I think the headlights thing is b/c 99% of BMW drivers use the automatic headlamp feature that uses a sensor to turn the lights on and off automatically.
Duhh... AMD DOES have a license for x86. Intel gave it to them yonks ago because their customers were demanding a viable second source. It also helps with that pesky antitrust thing.
They learned all the hard lessons of the Macintosh introduction in the 1980s, and decided that they did everything absolutely right! Overprice it, lock it down, and fight independent developers tooth and nail to preserve the "experience".
I predict that with the launch of the SDK, Apple will invite Mi.. Google as a special partner to develop applications for the iPhone, so that together can take down IB... Microsoft. I'm sure Apple is not worried about Android because the technology is inferior and it just doesn't have the same "class".
A good, no BS resource for the "softer side" of management is at http://fridayreflections.com/. The idea seems to be short stories on topics like accountability, results and learning... with stories from actual management episodes. A wisdom download instead of a methods and tools download, if you will.
My favorites: A desk is a dangerous place to view the world, many fail to grasp what is right in the palm of their hands... but there is tons more.
It's a pretty well-worn complaint that the better technologies often lose out, but innovators often seem to be at a loss about how to win in situations where they're up against an entrenched competitor with an inferior product but the existing relationship. I read on a blog somewhere the story of how Sun got it's early business away from the big guys of the day like Apollo... here's one such link: http://fridayreflections.typepad.com/friday_reflec tions/2007/05/persistence_pay.html
The consensus there seemed to be that sheer bloody minded persistence is the key ingredient to getting something innovative adopted. In other words, "Fall down seven times, get up eight times". Sounds too simple to be true... but I'm sure there's a million other stories like that.
In 1922, the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) felt gravely threatened by a newfangled technology called 'Radio', which they saw as a threat to their once lucrative profit streams.
Initially, ASCAP threatened to prosecute radio stations for playing their music, but eventually realised that they could not combat the rise of this 'Radio'. Instead they tried to milk it by setting up huge royalty fees (about $5000) to dissuade smaller stations and profit from larger ones.
In 1923 the radio stations banded together to fight ASCAP and formed BMI (Broadcast Music Incorporated) to try and break the monopoly ASCAP held over almost all recorded music.
At the time all the big sellers (the metallicas of this world) were with ASCAP, but BMI signed strange new artists with newfangled sounds like 'Rock n Roll' and 'R&B'. ASCAP arrogantly increased their royalties by 70% to try and kill off radio.
During the depression radio had a boom, and ASCAP brought in the lawsuits, in the infamous Waring case taking a radio station to the supreme court.
Instead of dying, radio thrived as a channel for this Rock n Roll sound, championed by popular personality DJs like Alan Freed and supported by lurative advertising. BMI's artists profited immensley and gained for the first time a huge amount of worldwide attention as their music was broadcast around.
I'll let you guess what happened from there on in. Feel free to draw parallels.
From Hyperreal:
http://hyperreal.org/music/lists/313/labels/ur/u r.html
Underground Resistance is a label for a movement. A movement that wants change by Sonic Revolution. We urge you to join the Resistance and help us to combat the mediocre audio and visual programming that is being feed to the inhabitants of earth, this programming is stagnating the minds of the people; building a wall between races and preventing world peace. It is this wall we are going to smash. By using the untapped energy potential of sound we are going to destroy this wall much the same as certain frequencies shatter glass. Techno is a music based in experimentation; it is sacred to no one race; it has no definitive sound. It is music for the future of the Human Race. Without this music there will be no peace, no love, no vision. By simply communicating through sound, Techno has brought people of all different nationalities together under one roof to enjoy themselves. Isn't it obvious that music and dance are the keys to the universe? So called primitive animals and tribal humans have known this for thousands of years! We urge all brothers and sisters of the underground to create and transmit their tones and frequencies no matter how so called primitive their equipment may be. Transmit these tones and wreck havoc on the programmers! Long live the Underground...
>At this point in time, the only people buying >Macs are luddite print designers and people with >a fetish for colored plastic.
Mac sales are actually increasing in 'Luddite' areas such as first time buyer *CUSTOMERS*, the 'normal joes'. You may not think such people deserve a computer, but at least Apple is catering for them with something they want - in a *CUSTOMER* focused appliance with all the traits they will ever need or want.
If the zealots love it too then all the better. Every platform needs zealots. Come on, your statement that all closed source platforms will die sounds more like the words of a Linux zealot than of someone who has an open point of view.
App support has previously been Apple's key weakness. With a multiplatform OS, the range of apps is bound to increase, since the user base is bound to expand beyond those who just upgrade their existing Mac box, even if only slightly at first.
Now the OS will go on any machine, but for some customers will be best on the 'premium' Mac boxes that I assume will be sexier looking and sold/specced with a *CUSTOMER* focus and good support.
So there is no reason why the Mac cannot survive, or thrive. I think in the end it will, because Apple is at last getting the marketing right. Marketing = listening to CUSTOMERS and giving them what they want.
In an area where hardware and software is getting more and more homogenized anyway, that's todays killer app... not Quark Xpress. (I always preferred Pagemaker anyway)
>The fact that Apple didn't gut the MacOS and >replace it with something modern
Such as a DOS based operating system? I know UNIX might be considered 'more modern' because of superior multitasking, but my mom does not give a toss about such things, and neither does the average iMac *CUSTOMER*.
>back in the 80's
In the 80s MacOS was modern, and way ahead of anything on a DOS box in terms of multimedia support - and certainly light years ahead of any kind of user-friendly GUI released until 1995. It was certainly a very suitable OS for the *CUSTOMER*.
>At this point in time, the only people buying >Macs are luddite print designers and people with >a fetish for colored plastic. Hell, the Mac even >lost the web designer market by failing to have >a CSS browser that doesn't crash every three >minutes.
Mac sales are increasing in 'Luddite' areas such as first time buyer *CUSTOMERS*, the 'normal joes'. You may not think such people deserve a computer, but at least Apple is catering for them with something they want - in a *CUSTOMER* focused appliance with all the traits they will ever need or want.
