Lifting The Veil On Behringer: A History Of Controversy
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- čas přidán 27. 06. 2024
- Today's episode is a bit controversial. Highlighting some of the legal battles Behringer has encountered and what the outcomes were. The intention is to shed some light on the company to better understand them today, good and bad. No one else wanted to make the video, so here it is.
Chapters:
0:00 Video Purpose
0:54 1989 Behringer Foundations
1:42 1997 Legal Case Mackie vs Behringer
2:37 2005 Roland Vs Behringer
3:08 2006 FCC Fines Behringer
3:42 2009 Peavey Electronics Vs Behringer
4:13 2017 Behringer Vs Dave Smith Instruments & Gearspace Users
5:00 2020 The Peter Kirn "Kirn Cork Sniffer" Controversy
5:48 Behringer Clones Synthesizers & Drum Machines
6:48 Behringer Cloning Arturia Controversy
7:32 Behringer Cloning Moog Controversy
8:08 Should We Stop Supporting Behringer?
9:11 Benn Jordan Calls Out Behringer
9:53 Behringer Donations
10:10 The Path Forward For Behringer - Hudba
Moog Mini Moog $4,999. Behringer Model D $349. Any questions?
And Poly D optimised …
We love Moog No doubt... but my budget says Behringer ... Thank's Behringer...
Myself, I have no issue with the recreation of the circuitry of other synths. However, the trade dress aspect of it does bother me, probably because I’m a designer by trade. If Behringer is going to clone old synths, I think they’d be well-served to provide them with their own aesthetic designs. That said, I own a Poly D so clearly even I bend my morals at times. 😁
I also draw a moral line between cloning stuff that is out of production vs. not. It feels way more Robin Hood to say “we’ve recreated that old thing you can no longer get and made it accessible to the masses!” than “we shamelessly ripped off the Keystep so we could sell it for a few bucks less!”
Behringer is a tough one. They’re doing some awesome things for us consumers but it’s hard to cheer for a company that is so relentless and unforgiving about biting other people’s work. 🤷♂️
Good video!
Thank you so much! Well said!
By law, a product rights becomes public domain after the patent expires. Even if the product is still on the market :)
But yes, some clones of Behringer could be questioned, because the original product patent isn’t expired yet. Thinking of Mother-32 clone, DFAM clone, Moogerfooger clones, for instance.
@@iamKiluka Absolutely. But I wasn’t talking about the law, just my own personal morals and how they feel about this. 😁
LMAO so it's not ok for Behringer to clone the Keystep, Quad VCA, Batumi, etc... but perfectly fine for anyone out there to copy Strandberg's multiscale headless guitar design and sell it for hundreds or even thousands of dollars less, or any other type of high end piece of music gear you can think of, there's a clone or inspired by product already made or in the works and widely accepted and used in the music industry. LMAO synthheads are a different breed 🤣🤣🤣 Time to wake up and realize that this is just how it is, it's exclusive for a little while, then it isn't anymore.
@@tricitytypebeat8622 No one said it doesn’t happen all the time. Of course it does. That’s why he made the video, presumably. This is simply a forum to say how we feel about it. How do you feel about it?
A couple things I wanted to mention regarding Behringer about 20 years ago. They were not producing the same level of quality they are now. I was doing a lot of front of house and monitors for live sound events and pretty much every band rider, even smaller bands had “absolutely no Behringer” on the rider, they probably still do. Their PA speakers and mixers were poor quality and not reliable at all for live use. To be fair, a lot of riders said the same about Mackie, both are considered very budget companies for live sound.
Another thing that most people won’t remember or know if they are younger is that sometime in the mid 2000’s, Sweetwater had a message come up on their site if you searched for Behringer. It said something like “due to the currently low manufacturing standards of Behringer products, we will not be selling them at this time. This could change in the future if their products improve” I can’t find any evidence of this on the internet but it was definitely a thing. Today Sweetwater, along with Amazon are the 2 largest distributors of Behringer products. So things can change.
