Is it me or have Korg and Roland been real quiet???

[TheBro]

Seems like the two have been really quiet. I think Behringer are smashing it right now and Korg and Roland are sitting back without putting their foot on the pedal. 

What you lot think?

[auxien]

fuck Behringer is what i think, since you asked

 

[Silent Member]

Roland seem to be all about their subscription based vst live service nonsense these days, why sell stuff for a price when they can be resold indefinitely. Korg did announce that wavestate thing, but other than that it's been pretty quiet. 

I guess they just can't compete when it comes to cheap child labor analogs and silly marketing.

[TheBro]

11 minutes ago, Gocab said:

Roland seem to be all about their subscription based vst live service nonsense these days, why sell stuff for a price when they can be resold indefinitely. Korg did announce that wavestate thing, but other than that it's been pretty quiet. 

I guess they just can't compete when it comes to cheap child labor analogs and silly marketing.

Mm you probably got a point there Gocab.

[user]

Yeah, at what rate do new synths need to be released anyway? The way Behringer is doing it is crazy and it would bum me out if this would somehow set the bar for other companies. It’s unsustainable and doesn’t encourage forging a deep relationship with your instruments but seems mostly more focused on frenzied consumerism and what’s most easily marketed right now. 
 

Also didn’t korg, beside announcing the wavestate, also recently release the nutakt and nubass? 

[exitonly]

Uhhh 2600 reissue was pretty huge

[psn]

And the Korg Berlin office will probably be a "big" deal  for the synth nerds. 

 

[chim]

The big synth makers had their chance, said you can't do it, parts don't exist anymore, too expensive, etc. They dropped the ball and instead went for plastic bullshit and subscription services. Behringer is a monument to their sins. 

[zlemflolia]

what if instead of mass producing synths, they small-quantity produced extremely complex and high quality unique synths that each cost $100k then allowed you to send them MIDI sequences which they run and record from the audio output

[Limo]

38 minutes ago, chim said:

The big synth makers had their chance, said you can't do it, parts don't exist anymore, too expensive, etc. They dropped the ball and instead went for plastic bullshit and subscription services. Behringer is a monument to their sins. 

Interesting take. Not wrong.

That said - it might be that "you can't do it, parts don't exist anymore, too expensive" is actually true - *unless* you already have massive factories for churning out cheap copies of guitar pedals and whatever else Behringer has been making since the 1990s. Sort of like how Eurorack modules are incredibly expensive for what they are, simply because they are manufactured in such small quantities parts and labor become very expensive.

Roland and Korg are large, but nowhere near as large as Behringer.

[psn]

Roland is so huge that synths is a tiny little nothing to them.

[thawkins]

Behringer is killing it because Ctrl-C Ctrl-V is easier than writing your own essay.

Korg still made the Volcas and -logues which are a huge hit it seems. At least on the Youtube video scene where you win by having a table full of small blinkenlights things. It's sort of like eurorack - everyone is making small gear that interfaces with other small gear and selling that. 

Not so much big advanced synths these days it seems. This might be because I don't go out looking for those - easier to justify dropping small amounts of cash for small widgets than one large amount of cash for a HAL9000-of-synthesis.

[Limo]

15 minutes ago, psn said:

Roland is so huge that synths is a tiny little nothing to them.

Not doubting you, just curious: what are they huge in? Not synths (which is kind of my point: if you don't do a lot of electronics manufacturing to begin with, making synths is expensive).

7 minutes ago, thawkins said:

Behringer is killing it because Ctrl-C Ctrl-V is easier than writing your own essay.

Korg still made the Volcas and -logues which are a huge hit it seems.

Arguably the Volcas are quite Ctrl-C Ctrl-V as well. As are the ARP clones.

[zlemflolia]

3 minutes ago, rhmilo said:

Not doubting you, just curious: what are they huge in? Not synths (which is kind of my point: if you don't do a lot of electronics manufacturing to begin with, making synths is expensive).