>The killer for the Mac is that in 2000 it still >doesn't have a stable web browser.
Netscape crashes less on my Mac box than IE does on my DOS machine. Admittedly Windows does have the march in this area, since MS has control of the entire front to back integration between the OS, applications and web browser, but it is only bad web designers that ignore Mac users and lower end browsers.
It's annoying that 99% of web developers dont seem to realise that the majority of *PEOPLE* on windows machines are still running the same crappy browser that came with their machine in 1996/7.
There is no reason why the Mac cannot survive. I think in the end it will, because Apple is at last getting the marketing right. Marketing = listening to CUSTOMERS and giving them what they want. In an area where hardware and software is getting more and more homogenized, that's todays killer app.
PPC750 was mainly developed by Motorola and IBM due to competetive demands by the consumer for faster computers, and the development of the Pentium that threatened the 680x0. Apple had an input too since it was the most significant platform based on the 68000 technology, but another annoying misconception is that Apple invented the PowerPC processor.
Their 'supercomputer' ads reinforce this illusion. Okay I know it was an engineer that decided to put that chip in there, but I do not think marketing tried to stop this. If they did then they were dumb.
My point is that marketing doesn't obstruct innovation as far as the customer is concerned, as long as it is done properly. Bad engineering also produces suboptimal outcomes - but then Marketing people are subsequently forced to come up with some ways of turning this into a feature so that they can get back the R&D cost, and then get the blame for the sloppy product.
Is it Marketing's fault the engineering was bad? Perhaps, if they forced something out the door prematurely, or they set the wrong objectives for development.
But that argument invalidates the view that Marketing holds up the release of OS X, since surely a buggier/crappier version would come out sooner if marketing ruled the roost.
Also, the Performa concept was not marketing focused, but engineering/product focused, in that the company would cream more money by producing a range of intentionally crap computers based upon existing models (by stripping out features and NuBus slots) so they could be sold at low prices, rather than finding out exactly what the customer wanted and making it.
Guess what, they didn't sell too well, and the proliferation of marginal difference models confused everyone. Was there a sign of a strategy there? That's not proper marketing, thats just an accounting idea dressed up as a sales pitch.
As for eliminating inventory by build on demand, a large % of Apple's core market does not have access to the internet before buying the computer, and is not technically oriented. (Engineering focus ignores this since such people are losers and dont deserve computers) They are unlikely to build on demand until the technology is more accessible.
Also, I doubt Apple could maintain volume on build on demand unless it invested billions in large scale flexible production plants. Again, this is a minor problem not of concern to engineering focus.
I've been out there on the front line and the conflict between marketing and engineering in most US tech firms is sad and counterproductive. Yeah you want to make cool stuff, but people have to want to buy it. Otherwise you should be an academic, which is much cooler and lets you have more freedom.
The synergy between marketing and engineering in Japanese firms is why they consistently roll out amazingly successful and technologically cool stuff, whereas a large proportion of good US projects get cancelled due to conflict, or the launch ends up a turkey.
Both the marketing people and the engineering people need to love one another, hold hands and skip through the park singing and dancing, then you get the best of both worlds!
Apple barely ever had os on time + marketing good
on
Apple Delays Mac OS X
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· Score: 2
i would say one of the main reasons the Mac was a relative failure compared to windows was that Apple spent too much time dicking around with crazy pet projects, and too little time on any serious business or marketing strategy.
Lots of funky technologies were breeding in the R&D labs, and some of them actually became quite useful (working at apple in the day would have kicked ass), but the majority of ideas like the Pippin were just frankly stupid and ignorant of what customers (who pay the bills at the end of the day) really wanted.
Now the reverse is true and it seems apple is nothing BUT slick marketing. Well, swings and roundabouts, eh? But remember, Apple has never been very good at getting an OS out on time. System 7 was in vapour for quite a while, and as for Copland, well, erm... So comparing the 'crap era' versus 'good era' marketing days, it seems that nothing really changes in Cupertino.
The only reason Apple is alive today is because of the iMac, which is basically a customer driven marketing tool. I bloody hate it when coders say that marketing gets in the way of 'good product'.
yes, it gets in the way of elegant and efficient software/hardware (what is important to engineers of course, for good reason) but the 99% of people buying iMacs do so because of the marketing, especially since MacOSes are pretty underspecced in terms of geek features compared to, say, Linux, and the hardware pricier than a bog standard PC.
Anyway, I know it was just a wee joke but I felt compelled to swim against the tide again.
If I came out with a soap right now called 'Hi Bob' and sued everyone who used these words in an e-mail or placed it on a website, on the grounds that if people could get away with saying 'Hi Bob' all of the time any old fool could release 'Hi Bob' soaps at a lower price and destroy my investment, then would I still have your support?
Perhaps this is indeed the fault of the law that if I was dumb enough to hinge my entire branding on a relatively common phrase, I would be obliged to harass people to keep my trademark - but that begs the issue, why should I be allowed to make that a trademark? Its not like Xerox, Linux or Kleenex - which were unique words unlikely to be said by anyone with coherent speech, and are 'brand names' because they are a UNIQUE differentiator.
Other posts rightly point out that a number of educational books and car repair books with 'for dummies' came out first. They didn't seem so bothered about IDG doing it. Perhaps they have a decent product.
Now, if my 'Hi Bob' soap had a picture of my Bob character on the packaging, and Hi Bob was written in a particular color/typeface combination, and someone came out with something roughly similar and tried to sell it, then I should go after them, no question - its a deliberate attempt to rip me off. Were the sites in question blatant attempts to rip IDG off? Hardly.
So, I do not think that those two words are a valid basis for a trademark any more than 'Hi Bob' is a trademark. McDonalds sued a scotsman called McDonald for opening a shop here bearing his own name, and won. Who do you think came up with THAT name first? Does someone called McDonald have the right to open a shop bearing his name?
If I remember, a man called Ronald McDonald had a go at McDonalds for infringing his personal 'brand' but he lost, probably because he does not have the same legal power in $$$
I'm behind these guys all the way. As people, if we do not set a precadent defending ourselves, then companies will steadily trademark ever more catchy sayings, until the use of the English language becomes a legal minefield for both marketers and normal people alike.