The other thing you didn’t mention is that Behringer, who is under the Music Tribe brand, are also sister companies to reputable brands like Midas, TC Electronic, and Klark Teknik. This technology has been incorporated into many newer Behringer synths, mixers, and interfaces. Coolaudio is another brand they own and they make most of the clone ICs that give the synths their vintage tone, something even the legacy companies like Korg and Roland struggle to replicate with their reissues of classic synths. The CEM3340 is one popular example but they are in all the synths and guitar pedals.
cheap and equal or higher than good wins that is, Behringer
The old Behringer issues of iffy build quality seems to be behind them. Today, Behringer's products are made as well, or better (I'm looking at you Korg!) than their competitors. As for "cloning" famous synths, I prefer to see them as homages - they have similar characteristics to, say, Moog, but they are not quite the same.
The Moog ones aren't quite as close but definitely sound good. My Blue Marvin 2600 on the other hand, that sounds amazing! The pure oscillator tones are so gnarly and the filter has to voices and both sound phenomenal
@@tricitytypebeat8622 The 2600 is a true triumph. It's amazing what's available for that price.
I'm glad you have pronounced the name Behringer correctly. Everybody says "behrinyer" in non German speaking countries
Just picked up a System 55 and BRAINS - solid quality - actually blown away tbh - nothing like the Behringer I knew 10 years ago - solid video m8
Great video. I've purchased two products from Behringer. Over 10 years ago I bought a small cheap 4 channel mixer, and I ended up throwing it away because it sounded so bad (too noisy). A few years ago I bought an X-Touch, and it's been fantastic. I love that thing. I would buy another product by them... but if there were another company making something similar for a similar price, I'd buy that instead. I suspect that almost every huge company does bad stuff that we're not aware of. Amazon, Google, Apple, and Microsoft have all screwed people, but I still give them money.
There is a type of patent called a design patent which covers the look of a product, not the circuit. They exist to stop companies from doing what Behringer did with the swing.
Nice little summary of the brief history of Behringer, and of its most unsavoury lawsuits. I am happy to read that Ben Jordan's call was answered. I do not believe for one second that the company that sued Dave Smith suddenly saw the light and tried to become a fair player, but at least they are beginning to see that the backlash over their most outrageous moves is getting too costly on their public image. Good for us and for them !
What I fail to understand is Uli Behringer's motivations here. His company staff proved over and over that they were fully capable of developing strong, original products (the example of the DeepMind comes to ... err ... mind), and at the same time to cleverly re-interpret out-of-market designs with expired patents (their reinterpretation of the Arp 2600 is a true masterpiece, I find).
Why on earth, then, would they want to be mostly identified with the worst examples of their exploitative copies of products that are still on the market ? Why try and earn a few cents per units selling a ripped-off version of Arturia's Keystep (i.e. the Swing) when you designed such a great (and cheap) synthesiser as the Neutron ?
This simply baffles me !
As a dirt poor musician, I absolutely love what they are doing with their hardware.
Most of the time, yes. But the Swing is an outlier. The Keystep is already cheap, they took their thing, made it exactly the same and sell it for $10 less. Thats pretty rude. Not disagreeing with you on other things they "clone". The Swing was just a step over the line, imo.
@@l1fef0rm That's business, it's a dog eat dog world.
lot more than $10 less
I understand your less than positive spin on Behringer, as you are a Moog fan, however, the synth's that Behringer provides give the rest of us access to some very beautiful machines. I own a Deep Mind 12, Neutron, RD-6 and a TD-3MO and have nothing but positive things to say... thank you for your video!
Appreciate your thoughts! This video is purposely made to shed light on some controversies. To give everyone a well rounded perspective of them. I’ve actually been a really big outspoken supporter of some of the things they do! ✌️ -TA
@Mark, you will notice that out of the three products you own, two are genuine original creations by Behringer (the DeepMind and the Neutron, which are both impressive products), and one is the recreation of a Roland product that used to be out-of-market when Behringer commercialised it (Roland has since re-issued it, probably imitating Behringer back in that ! 🙂). So, in a way, what you own represent Behringer at their best: clever original designs and brilliant recreations of out-of-market products.
What makes people cringe however is something entirely different, which has nothing to do with being a Moog, Roland or an Arturia fan: you do not need to like these companies to disapprove of Behringer's complete rip-offs of some of their PRESENT products (visual design included !). In that respect, the Swing is probably the worst (or best) example: a cheaper copy of an already cheap product that redefined the market of MIDI controllers a few years back. The irony of it is that the price difference ends up being less than 15 USD (on a $120 product), with the original Arturia keyboard being already aimed at penny-less musicians like us !
