Ok, I'm sorry but I'm going to chime in.
I get along with Andy, don't know if anyone get's along with Randy
How about Josh?
I don't think Josh thought this was easy money at all, he worked really hard to pull this off then felt like it was swept out from under him at the launch. I know from conversations he was working through the optimization but became very disengaged when the Ultimarc release happened, right or wrong this was not mal-intent.
I think he felt his idea was cool, then realized that in the Real World (TM) nobody would just say "wow cool man, take a nice big chunk of the market".
Nothing happened to him "at the launch". At launch he was actually alone and free to make his offer irresistible. Apart from a coupld of mediocre sw/fw updates, nothing else.
If he was disengaged because he faced the free market, it was wrong any way you see it. I don't say (and don't believe) he planned for a "grab n' run", but well this is what happened in the end.
Few months (not even a full year) of support for the first customers and then Mr. Invisible.
I do think we walk a fine line. It is true, Randy and Andy are still here, but basically selling the same stuff they were 10 years ago except when someone else does something like the howler. So how do you balance this, encourage innovation. This market is much more territorial than most of the customers realize, and that's a shame.
I agree with what you say. Since they are part of an oligopoly, they make the rules.
They don't even compete each other.
Would love more innovation in the field.
Then again they deal with a market that comes from the 80ies, so nobody actually pushes them to advance the market.
I remember when I told Andy about a cool extra feature one of his signature product could have, he told me he had plans for that and designed and sent to his manufacturing (Chinese) partner to make some test units but they didn't come and he would ask again... well suffice to say, he finally posted SOMETHING in his site about that extra feature maybe more than a year later.
Indeed they don't feel any push, so they just work with what they have. I don't like it either.
I don't see how it would change. Not with business rookies like Josh "buhuhu that man stole my toy".
I do wish more people like Josh would push things, but I'm not sure about the answer. I think ressurecting this thread is going to little more than open old wounds, but, hey what's done is done
Agreed. I just wanted to bring this up to date.