Indeed you're right - Apple was a great name for a personal computer.
Are you aware the beatles record company, Apple Recordings or some such, sued apple for using THEIR name? (I think there was a setllement)
Now, their reasoning was the the Mac had a built in sound card. Because it was capable of reproducing sound, it was an infringement of their record company. Either take sound support out or pay em off.
What about Macintosh? I beleive that if the creators of this raincoat brand had gone after Apple then they would have had to name the computers something else. Jacket, perhaps?:)
As you say, context is important. Any fool realises that Apple Macs are not made by the beatles record company, and that they are not wearable garments to protect you from the rain.
So, is IDG right to go after little tiny amateur sites like the ones pointed to on the web page, because they use these words too? Even when they dont ave a profoundly yellow book/page/printed context?
Perhaps, perhaps not. I do know one thing for certain, I doubt it has much negative effect on their brand.
> Does that sound like contempt to you? It dosn't to me.
No, it isn't contempt - for them.
I was referring to contempt for customers, if they think that any use of 'For Dummies' is related to their product lines. The excuse that it confuses customers to have a website such as the ones that are used as examples on the web page reffered to in the story is clearly bullshit, and they cannot expect us to beleive it.
Now I agree that they were the first to use this for books, and in combination with their unique design should be allowed to protect that idea and investment in this market. Kleenex and Xerox are different issues, since I am not aware of those particular words being in dictionaries previous to their creation. These are called 'brand names' because they identify the brand distinctly from its competitors.
If I came out with a soap right now called 'Hi Bob' and sued everyone who used these words in an e-mail or placed it on a website, on the grounds that if people could start saying 'Hi Bob' all of the time then any old fool could release 'Hi Bob' soaps at a lower price and destroy my investment, then would I still have your support?
Perhaps this is indeed the fault of the law that if I was dumb enough to hinge my entire branding on a relatively common phrase I would be obliged to harass people to keep my trademark, but that begs the issue, why should I be allowed to make that a trademark?
Now, if my 'Hi Bob' soap had a picture of my Bob character on the packaging, and Hi Bob was written in a particular color/typeface combination, and someone came out with something roughly similar and tried to sell it, then I should go after them, no question - its a deliberate attempt to rip me off. Were the sites in question on the site you probably haven't visted blatant attempts to rip them off? Hardly.
So, I do not think that those two words are a valid basis for a trademark any more than 'Hi Bob' is a trademark. McDonalds sued a scotsman called McDonald for opening a shop here bearing his own name, and won.
If I release a software product called delmoi, i'm going to come after you too, for falsely representing my company and diluing the integrity of my brand with your posts.
"... to be actionable the use must not fall within any of the statutory exemptions. Under the Act, 'fair use' of a mark in comparative advertising, 'non- commercial' use of a mark, and news reporting and commentary are not actionable."
Yes, agreed. I know it is common ettiquite to read other peoples posts before posting, and I did so.
This is why I did not address the issues directly but instead gave my 2p, albeit with little understanding of the law, about how these websites could possibly compete with their line of books, even if they did feature a phrase they 'pioneered'.
I think you will also agree that the majority of other posts in this forum address the point from this perspective also.
1) The sites they demand changes to are not published works and do not compete in any kind of marketplace - you said this yourself.
This was a core point in my post. Check the bit about 'substitute for product line'. It seems they are going still after everything on the web with that phrase anyway. That is what I find distasteful.
2) They should be allowed to brand the yellow cover, black type and 'for dummies' as a trademark, but not words in the english language. Even if they were the first to put them together it should not be acceptable to control speech on this level. If this is something to do with the law then you are correct it is the law that needs changing.
3) Some firms try very very hard to get their branding in common currency and spread it as far as possible. Becoming recognised as the cool 'hip' thing in such situations is the kind of brand equity most firms would kill for.
In other words I think they are being needlessly overzealous, or perhaps too cautious about protecting the trademark. I know I have just repeated what most of the posts say, but thats what I was trying to avoid in the first place.
So, lets say we agree over a common misunderstanding.
so much agression! Personal insults by the way are not the best way to get the point accross, and tend to highlight ones stupidity. You may pick at my spelling and grammar now to highlight your 13 year old intellectual superiority over me now.
yes they lose the trademark if they do not enforce it... THATS NOT THE ISSUE.
The issue that they make and that I do in a roundabout way is that 'For Dummies' shouldnt be valid for a trademark because it is a common part of the english language and any idiot should be able to tell that it isnt exclusive to a product line.
the point i was making was that if it was part of a larger overall brand (like you say with the yellow shit) then they should protect it because that would indeed qualify as some kind of exclusive property. BUT NOT THE NAME. You even reinforce my point with the reference to me releasing a book on my masturbation techniques with 'bright yellow book with garish black graphics'. THAT IS THE TRADEMARK
So please, may I suggest YOU READ POSTS BEFORE YOU FLAME THEM.
Looking over the actual website, it is just me, or is it also difficult for you too to contain sniggers at this whole thing?!
Their pursuit of 'blatant infringement upon IDGB's internationally protected trademark "For Dummies®"' (Perhaps it was the ® at the end?), not to mention the fact that they forced changes to a site about Irish Step Dancing, or that they 'constantly track the web' for 'illegal' occurrences of 'for dummies' sounds like an amusing PR disaster waiting to happen for IDG.
They give the example of hoover being a brand dilution. (In the US I hear a lot of people Vacuum instead of Hoover®). I don't see what problem having everyone think of your brand for something as generic as vaccum cleaners, or for that matter books. As long as it is easy to differentiate a genuine 'for dummies®' from a homage, then they should consider it voluntary brand building - especially from not for profit sites.
If 'For Dummies®' is the first thing I think about when I want an easy technical reference, and I know that those yellow IDG® books are the the originals, then guess what i'm going to buy? Since they are apparently spending so much effort and money building this brand, the name should only be a part of the mix that customers associate with them. If the Irish step dancing site had a yellow background with a sign® etc then perhaps we are coming closer to confusion.