Frankly, it baffles me that the very same company should do both of those things. It is as if they would rather be known for their cheap imitations than for their genuinely great original creations ! I fail to get it.
@@goingmodularThe Deepmind is a clone of the Juno*
@@hulkslayer626 That is a bit of a stretch. The DeepMind was definitely inspired by the 106, but to be fair, the same could be said of pretty much any modern digitally-controlled analog synth, since the Juno series pioneered this type of architecture.
But beyond that, the workflow on a DeepMind is very different (much thanks to the screen), the polyphony in the 12 version is twice that of a Juno 106, and the DeepMind series introduced analog morphing between sounds for the very first time in a consumer synth (to the best of my knowledge). Analog morphing was no small feat in 2016, and at about the same time as the DeepMind came out, this function was showcased by Arturia on their (excellent) MatrixBrute mono synth as a major innovation.
So not only was the DeepMind not a clone, but it did pack totally innovative functions that were strangely overlooked by critics at the time.
I guess this is what you get for being a serial copier: even your most original creations end up being erroneously flagged as copies. Which somehow proves my point above, in a way.
I've been pondering the controversy surrounding Behringer, and it raises a question in my mind: Why are we accepting the exorbitant prices set by the original designers? When Behringer produces a product like the Keystep at a significantly lower cost compared to Arturia, it makes me question the inflated pricing in the synth/music hardware market. While I'm unsure if Behringer's intent is to highlight this problem, their ability to recreate these products with comparable quality and at a discounted price brings attention to the issue of overvaluation and overpricing that plagues the industry.
Morally, it's a grey area for me as well. I can't help but draw parallels to the peasants of old who likely had mixed feelings about Robin Hood. Sure, Robin Hood was stealing, which is generally considered wrong. However, he was taking from the wealthy and giving to those who had less. As a struggling musician/artist, I can understand the sentiment of the "peasants" in this scenario. I might think, 'I don't particularly like your methods, but I do need to survive.'
Perhaps we should shift our focus and start asking a different question: Why are music electronics prices so high? (I'm excluding boutique synth designers who typically handcraft their products.) Are these prices truly justified? Does Behringer's production of these "copycat" products indicate an underlying issue within the market?
For me, the frustration stems from a broader observation within our culture, especially from a North American perspective. Artists are consistently undervalued. It's impossible to ignore the dichotomy between the music electronics industry setting inflated prices and the undervaluation of the very customers they serve-artists, musicians, and entertainers-who are perpetually under appreciated, underpaid, and undervalued.
However, it's crucial to emphasize that despite the controversy surrounding Behringer and their "copycat" products, I still love and value the original designers of these products. I have deep respect for their hard work and creativity. Their inventions should be held in high regard for providing us with the tools to create what we do. It's essential to acknowledge their contributions and the impact they have had on the industry.
Curious to hear other peoples thoughts on this.
It costs money to pay engineers to design things. There's design, prototyping, testing, improving, designing again, testing again, etc. And this applies to hardware, software, and the housing and all the little parts that come together for a final product. Then there's also the element of risk - will your cool new product be successful? If not, the company needs to make back the money lost on failures with some successes.
When you clone someone else's work, you don't have to pay the same tens/hundreds of thousands of dollars in development costs, so you can sell your gear for lower cost and still make a profit. And you won't bother cloning something that didn't already prove itself to be a successful product, so you don't have that element of risk either.
Ja,es stimmt.Derzeit empfinde ich auf dem Synthesizer-Markt ein Umgestalten.Derjenige gewinnt mit den preisgünstigsten Clones alter Schätzchen im neuen Gewand.Dabei ist das Grundinnenleben immer dasselbe,mit neuer SMD Elektronik aufgepeppt.
This goes on with guitar effect pedals. If something is an analog circuit you can legally clone it. You might not like it, but it's all publicly available information. So synths (analog for the most part mind you) are fair game in my mind as long as something about it is slightly different. That my take on this.
