe if they’d pushed that brand a little more and leaned on it a little less, they might be in a different place.
Who knows though, really. It’s difficult for subjects like this not to fall into speculation and gossip and I’m probably guilty of a bit of both here, so probably best to move on, I guess.
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Mjeah these days a LOT of effort is put into ”capturing user intent” and modelling user behaviour/domain language in the field of software development. Especially in product development. You want to know what a user really wants to do and why, so you can focus on building THAT instead of a confusing mess
Don’t blame InMusic, without them Moog would likely ceased to exist. I wonder how much Behringer have contributed to the problems.
Behringer is a convenient scapegoat because so many people already hate them. But the people buying bargain clones of the Model D, DFAM, and Mother were never going to buy a product that cost 3x/4x/10x the price of the clone. And if their entire business model failed because their most inexpensive products (DFAM/M32) got poached, then shame on them.
Moog as a company coasted on a legacy of goodwill from the community. Their marketing leaned hard into this spiritual/metaphysical vibe, but in the end, they were just making pricey niche musical instruments based on an expired patent. My guess is that QC issues and a hubristic pursuit of a ruinously expensive poly did them in. We’ll get the truth someday, but the wounds are likely too fresh right now for that.
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I see what you’re getting at, but cloning means you don’t need to pay for R&D, someone does though. And they need to make up that investment through sales of instruments. The cloner gets it ”for free”. Cool with an obsolete product, but with a current product if you’re affecting sales of the original product you’re effectively stealing
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What Moog got for their R&D was a multi-year “first to market” sales window and the advantage of being the prestige product. To their customer base, those things mean a great deal, as seen by the vitriol in these sorts of threads. But if the designs aren’t patentable, it’s not stealing in any legal sense. And I’ll reiterate: if the DFAM and Mother 32 were the two products keeping Moog afloat, then the ship was going down anyway
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