It's not really about protecting us poor consumers from confusion, however - especially in this case, since you would have to view your customers with extreme contempt for their intellegence if they think everything contianing 'For Dummies' is part of their product line, or even a good substitute for what is in their product line.
I agree that if someone came into the technical books market with a 'for profit' product, or even something that was on sale for any kind of money, and it copied the visual branding aspects as well as the name, then they should have some right to stop it, to protect market share.
But treating customers with contempt, by implying their sheer stupidity, and by acting like a bully® in one of the principal forums where their brand equity matters, is both insensitive and stupid. The more people they harass about this on the internet, the faster the word is going to spread that these people are total arseholes.
So, I suggest that all us Dummies® exercise our market power and intellegence and go and buy something different in future when we need to learn or teach someone about something. Spread the word.
Yeah, replicators a'la startrek would make the world much nicer....
but you can't expect metallica to give away music because this sort of effect is possible with digital media. open source works so well because the benefits the coders derive are also as easily replicable - recognition, the altruisic creation of something good, and because they can exchange code with one another to everyones mutual benefit.
Now, metallica might like to hear the music of other people, but I do not think this is suffcient compensation if they want to do things like buy food, crack or whatever they like to buy.
Another reason why open source works is because you can make something for free, learn from that and add to your skill set, then go to work and use that skill to make something to get $$$, so you can pay your rent.
On the other hand, A song is a commodity because once you make it, normally aside from remixing it cannot be differentiated. You can have variable quality MP3 files, but as long as someone out there rips the 160KB/s version, then it is this version that will be most widely distributed. Nobody will take the 64KB/s from the website if they can get it from Napster at a higher bitrate.
So how do metallica make money? Sell special songs for money only and only give away some (like open source?). No - because people will copy these also. Again, a commodity because they can no longer prevent the price it is consumed at from falling to zero.
Sell merchandise? Please, do you think thats why musicans like to make music? Also, To have sustainable revenue from touring and concerts, they would have to stop producing and tour constantly. But if they stop producing then the quality of the concerts is diminshed, since people want to hear new material.
The answer is clear and simple. It works for the Greatful Dead, it works for Public Enemy. The answer is loyalty. If you get your fans to like you (instead of pissing them off by doing this) then people will WANT to pay you, to ensure that more songs are made, and because they have positive feelings for you.
Unfortunately, record companies, mass marketing etc stand in the way of this. So, metallica should get closer to fans by themselves!! The Internet is a brilliant way to do this because they can communicate and learn with so many fans so easily.
Perhaps hire someone to run them a website from which they can sell CDs and MP3s themselves, as well as set up message boards or other community features where they participate.
This whole bust up is a classic example of not understanding the fans. If you understand the fans, they understand you.
You'd be surprised how many people share this view. At risk of being a 'me too', I agree entirely with this in that most mainstream music seems to be moving towards a mass marketing ideal - where the blandest and most generic, insipid product is shoved down our throats with ever more inventive marketing synergies driven by massive budgets made possible by continuing consolodation and mergers.
This is downright evil, not because people are making big profits (i dont care how rich brittany gets) but because these channels are spreading their net like a cancer to homgonize and suffocate culture around the globe, driven mostly by focus group sessions with 12 year old girls. These corporate entities dont have any picture of their 'customers' further than the sales figures they get back from the record stores.
Even smart marketing people know this is downright wrong, and trust me, this situation will not go on forever. People will figure out that they need to go to the Internet or their independent record store to hear music that is actually innovative. Then more mainstream artists and labels will figure it out and try and connect with their fans more directly, at the very least to get a 'competetive advantage' over the rest of the suckers.
But, this thing needs to be consumer led. If you care about music, then dont be afraid to branch out. Go to an independent store in your local big city instead of carefully controlled retail environments like wal-mart. Make more of an effort to support good artists on MP3.com etc (the money some excellent artists make is pathetic). Otherwise, im afraid, the mass market is getting exactly what it deserves.
I'm not sure I see the validity in the argument that metallica has nothing to lose because they can still extract large rents from 'physical market' customers when people use Napster. (Often the extent of these rents are exaggerated because even though production/distribution costs are minimal when economies of scale and scope are employed, I am sure marketing/promotion appropriates a bigger slice, but I digress)
This assumption, as does any overly simplistic economic argument, assumes that the market remains static. No/.er would deny that Internet and MP3 use is likely to increase. Using the simple framework you put forward, as mass market subsidisers cross to the Net and Napster, their willingness to pay falls to zero and they copy the file for free.
Either Metallica loses money and eventually charges nothing for music, or existing physical customers are charged more rents to subsidize the free riders. This is what they mean by having music commoditized. Of course, there is the argument that most MP3s are an imperfect substitute for a CD (encoding is not perfectly as good yet) and since music is an experience good this might actually drive CD sales.
But once bandwidth and playback hits CD quality and audio files become a perfect substitute, Metallica are screwed unless they start finding a way to add value. Even with protected audio files people will still rip off to unprotected formats and distribute them. Its human nature and so they need to work around it.
You could say that concerts, tours, and t-shirts are alternative value drivers, but this economic model of giving stuff away for free only works if you can create strong and sustainable demand for these. Unless Metallica branches into increasingly cheezy merchandizing and tours constantly, this is unlikely to generate the same revenue.
Perhaps what metallica need to generate is goodwill. Record companies used to do this by using powerful marketing synergies to stuff product down your throat. These days you can connect directly with more and more people.
Slashdot Mirror
I think the headlights thing is b/c 99% of BMW drivers use the automatic headlamp feature that uses a sensor to turn the lights on and off automatically.
Duhh... AMD DOES have a license for x86. Intel gave it to them yonks ago because their customers were demanding a viable second source. It also helps with that pesky antitrust thing.
1) Take "The Mythical Man Month",
2) Create a new cover using pastel colors, and put a glossy gradient badge on the cover saying "Web 2.0"
3) Publicize your new edition to a bunch of Web 2.0 Blogs as "revolutionary new insights".
4) Profit!