There is a huuuge Research and Development cost when you create a new product. The companies that actually create those cannot sell a synth for 50 bucks because they need to cover the RnD costs they paid upfront. And then comes Behringer who steals their product and starts selling it for pennies. There must be a definitive line between "inspired by" and "copied by", otherwise we risk putting companies that actually create new products out of the business.
You know what's wild about the Mackie situation? For one they one THOUSAND percent ripped off the look of the Mackie 8 Bus. Also Mackie pulled their line of mixers from Sam Ash until Behringer changed the look. They were the same machines, just the exteriors
Copyright, patents , intellectual property is such a mess.
Some things are allowed and similar things in another realm are not.
In shops there are snacks that look exactly like the ones they’re ripping off.
Patent trolls, samples from songs , I’m just too lazy to continue.
Behringer? I think we should make a law requiring companies to produce they invented in a certain amount or else companies like Behringer can produce them. And limit copyright to max 25 years after death.
As someone who has been a long time DAW musician and just stepped into the hardware world late last year the amount of money that has gone into equipment has been quite heavy... I always heard communities talking poorly about Behringer so i just avoided them until I was about to purchase a second Moog DFAM and saw the Edge demo... I make zero income from my music and dont plan on ever performing again or selling albums so i have begun to look more at Behringer for future equipment purchases... Great to hear the full back story about them... I dont agree with cloning someone elses products but I feel as a mostly hobbyist musician having access to more equipment while staying under budget definitely sounds like something i am contemplating for sure...
Seeing this video after watching your video on the announcement of Moog being acquired by inMusic on it further my points I made on that video... I love America and our concept of free enterprise and competition... Behringer does nothing different than names like Warm Audio, CAPY, Heritage Audio and etc... Moog makes great gear but they charge what they do because they can... to me they never hide about what they're cloning so hopefully Moog's partnership with inMusic can bring their price down and further make the space creative
If you cant copyright a chord progression (a series of chords played in a certain order) how can we patent a synthesizer (a series of oscillators and filters in a certain order) its more fundamental than the music its going to make we can’t just make up a endless amount of options we already did
a chord progression is not intellectual property. The patent scouting that Berhinger employs is disgusting. they wait for patents to expire before snapping them up and shamelessly profiting. They have taken IP from Moog, Mutable Instruments, the open source community, among many others.
The only thing that they have actually innovated is the deep mind.. oh wait thats actually the Juno 106..
Never mind..
The owner has also been publicly antisemitic.
Actually, you can copyright a chord progression, but you cannot infringe on others' copyrights when doing so. Patent and trademark laws are very different than copyright, though all three types are intellectual property. If patents and trademarks are not protected for a fair amount of years, there's no financial reason for inventors to brings products to market.
Surely with the funds they now have Behringer can produce their own unique synths?
They did put out the Deepmind series. I think it's a fine synth, especially at that price point.
Also, the Neutron.
@@Tiger.Arcade ...and the unreleased Proton. I forgot about that.
I wish they would make their own more, too. The Neutron and DeepMind are among their very best products. People love them and there are no moral qualms to be seen. Do that more, please!
They have.
i am not 100% sure i concretely come down on any side of this. I think affordable clones, especially of legacy or out of production equipment is probably beneficial overall. the only Behringer product i currently own is a patch bay, but id be interested in trying or using more of it. i can say the whole thing is just interesting. I am not a huge fan of intellectual property as a concept, but even not liking it, what Behringer does sort of helps me think through where lines may or may not need to be drawn on such things
It's a shame that Behringer seems more occupied with cloning than releasing their own products of which they've shown they can deliver. For instance I find it's frustrating to see them wave about the BCR32, but never releasing it and instead keep releasing clones without even trying to innovate anything on it to make it better than the product originally was.
Behringer I beg you to clone the Akai AX60!
It's been perfectly acceptable, and outright admired by many in the music industry, for any company in the world, small, huge, or anywhere in between, to make cloned or inspired by vintage and modern instruments, preamps, compressors and other outboard gear, mixers, speakers, guitar amps, studio monitors, microphones, the list goes on and I think most educated musicians understand and appreciate this.
Then there is the elitist synth head community, which somehow thinks that the rules of the music gear world do not apply to their special little blinking bleep and bloop groove boxes, and that Behringer is the Antichrist of all electronic music!🤣🤣🤣Keep fighting that good fight though, keep them prices high and that gear exclusive!