Arguably the Volcas are quite Ctrl-C Ctrl-V as well. As are the ARP clones.

https://www.roland.com/RolandComSite/media/global/release/pdf/2014/20140514_4.pdf

 

[Limo]

3 minutes ago, Zeffolia said:

https://www.roland.com/RolandComSite/media/global/release/pdf/2014/20140514_4.pdf

 

Thanks! Great resource.

Looks like electronic instruments are a large part of their revenue, even though for them it seems to mean digital pianos more than synthesizers (for which sales are down, it seems).

I would *think* if you can make a digital piano cheaply a synthesizer is a no brainer, but apparently this doesn't work out that way.

Maybe because a digital piano is at heart a mechanical device (nice keys) that triggers a sampler. Dunno.

Anyway, once again: thanks for the reply. Really cool.

[chim]

58 minutes ago, thawkins said:

Behringer is killing it because Ctrl-C Ctrl-V is easier than writing your own essay.

Also, enormous market demand that has gone unsatiated for years. 

[thawkins]

Well yeah I guess nobody wanted to pull the trigger to set up all those factories in China because they did not have the volume to justify it. If you just copy designs you can make the volume more easily, that's what happened maybe?

[sweepstakes]

11 hours ago, rhmilo said:

Arguably the Volcas are quite Ctrl-C Ctrl-V as well. As are the ARP clones.

Ehh, I think the only one you could fairly say this of is the FM, and even in that case they made some really nice performance/editing improvements, not to mention trimming it way down. Volcas are their own thing, imo, but they also fit squarely into the aforementioned "table of blinky things that fit together" category.

[oscillik]

60 million unemployed in the US alone.

I know what will help… Roland or Korg shitting out another rehash of their glory days.

[thawkins]

9 minutes ago, oscillik said:

60 million unemployed in the US alone.

I know what will help… Roland or Korg shitting out another rehash of their glory days.

Well it's not like bringing new products to market needs no designers, marketing, all the employees who make this magic happen. I mean these companies are not based in the US, but that does not mean they don't keep people on payroll?

And not to get too political, but it's not our fault that the US is the richest country in the world but absolutely sucks at providing a social safety net for it's workers.

[oscillik]

24 minutes ago, thawkins said:

Well it's not like bringing new products to market needs no designers, marketing, all the employees who make this magic happen. I mean these companies are not based in the US, but that does not mean they don't keep people on payroll?

And not to get too political, but it's not our fault that the US is the richest country in the world but absolutely sucks at providing a social safety net for it's workers.

Don't get your knickers in a twist. I didn't mention the US for any reason other than highlighting that there is mass unemployment on an end-times scale.

Most people who would previously have had the disposable income to be able to buy bleep-bloop-blerp machines likely have more important priorities at the moment. So it kind of makes sense for manufacturers of such boutique items to maybe calm their tits and not waste R&D and manufacturing costs on something that likely won't meet sales projections.

[thawkins]

Sure, but have you also considered that there's also an enormous bunch of people who are not spending money eating out, traveling, and now they need to make staying indoors more interesting. Perhaps learn a hobby? Take up IDM?

I'm not arguing that it's not troubling to see those unemployment numbers, but on the other hand, I am pretty sure demand for indoors fun toys like video games, instruments has gone up too.

I mean we've cooked all our meals since early March, guess what - now I have actually spent less money on everyday stuff. Dumb example but you can get a used Volca Sample for what you pay for 3 restaurant dinners here in Paris.

[oscillik]

3 minutes ago, thawkins said:

Sure, but have you also considered that there's also an enormous bunch of people who are not spending money eating out, traveling, and now they need to make staying indoors more interesting. Perhaps learn a hobby? Take up IDM?

I'm not arguing that it's not troubling to see those unemployment numbers, but on the other hand, I am pretty sure demand for indoors fun toys like video games, instruments has gone up too.

I mean we've cooked all our meals since early March, guess what - now I have actually spent less money on everyday stuff. Dumb example but you can get a used Volca Sample for what you pay for 3 restaurant dinners here in Paris.

Even with that taken into account, I think it would be a bad idea. But I'm not a business or economics expoert

[exitonly]

https://techcrunch.com/2020/05/15/us-video-game-sales-have-record-quarter-as-consumers-stay-at-home/

i prefer playing with synths