Look, Apple is being true to it's roots!
.. Google as a special partner to develop applications for the iPhone, so that together can take down IB ... Microsoft. I'm sure Apple is not worried about Android because the technology is inferior and it just doesn't have the same "class".
They learned all the hard lessons of the Macintosh introduction in the 1980s, and decided that they did everything absolutely right! Overprice it, lock it down, and fight independent developers tooth and nail to preserve the "experience".
I predict that with the launch of the SDK, Apple will invite Mi
A funny cartoon on this subject, with a point to ponder about the way it was handled by the media and the officials there: ahref=http://fridayreflections.typepad.com/weblog/2008/01/tiger-escapes-a.htmlrel=url2html-14940http://fridayreflections.typepad.com/weblog/2008/01/tiger-escapes-a.html>
A good, no BS resource for the "softer side" of management is at http://fridayreflections.com/. The idea seems to be short stories on topics like accountability, results and learning ... with stories from actual management episodes. A wisdom download instead of a methods and tools download, if you will.
... but there is tons more.
My favorites: A desk is a dangerous place to view the world, many fail to grasp what is right in the palm of their hands
It's a pretty well-worn complaint that the better technologies often lose out, but innovators often seem to be at a loss about how to win in situations where they're up against an entrenched competitor with an inferior product but the existing relationship. I read on a blog somewhere the story of how Sun got it's early business away from the big guys of the day like Apollo ... here's one such link: http://fridayreflections.typepad.com/friday_reflec tions/2007/05/persistence_pay.html
... but I'm sure there's a million other stories like that.
The consensus there seemed to be that sheer bloody minded persistence is the key ingredient to getting something innovative adopted. In other words, "Fall down seven times, get up eight times". Sounds too simple to be true
In 1922, the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) felt gravely threatened by a newfangled technology called 'Radio', which they saw as a threat to their once lucrative profit streams.
Initially, ASCAP threatened to prosecute radio stations for playing their music, but eventually realised that they could not combat the rise of this 'Radio'. Instead they tried to milk it by setting up huge royalty fees (about $5000) to dissuade smaller stations and profit from larger ones.
In 1923 the radio stations banded together to fight ASCAP and formed BMI (Broadcast Music Incorporated) to try and break the monopoly ASCAP held over almost all recorded music.
At the time all the big sellers (the metallicas of this world) were with ASCAP, but BMI signed strange new artists with newfangled sounds like 'Rock n Roll' and 'R&B'. ASCAP arrogantly increased their royalties by 70% to try and kill off radio.
During the depression radio had a boom, and ASCAP brought in the lawsuits, in the infamous Waring case taking a radio station to the supreme court.
Instead of dying, radio thrived as a channel for this Rock n Roll sound, championed by popular personality DJs like Alan Freed and supported by lurative advertising. BMI's artists profited immensley and gained for the first time a huge amount of worldwide attention as their music was broadcast around.
I'll let you guess what happened from there on in. Feel free to draw parallels.
http://www.submerge.com
u r.html
http://www.undergroundresistance.com
From Hyperreal:
http://hyperreal.org/music/lists/313/labels/ur/
Underground Resistance is a label for a movement. A movement that wants change by Sonic Revolution. We urge you to join the Resistance and help us to combat the mediocre audio and visual programming that is being feed to the inhabitants of earth, this programming is stagnating the minds of the people; building a wall between races and preventing world peace. It is this wall we are going to smash. By using the untapped energy potential of sound we are going to destroy this wall much the same as certain frequencies shatter glass. Techno is a music based in experimentation; it is sacred to no one race; it has no definitive sound. It is music for the future of the Human Race. Without this music there will be no peace, no love, no vision. By simply communicating through sound, Techno has brought people of all different nationalities together under one roof to enjoy themselves. Isn't it obvious that music and dance are the keys to the universe? So called primitive animals and tribal humans have known this for thousands of years! We urge all brothers and sisters of the underground to create and transmit their tones and frequencies no matter how so called primitive their equipment may be. Transmit these tones and wreck havoc on the programmers! Long live the Underground...
ein zwei drei vier funf sechs zieben acht...
interpol and fbi and scotland yard.....
hmm, think this has anything to do with it?
:)
I refer you to someone's previous post:
>At this point in time, the only people buying
>Macs are luddite print designers and people with
>a fetish for colored plastic.
Mac sales are actually increasing in 'Luddite' areas such as first time buyer *CUSTOMERS*, the 'normal joes'. You may not think such people deserve a computer, but at least Apple is catering for them with something they want - in a *CUSTOMER* focused appliance with all the traits they will ever need or want.
If the zealots love it too then all the better. Every platform needs zealots. Come on, your statement that all closed source platforms will die sounds more like the words of a Linux zealot than of someone who has an open point of view.
App support has previously been Apple's key weakness. With a multiplatform OS, the range of apps is bound to increase, since the user base is bound to expand beyond those who just upgrade their existing Mac box, even if only slightly at first.
Now the OS will go on any machine, but for some customers will be best on the 'premium' Mac boxes that I assume will be sexier looking and sold/specced with a *CUSTOMER* focus and good support.
So there is no reason why the Mac cannot survive, or thrive. I think in the end it will, because Apple is at last getting the marketing right. Marketing = listening to CUSTOMERS and giving them what they want.
In an area where hardware and software is getting more and more homogenized anyway, that's todays killer app... not Quark Xpress. (I always preferred Pagemaker anyway)
Moof!
>The fact that Apple didn't gut the MacOS and
>replace it with something modern
Such as a DOS based operating system? I know UNIX might be considered 'more modern' because of superior multitasking, but my mom does not give a toss about such things, and neither does the average iMac *CUSTOMER*.
>back in the 80's
In the 80s MacOS was modern, and way ahead of anything on a DOS box in terms of multimedia support - and certainly light years ahead of any kind of user-friendly GUI released until 1995. It was certainly a very suitable OS for the *CUSTOMER*.
>At this point in time, the only people buying
>Macs are luddite print designers and people with
>a fetish for colored plastic. Hell, the Mac even
>lost the web designer market by failing to have
>a CSS browser that doesn't crash every three
>minutes.