Written by a producer who owns and loves his four analog synths, an RD-9 and a Keystep Pro. No hate, just facts!
Everyone on here is using computers assembled by children, anyway, not that this would be something they might want to investigate. Or how about all the roof suicides in Taiwan's tech/chip factories? The moment you point the finger at Behringer, you're virtually surrounded by products Made in China, and that includes Apple products, your analog "legacy" companies, many of whom are multinationals themselves and have been for decades.
When you start pointing fingers over production, you have to start a discussion about the problems of large-scale industrial production, the bulk of which is now in China, a fact of life. Most consumers don't want to think about these things, fine. I have yet to see any serious journalistic investigation into Behringer's business practices on the internet. This has been true for well over a generation. All elitist and purist arguments are of no value and shouldn't be part of any serious discussion about the access people have to what is old technology, well out of patent and copyright protection. It's not even a moral issue, and Behringer is hardly alone in the analog cloning game, just a fact. Most consumers don't want to think about these things, fine. I have yet to see any serious journalistic investigation into Behringer's business practices on the internet.
Let's be honest: back when Roland was mass-manufacturing analog synthesizers in the 70s, Japan was at that time considered the China of that era, and Taiwan had a road ahead of it in building up its tech producing abilities that are now the rival of the entire world. Neither Korg or Roland are mom and pop businesses, they're corporations, multinational ones. So is Behringer. Both of them have parts and accessories that are made in China, and they're hardly alone, so does Moog, so has Dave Smith Instruments, an endless list.
The fact is, Behringer is doing what Roland did about four decades ago in producing far more affordable analog synthesizers than the competition (I won't even go into the fact that the late Bob Moog was a bad businessman in the pioneering years.)
I believe a lot of people miss the elephant in the room: that corporations de facto run the world. I don't like this fact any more than anyone else who views it sincerely as a problem. That's not what most of the critics of Behringer are saying. What are they saying in the end? Nothing at all.
I stumbled upon this as I’m new to synths. What’s interesting about this is there are so many examples of this across industries. Apple and PC, or Apple and Android are a few that are in my working realm, So it’s not much of a surprise to me that someone would copy something here and that it wouldn’t be issue. Is it Dickish? I have always felt so but depending on which ‘side’ you’re on ‘original vs copy’ the arguments never stop.
Makes it more interesting a few months after you post this that now Moog got scooped up by a big conglomerate who owns all sorts of stuff. Now who’s the big bad corp and who’s the small guy? Heh.
A clone would be 100% look/feel alike, right? They sound very close. Most of their 'cloned' synths have totally different dimensions and some extra features. They use equivalent components that haven't been used in original vintage products and I seriously doubt that even the circuit boards are identical.
What we think is cloned is not really cloned. There may be exceptions but their synths I just dont see it. I dont defend B for playing dirty sometimes... who doesn't?
Behringer is a bad idea if we want to support quality and engineering innovation. No company should be allowed to sell off the backs of others hard work, investments and dedication. Don’t buy Behringer where they are blatantly copying others work, it’s the exact same as supporting software piracy.
No it is not...a lot of companies produce copies of fender guitars like strat and tele or jag and so on. The same to Gibson Les Paul model. The patent of a product is going for 20 years...i mean a lot of time to sell enough of your protected stuff, isn't it ? Behringer reproduce great copies of synthesizer gear you never could afford or even get in case of no source. I think they produce little affordable toys to give a near taste of the original without endanger your pension...it's your decission not to buy, but believe me other companies reproduce their own stuff in China too and demand x-times more money for that...
Thw Swing is much better than the KeyStep
The cloning is one thing, there's pros & cons there (I own the Neutron myself), but the Gearslutz episode and Kirn-shaming is bottom-draw immoral behaviour.
Totally understand folk boycotting this brand.
Problem is, Uli's kind of set himself up for the sort of mudslinging his company's received, especially when they came on the market and were immediately jumped on by dbx. Dbx said that Behringer had stolen circuits and concepts from their line of dynamics processors, and had a really solid case for this. But that went away, along with some other patent squabbles, with pretrial settlements. It wasn't until he took on Greg Mackie that Behringer had to deal with someone who was pissed at them for _moral_ reasons, not just mere industrial patent theft. And then came the others...Roland, Arturia, Mutable...and now, Make Noise, with B's Maths clone. Yeah, sure... let's just ignore Joe's decade or so of work on perfecting one of Eurorack's most essential modules and just by a 2019 version and copy, copy, copy. Oh...then undercut the eff out of Joe when the "Baths" module comes out.
See, THIS is the problem with Uli Behringer and his Tribe. It's not simply enough to copy a product...Uli can and has acted out in some rather vindictive ways.
Case in point: Peter Kirn. I thought the "corksniffer" (which was NOT released, save as a CGI render which caused Behringer a whole new world of disrespect due to...well, what DO you call the actions of a CEO jeopardizing his company over an insensitive and childish prank?) fiasco...which, in most sensible companies would be good for a chuckle and a day or three of in-house amusement. But not in THIS case, as they not only tossed that render around online, there was CLEARLY some sort of malice present. One way this obviously popped up was that right-outta-the-Protocols of the Elders of Zion graphic, depicting the music journalist as a smearo-typical caricature of Jewish tropes. Not cool. On many levels, too.
But at the same general time as this, Behringer was prepping their ARP 2600 clone for its sales launch while Korg was prepping their ARP 2600FS clone to... well, ultimately piss off scads of musicians who couldn't get one. And then Korg waited an unreasonable amount of time...and perhaps an irresponsible amount of time, as multiple info sources told me that they'd never see as huge a crowd as they did that was primed and ready to drop $4000+ IF ONLY the synth existed to buy. A couple of months into this bullshit and B was about to drop their 2600s. Plural. One was supposed to be the "v.5" (which I have), another was an extended "v.2" and the Blue Meanie clone was the third. Why, they even made it easier to schlep around AND they included the 3620 keyboard module circuits... something which Korg left off of their shrunk-down 2600M.
So when Uli and his Tribe do the RIGHT thing...damn right I'll stand up and say so. But their history sortakinda dictates that you DO NOT give him props UNTIL you have his new offerings in hand. It's sort of like housebreaking your dog...treats when they do good, spray bottle and newspaper otherwise.
And as for right now, I think it's about time to fill up the spray bottle again. Where are all of these synthesizers we should have? Oh, right...chip shortage. But then, if you know this...then make a statement about it, one that also clears up the confusion over why several dozen products had their hype controls dimed when it should've been apparent that there was no way for them to fulfill that production goal. Case in point: the Enigma.
Buchla designs use vactrols. MATCHED vactrols in specific circuits, even. Now, if you have a sizable modular company such as Tiptop, whose modules you can even buy via Walmart's website, and both they and Buchla USA have been talking about the dwindling supply of vactrols, this might indicate that it's a terrible idea to preannounce a new synth that will require these scarce parts. Yeah, the hope is that Uli'll fab vactrols, just like the Curtis chips. But I ain't holding MY breath, waiting for their Sound Beasel...or a lot of other stuff they mentioned. And they continue their thinly-veil IP theft right alongside the specious claims, with fiascos such as the Swing, the Braids oscillator, and now the Maths.
Given these antics, it's very difficult to predicate anything about their releases and actions. I've even seen press where it was speculated that Music Tribe's release of these "plans" were actually targeted at investors that were nosing over a planned stock offering. More plans = more success...right?
Well...not hardly. Behringer apparently thinks that your corporate credibility is based on sales figures. This is in contrast to music instrument companies around the world who know that there's more to making instruments than how many you can sell. And to ME, that's at the crux of the debate.
As mentioned, Uli Behringer is an engineer. But the vast majority of respected music firms are run by and for _musicians,_ and there's loads of differences between those.
Case in point: Pro Tools. More coders, less musicians, I hate it. But with Ableton...that began as a music project, created by musicians, and I LUUUURVE me some Ableton Live. When you have working musicians at the fore, you tend to get musical tools as a result, and not something cobbled up by an E.E. grad that looks and works like... something cobbled up by an E.E. grad.
Bottom line: treat Uli nice when he plays nice. But when he reverts to his low-effort crap (coughcoughTaurusclonecough), I'll be looking around for deployable dirtbombs. And honestly, we might want to follow this approach with some other firms...Korg comes to mind right off, tbh. They need a refresher on the general public and faceless corporations' responses to them, then maybe they too can pick up a clue or three about marketing and... well, just plain ol' common sense.