Mac sales are increasing in 'Luddite' areas such as first time buyer *CUSTOMERS*, the 'normal joes'. You may not think such people deserve a computer, but at least Apple is catering for them with something they want - in a *CUSTOMER* focused appliance with all the traits they will ever need or want.
>The killer for the Mac is that in 2000 it still
>doesn't have a stable web browser.
Netscape crashes less on my Mac box than IE does on my DOS machine. Admittedly Windows does have the march in this area, since MS has control of the entire front to back integration between the OS, applications and web browser, but it is only bad web designers that ignore Mac users and lower end browsers.
It's annoying that 99% of web developers dont seem to realise that the majority of *PEOPLE* on windows machines are still running the same crappy browser that came with their machine in 1996/7.
There is no reason why the Mac cannot survive. I think in the end it will, because Apple is at last getting the marketing right. Marketing = listening to CUSTOMERS and giving them what they want. In an area where hardware and software is getting more and more homogenized, that's todays killer app.
Not sure about your point, perhaps I am stupid.
PPC750 was mainly developed by Motorola and IBM due to competetive demands by the consumer for faster computers, and the development of the Pentium that threatened the 680x0. Apple had an input too since it was the most significant platform based on the 68000 technology, but another annoying misconception is that Apple invented the PowerPC processor.
Their 'supercomputer' ads reinforce this illusion. Okay I know it was an engineer that decided to put that chip in there, but I do not think marketing tried to stop this. If they did then they were dumb.
My point is that marketing doesn't obstruct innovation as far as the customer is concerned, as long as it is done properly. Bad engineering also produces suboptimal outcomes - but then Marketing people are subsequently forced to come up with some ways of turning this into a feature so that they can get back the R&D cost, and then get the blame for the sloppy product.
Is it Marketing's fault the engineering was bad? Perhaps, if they forced something out the door prematurely, or they set the wrong objectives for development.
But that argument invalidates the view that Marketing holds up the release of OS X, since surely a buggier/crappier version would come out sooner if marketing ruled the roost.
Also, the Performa concept was not marketing focused, but engineering/product focused, in that the company would cream more money by producing a range of intentionally crap computers based upon existing models (by stripping out features and NuBus slots) so they could be sold at low prices, rather than finding out exactly what the customer wanted and making it.
Guess what, they didn't sell too well, and the proliferation of marginal difference models confused everyone. Was there a sign of a strategy there? That's not proper marketing, thats just an accounting idea dressed up as a sales pitch.
As for eliminating inventory by build on demand, a large % of Apple's core market does not have access to the internet before buying the computer, and is not technically oriented. (Engineering focus ignores this since such people are losers and dont deserve computers) They are unlikely to build on demand until the technology is more accessible.
Also, I doubt Apple could maintain volume on build on demand unless it invested billions in large scale flexible production plants. Again, this is a minor problem not of concern to engineering focus.
I've been out there on the front line and the conflict between marketing and engineering in most US tech firms is sad and counterproductive. Yeah you want to make cool stuff, but people have to want to buy it. Otherwise you should be an academic, which is much cooler and lets you have more freedom.
The synergy between marketing and engineering in Japanese firms is why they consistently roll out amazingly successful and technologically cool stuff, whereas a large proportion of good US projects get cancelled due to conflict, or the launch ends up a turkey.
Both the marketing people and the engineering people need to love one another, hold hands and skip through the park singing and dancing, then you get the best of both worlds!
i would say one of the main reasons the Mac was a relative failure compared to windows was that Apple spent too much time dicking around with crazy pet projects, and too little time on any serious business or marketing strategy.
Lots of funky technologies were breeding in the R&D labs, and some of them actually became quite useful (working at apple in the day would have kicked ass), but the majority of ideas like the Pippin were just frankly stupid and ignorant of what customers (who pay the bills at the end of the day) really wanted.
Now the reverse is true and it seems apple is nothing BUT slick marketing. Well, swings and roundabouts, eh? But remember, Apple has never been very good at getting an OS out on time. System 7 was in vapour for quite a while, and as for Copland, well, erm... So comparing the 'crap era' versus 'good era' marketing days, it seems that nothing really changes in Cupertino.
The only reason Apple is alive today is because of the iMac, which is basically a customer driven marketing tool. I bloody hate it when coders say that marketing gets in the way of 'good product'.
yes, it gets in the way of elegant and efficient software/hardware (what is important to engineers of course, for good reason) but the 99% of people buying iMacs do so because of the marketing, especially since MacOSes are pretty underspecced in terms of geek features compared to, say, Linux, and the hardware pricier than a bog standard PC.
Anyway, I know it was just a wee joke but I felt compelled to swim against the tide again.
Moof!
If I came out with a soap right now called 'Hi Bob' and sued everyone who used these words in an e-mail or placed it on a website, on the grounds that if people could get away with saying 'Hi Bob' all of the time any old fool could release 'Hi Bob' soaps at a lower price and destroy my investment, then would I still have your support?
Perhaps this is indeed the fault of the law that if I was dumb enough to hinge my entire branding on a relatively common phrase, I would be obliged to harass people to keep my trademark - but that begs the issue, why should I be allowed to make that a trademark? Its not like Xerox, Linux or Kleenex - which were unique words unlikely to be said by anyone with coherent speech, and are 'brand names' because they are a UNIQUE differentiator.
Other posts rightly point out that a number of educational books and car repair books with 'for dummies' came out first. They didn't seem so bothered about IDG doing it. Perhaps they have a decent product.
Now, if my 'Hi Bob' soap had a picture of my Bob character on the packaging, and Hi Bob was written in a particular color/typeface combination, and someone came out with something roughly similar and tried to sell it, then I should go after them, no question - its a deliberate attempt to rip me off. Were the sites in question blatant attempts to rip IDG off? Hardly.
So, I do not think that those two words are a valid basis for a trademark any more than 'Hi Bob' is a trademark. McDonalds sued a scotsman called McDonald for opening a shop here bearing his own name, and won. Who do you think came up with THAT name first? Does someone called McDonald have the right to open a shop bearing his name?
If I remember, a man called Ronald McDonald had a go at McDonalds for infringing his personal 'brand' but he lost, probably because he does not have the same legal power in $$$
I'm behind these guys all the way. As people, if we do not set a precadent defending ourselves, then companies will steadily trademark ever more catchy sayings, until the use of the English language becomes a legal minefield for both marketers and normal people alike.
Indeed you're right - Apple was a great name for a personal computer.
:)
Are you aware the beatles record company, Apple Recordings or some such, sued apple for using THEIR name? (I think there was a setllement)
Now, their reasoning was the the Mac had a built in sound card. Because it was capable of reproducing sound, it was an infringement of their record company. Either take sound support out or pay em off.
What about Macintosh? I beleive that if the creators of this raincoat brand had gone after Apple then they would have had to name the computers something else. Jacket, perhaps?
As you say, context is important. Any fool realises that Apple Macs are not made by the beatles record company, and that they are not wearable garments to protect you from the rain.
So, is IDG right to go after little tiny amateur sites like the ones pointed to on the web page, because they use these words too? Even when they dont ave a profoundly yellow book/page/printed context?
Perhaps, perhaps not. I do know one thing for certain, I doubt it has much negative effect on their brand.
> Does that sound like contempt to you? It dosn't to me.
No, it isn't contempt - for them.
I was referring to contempt for customers, if they think that any use of 'For Dummies' is related to their product lines. The excuse that it confuses customers to have a website such as the ones that are used as examples on the web page reffered to in the story is clearly bullshit, and they cannot expect us to beleive it.
Now I agree that they were the first to use this for books, and in combination with their unique design should be allowed to protect that idea and investment in this market. Kleenex and Xerox are different issues, since I am not aware of those particular words being in dictionaries previous to their creation. These are called 'brand names' because they identify the brand distinctly from its competitors.
If I came out with a soap right now called 'Hi Bob' and sued everyone who used these words in an e-mail or placed it on a website, on the grounds that if people could start saying 'Hi Bob' all of the time then any old fool could release 'Hi Bob' soaps at a lower price and destroy my investment, then would I still have your support?
Perhaps this is indeed the fault of the law that if I was dumb enough to hinge my entire branding on a relatively common phrase I would be obliged to harass people to keep my trademark, but that begs the issue, why should I be allowed to make that a trademark?
Now, if my 'Hi Bob' soap had a picture of my Bob character on the packaging, and Hi Bob was written in a particular color/typeface combination, and someone came out with something roughly similar and tried to sell it, then I should go after them, no question - its a deliberate attempt to rip me off. Were the sites in question on the site you probably haven't visted blatant attempts to rip them off? Hardly.
So, I do not think that those two words are a valid basis for a trademark any more than 'Hi Bob' is a trademark. McDonalds sued a scotsman called McDonald for opening a shop here bearing his own name, and won.
If I release a software product called delmoi, i'm going to come after you too, for falsely representing my company and diluing the integrity of my brand with your posts.
"... to be actionable the use must not fall within any of the statutory exemptions. Under the Act, 'fair use' of a mark in comparative advertising, 'non- commercial' use of a mark, and news reporting and commentary are not actionable."
Yes, agreed. I know it is common ettiquite to read other peoples posts before posting, and I did so.
This is why I did not address the issues directly but instead gave my 2p, albeit with little understanding of the law, about how these websites could possibly compete with their line of books, even if they did feature a phrase they 'pioneered'.
I think you will also agree that the majority of other posts in this forum address the point from this perspective also.
1) The sites they demand changes to are not published works and do not compete in any kind of marketplace - you said this yourself.
This was a core point in my post. Check the bit about 'substitute for product line'. It seems they are going still after everything on the web with that phrase anyway. That is what I find distasteful.
2) They should be allowed to brand the yellow cover, black type and 'for dummies' as a trademark, but not words in the english language. Even if they were the first to put them together it should not be acceptable to control speech on this level. If this is something to do with the law then you are correct it is the law that needs changing.
3) Some firms try very very hard to get their branding in common currency and spread it as far as possible. Becoming recognised as the cool 'hip' thing in such situations is the kind of brand equity most firms would kill for.
In other words I think they are being needlessly overzealous, or perhaps too cautious about protecting the trademark. I know I have just repeated what most of the posts say, but thats what I was trying to avoid in the first place.
So, lets say we agree over a common misunderstanding.
so much agression! Personal insults by the way are not the best way to get the point accross, and tend to highlight ones stupidity. You may pick at my spelling and grammar now to highlight your 13 year old intellectual superiority over me now.
yes they lose the trademark if they do not enforce it... THATS NOT THE ISSUE.
The issue that they make and that I do in a roundabout way is that 'For Dummies' shouldnt be valid for a trademark because it is a common part of the english language and any idiot should be able to tell that it isnt exclusive to a product line.
the point i was making was that if it was part of a larger overall brand (like you say with the yellow shit) then they should protect it because that would indeed qualify as some kind of exclusive property. BUT NOT THE NAME. You even reinforce my point with the reference to me releasing a book on my masturbation techniques with 'bright yellow book with garish black graphics'. THAT IS THE TRADEMARK
So please, may I suggest YOU READ POSTS BEFORE YOU FLAME THEM.
ps you suck
Looking over the actual website, it is just me, or is it also difficult for you too to contain sniggers at this whole thing?!
Their pursuit of 'blatant infringement upon IDGB's internationally protected trademark "For Dummies®"' (Perhaps it was the ® at the end?), not to mention the fact that they forced changes to a site about Irish Step Dancing, or that they 'constantly track the web' for 'illegal' occurrences of 'for dummies' sounds like an amusing PR disaster waiting to happen for IDG.
They give the example of hoover being a brand dilution. (In the US I hear a lot of people Vacuum instead of Hoover®). I don't see what problem having everyone think of your brand for something as generic as vaccum cleaners, or for that matter books. As long as it is easy to differentiate a genuine 'for dummies®' from a homage, then they should consider it voluntary brand building - especially from not for profit sites.