Behringer is great. It's affordable for people who want gear and have a budget. I can't wait for the Solina and the DMX or BMX drum machine.
SHALLOW MUCH?
@@onbutton8525 shallow? No the sound is rich and my pockets are not empty. Moral arguments are just idealogical masks. Either you made your own original instrument from scratch or you are a consumer purchasing the best goods within your budget.
Did you insist moral arguments are "ideological masks" and then make a moral argument in the next sentence?
Moral arguments are still worth having and will happen one way or another, human nature.
I have the Neutron and it sounds cool @@Axiohm000
That board room video you showed, he looks kick ass, status, alpha and making a deal. And yes ppl in the electronic equipment community hates this guy. Something to do with ethics 😊😊😊
This is good. I always wondered a bit about the history of Behringer as a company. I'm not a fan, but mostly because I'm not into the unoriginality of their stuff. If I was in a pinch though and needed a stop gap, I might pick something up.
I don't care but for sure Behringer could do much better work with Swing. They could inhance it a lot but instead almost completely cloned. Would be good if they added screen and memory for sequences + simultaneously working sequencer and arpegitor. Oh wait AKAI already did this with their Mini Plus 😊 and I don't see the reason for buying both arturia and Behringers knock off.
To be honest, i'm perfectly happy to be able to buy instruments at the fraction of the cost of the originals, i don't really care if they copied someone lol
I mean, Moog just sold in order to break their employees' legal union, so it's not like synth companies are all paracgons of virtue.
That's a flat-out lie.
I'm a huge fan of Behrringer. I could never justify other companies prices. Behringer have showed the world what a rip off these companies are. You are paying huge amounts for named brands.
The Swing is much better with more features than the Keystep. Even second hand Moog gear is grossly expensive.
I use social media, therefor i support questionable tech corps, on devices that aren't possible without at least some level of slave labor. Most of the products I use day to day are also in part a result of slave labor somewhere down supply chain, if only in the raw materials. It is almost impossible to avoid this short of making everything you own from scratch, with full knowledge of the origins of every raw material. The very roof over my head is likely the same case.
I'm a lot of things but a hypocrite is one I try to avoid being. If I'm willing to use these products day to day, and willing to buy more, knowing this reality, then who am I to climb the moral mountain and stand atop of it pointing down, all miffed or angry over some clones and or copies, ect? Muh ethics? So selectively and inconsistent? Na. I'm just another cog in the same machine you're in. I choose to take part in it everyday, it's convenient. You think so too reader, that's why you're still here.
Not saying you should go nuts and have zero standards. it's just that in the grand scheme of things this is a non-issue in my eyes and every other synth manufacture has some ethical and or moral issue you'll have accept or overlook/ignore as well.
I'll watch the video in a few hours. Work 🎸
This is a thoughtful comment and I agree with it 100%.
That said, the question here isn’t this deep. You can have an opinion on whether Behringer is ethically worse than any other synth company and still hold everything you said in your head, as well. 😁
En poco tiempo me llega mi Ms-20 😍
Digo, mi Beringer k2 Jsjsjjss 😂😂😂
Company built on scummy behaviour. Not interested in supporting. There many other companies like make noise, moog, sequential, arturia etc that put in the hard work to create innovative products that I’d much rather exchange my money with. It’s a transaction in which you are supporting and encouraging But hey everyone makes their own decisions.
Also, their logo sucks. Obviously their own design.
😂 the logo 😂
I agree that this ear of a logo is appalling (and I do not consider myself anti-Behringer !).
the kirn cork sniffer was hilrious, peter kirn is pretty insufferable and elitist. My biggest issue with behringer is the made in china part. I have the devilfish 303 clone they released and i love it. Id never be able to afford the real deal nor would i wanna spend the money on a real 303.
Behringer just announced that they are moving to original designs, like the upcoming Proton.
And even while cloning, bringing an analog poly at $400 or so is innovation by itself. I'll still save for a Sequential/Novation but I'll also get Behringer gear when it is widely available.
I’ve no real issue on B doing knock off gear. It’s the B fan base that’s awful.