If 'For Dummies®' is the first thing I think about when I want an easy technical reference, and I know that those yellow IDG® books are the the originals, then guess what i'm going to buy? Since they are apparently spending so much effort and money building this brand, the name should only be a part of the mix that customers associate with them. If the Irish step dancing site had a yellow background with a sign® etc then perhaps we are coming closer to confusion.
It's not really about protecting us poor consumers from confusion, however - especially in this case, since you would have to view your customers with extreme contempt for their intellegence if they think everything contianing 'For Dummies' is part of their product line, or even a good substitute for what is in their product line.
I agree that if someone came into the technical books market with a 'for profit' product, or even something that was on sale for any kind of money, and it copied the visual branding aspects as well as the name, then they should have some right to stop it, to protect market share.
But treating customers with contempt, by implying their sheer stupidity, and by acting like a bully® in one of the principal forums where their brand equity matters, is both insensitive and stupid. The more people they harass about this on the internet, the faster the word is going to spread that these people are total arseholes.
So, I suggest that all us Dummies® exercise our market power and intellegence and go and buy something different in future when we need to learn or teach someone about something. Spread the word.
Yeah, replicators a'la startrek would make the world much nicer....
but you can't expect metallica to give away music because this sort of effect is possible with digital media. open source works so well because the benefits the coders derive are also as easily replicable - recognition, the altruisic creation of something good, and because they can exchange code with one another to everyones mutual benefit.
Now, metallica might like to hear the music of other people, but I do not think this is suffcient compensation if they want to do things like buy food, crack or whatever they like to buy.
Another reason why open source works is because you can make something for free, learn from that and add to your skill set, then go to work and use that skill to make something to get $$$, so you can pay your rent.
On the other hand, A song is a commodity because once you make it, normally aside from remixing it cannot be differentiated. You can have variable quality MP3 files, but as long as someone out there rips the 160KB/s version, then it is this version that will be most widely distributed. Nobody will take the 64KB/s from the website if they can get it from Napster at a higher bitrate.
So how do metallica make money? Sell special songs for money only and only give away some (like open source?). No - because people will copy these also. Again, a commodity because they can no longer prevent the price it is consumed at from falling to zero.
Sell merchandise? Please, do you think thats why musicans like to make music? Also, To have sustainable revenue from touring and concerts, they would have to stop producing and tour constantly. But if they stop producing then the quality of the concerts is diminshed, since people want to hear new material.
The answer is clear and simple. It works for the Greatful Dead, it works for Public Enemy. The answer is loyalty. If you get your fans to like you (instead of pissing them off by doing this) then people will WANT to pay you, to ensure that more songs are made, and because they have positive feelings for you.
Unfortunately, record companies, mass marketing etc stand in the way of this. So, metallica should get closer to fans by themselves!! The Internet is a brilliant way to do this because they can communicate and learn with so many fans so easily.
Perhaps hire someone to run them a website from which they can sell CDs and MP3s themselves, as well as set up message boards or other community features where they participate.
This whole bust up is a classic example of not understanding the fans. If you understand the fans, they understand you.
So why not make more of an effort to do this?
You'd be surprised how many people share this view. At risk of being a 'me too', I agree entirely with this in that most mainstream music seems to be moving towards a mass marketing ideal - where the blandest and most generic, insipid product is shoved down our throats with ever more inventive marketing synergies driven by massive budgets made possible by continuing consolodation and mergers.
This is downright evil, not because people are making big profits (i dont care how rich brittany gets) but because these channels are spreading their net like a cancer to homgonize and suffocate culture around the globe, driven mostly by focus group sessions with 12 year old girls. These corporate entities dont have any picture of their 'customers' further than the sales figures they get back from the record stores.
Even smart marketing people know this is downright wrong, and trust me, this situation will not go on forever. People will figure out that they need to go to the Internet or their independent record store to hear music that is actually innovative. Then more mainstream artists and labels will figure it out and try and connect with their fans more directly, at the very least to get a 'competetive advantage' over the rest of the suckers.
But, this thing needs to be consumer led. If you care about music, then dont be afraid to branch out. Go to an independent store in your local big city instead of carefully controlled retail environments like wal-mart. Make more of an effort to support good artists on MP3.com etc (the money some excellent artists make is pathetic). Otherwise, im afraid, the mass market is getting exactly what it deserves.
I'm not sure I see the validity in the argument that metallica has nothing to lose because they can still extract large rents from 'physical market' customers when people use Napster. (Often the extent of these rents are exaggerated because even though production/distribution costs are minimal when economies of scale and scope are employed, I am sure marketing/promotion appropriates a bigger slice, but I digress)
/.er would deny that Internet and MP3 use is likely to increase. Using the simple framework you put forward, as mass market subsidisers cross to the Net and Napster, their willingness to pay falls to zero and they copy the file for free.
This assumption, as does any overly simplistic economic argument, assumes that the market remains static. No
Either Metallica loses money and eventually charges nothing for music, or existing physical customers are charged more rents to subsidize the free riders. This is what they mean by having music commoditized. Of course, there is the argument that most MP3s are an imperfect substitute for a CD (encoding is not perfectly as good yet) and since music is an experience good this might actually drive CD sales.
But once bandwidth and playback hits CD quality and audio files become a perfect substitute, Metallica are screwed unless they start finding a way to add value. Even with protected audio files people will still rip off to unprotected formats and distribute them. Its human nature and so they need to work around it.
You could say that concerts, tours, and t-shirts are alternative value drivers, but this economic model of giving stuff away for free only works if you can create strong and sustainable demand for these. Unless Metallica branches into increasingly cheezy merchandizing and tours constantly, this is unlikely to generate the same revenue.
Perhaps what metallica need to generate is goodwill. Record companies used to do this by using powerful marketing synergies to stuff product down your throat. These days you can connect directly with more and more people.
Perhaps this could be it?
THIS GOT TACKED ON TO THE END OF THE WRONG BLOODY POST!!!
(please refer to the previous trancey defence of napster and forgive my stupidity!)
ps the underground argument is still valid.