Very clever marketing. People believe they ‘basically’ own a Moog or a Juno. No, you don’t. As much as I don’t own a CS80 because I have Arturia. My parrot can sound like a Nokia… she’s still a parrot though.
This is not a controversy, except that those who love to spend $5000 for a synth made when they were in strollers.. So Behringer clearly is paying homage to the same companies that want to act as gatekeepers. So Moog and others are pissed because Behringer makes something close to the original yet offers MUCH MORE at a great low price. STOP CRYING and make better, affordable gear for the common people. For example, I OWN an original Roland HS60,and I WELCOME Behringer and Roland to make a more versatile machine with similar specs..THANK YOU...OH, ok, so now some of us are 'moral ' and perfect??? We have smartphones, headphones, pedals, computers,etc,etc that are clones/homages,and it's somehow not an issue???? Oh so now a musician who gave a bad review about a sampler he did not know how to use, is the voice of morality and gatekeeper????yeah,ok..NOT....I respect NO opinions that are not across the board for ALL companies..
How are Moog gatekeepers? They’re an employee owned company trying to make a profit … by selling their own products.
They invented the Minimoog. They invented the Dfam and Mother 32. They should be allowed to make a profit off their instruments, and continue to have the resources to develop and release new products for the world, without some corporatized Walmart operation mass producing clones of their products in China at a fraction of the cost.
Is Fender a gatekeeper because they sell guitars that dwarf the price of a new Model D? There are vintage Fenders and limited editions that go for 20 grand. Or what about Gibson? They have the same story with their guitars. Is Pearl or Ludwig a gatekeeper because they sell pro level drum kits that cost 10 - 20 grand?
Quality instruments cost money. Gear companies need to make money in order to continue to stay in business, pay employees, and create new products.
And in the case of Moog … 4-5 grand is literally what the price of a Model D is in the market … and thats the low end.
Should Moog, or Oberheim (who also just released a classic re-issue worth 5 grand), just make vsts in a box like Roland so they could constantly churn out new products for an affordable price that leech off their history and past? Would that make Moog more of company for the people? Should they never develop a new product, but just make digital groove boxes and cheap digital boutique modules that trade in on their past and their brand name?
Or is it maybe a cool for Moog to simultaneously give people products that they want (new upgraded Model D), AND make a profit when they are still in the process of developing new things … while they are at a bit of slow point in terms of product sales (no new products other than the Mavis for a while, and most people who buy Sub 37’s or Matriarch’s or GM’s buy them used on EBay. In case you didn’t know … Moog doesn’t get money from EBay purchases?)
And … have you ever thought about any of this, or do you just go about your life whining about why YOU can’t afford cool things, so eff all these “gatekeeper” companies who dare to stay in business?!
@@79Glitch , I feel the same as you do. People seem to get upset at the very existence of things they desire but cannot afford, and end up calling that "gatekeeping". This fundamentally is entitlement, and as all forms of entitlement, it creates moral blind spots. In this case here, the blatant theft of product designs is reframed positively as "sharing riches with the masses against the gatekeeping nobility".
People, we are talking SYNTHESISERS ! Not food or health care ! These goods do not answer to any base human needs, they are leisure items and nobody's life ever got miserable for lack of being able to afford a new synth ! There are a million ways to share the love of music among all people, rich or poor, but plagiarism is not one of them in my book.
A Problem with behringer that people don’t bring up is that when buying their garbage, you’re slowly forcing real synth companies to bend into making cheap recycled crap instead of developing new and amazing instruments.
I’m all for making something based on a minimoog that sounds like a minimoog, but when you basically call it a minimoog and make it look like and feel like a fisher price toy set, it’s just pathetic to me.
Now we have tracks filled with these weird over brightened sharp 909/808 ish sounding drums, mixed with harsh sounding synths. They’re cheap for a reason, none of its going to work in a few years and it will all end up in the ocean. Sick way to spend money lol.
It also makes the manufacturers hesitant to invest in R&D and innovation if someone is going to come along and steal the fruits of their labours.
With a few exceptions, Behringer does not innovate. Their focus is on “how can we deliver 80% of the experience for 15% of the cost and sell it at 30% 0f the price?”. All of the ‘hard’ work has been done by someone else.