CoolCat
Well-known member
now that sounds like a punk rock nursing home! I Wanna Be Sedated anyone?
E
ecc83
Well-known member
I would expect a high tech Co like Telefunken to have all their CNC data on their servers and we know how good the Chinese are at hacking other people's data! Thus they might just be able to dump the design info straight into their CNC machines and 3D printers?
Handbooks would of course be a doddle! It would seem "The Rest of the World" is just one big technical resource to China?
Dave.
R
R D Smith
It's as good as it is, for as long as it lasts.
There is no such thing as intellectual property in CN. If any of the parts are made in CN, they don't have to hack anything. The info is already there and available.
rob aylestone
Moderator
Oddly, they do actually have copyright legislation. They just routinely ignore it. I had a few useful products, then tried to order more and they had crossed a line, breaking one of their own laws. Our frequencies in the UK happen to be used by their military. The factory was banned from producing any more.
If anyone supplies the factory in china with a CNC file, its not considered private. Same with injection moulding. If the manufacturer makes 1000 products for a customer, and another customer wants the same thing, they make them. Motorola and Icom, both companies based in other countries have products made in china. Once the models are discontinued, they expect the plants to stop making them. They dont, or at least, they keep the tooling. Remember those radios that blew up some bad guys? The manufacturers could not tell if they were genuine old ones, or unofficial ones that sell on aliexpress. They got called counterfeit, or fakes, but they are 100% the same product, just being sold direct from the factory who have all the parts. The resl manufacturers struggle to justify ‘fake’, the best is perhaps ‘unauthorised’. Having both, i can actually tell the difference. The colour of the plastic has a slightly different colour, but you need an original to tell!
If anyone supplies the factory in china with a CNC file, its not considered private. Same with injection moulding. If the manufacturer makes 1000 products for a customer, and another customer wants the same thing, they make them. Motorola and Icom, both companies based in other countries have products made in china. Once the models are discontinued, they expect the plants to stop making them. They dont, or at least, they keep the tooling. Remember those radios that blew up some bad guys? The manufacturers could not tell if they were genuine old ones, or unofficial ones that sell on aliexpress. They got called counterfeit, or fakes, but they are 100% the same product, just being sold direct from the factory who have all the parts. The resl manufacturers struggle to justify ‘fake’, the best is perhaps ‘unauthorised’. Having both, i can actually tell the difference. The colour of the plastic has a slightly different colour, but you need an original to tell!
CoolCat
Well-known member
My understanding reading about mics is China is the main hub of body's, headbaskets...even for pricier cloners and more.
Sennheiser and Neumann, Rode, are couple who make it all in house, its almost refreshing to hear these days.
The legal thing would be hard, for say Headbasket copy's, where Neumann Lawyers can stop WARM Audio or GoToToolz and Rode NT2 on the 87 /67 Headbasket shape but China doesn't seem to care about being sued and makes them all year long.
Like Rob said already, China probably doesn't really care and ignores the Lawyers, China business probably only worry's about being tossed in their own prisons by their Govt.
(I wonder why, if the 67/87 headbasket is copyright protected, why wasn't the U47 body an headbasket? )
As for stealing information I think most US company's handed all that details and schematics to China. One job I had , turned into me shipping boxes of technology papers and parts, to Taiwan for a couple years! as the company offshored to Taiwan and closed the US factory. Oddly it was a American / Korean owned company in Taiwan...lol
crazy the shell games played. Of course the management told everyone in the factory "they will only be doing our overflow work" which is a common lie when offshoring the factory. The only thing left is a small group who do QC on the foundry, keeping them honest....because the foundry gets money off parts shipped, so QC failing parts reduces the foundrys income....I heard stories the foundry was caught de-calibrating tools so everything passed !! and more parts shipped!! and then the parts were sent to the End User who installed the parts in their TV's and the TV;s were failing and being returned.. I saw recently they are now moving the company to US 20yrs later (China attacking Taiwan threats I suppose-.
house of cards , QC unknown. ...what if the product was foundried from the US to Taiwan for a Korean company who then moves the Korean company to US soil, does it become a US product again? lol
Sennheiser and Neumann, Rode, are couple who make it all in house, its almost refreshing to hear these days.
The legal thing would be hard, for say Headbasket copy's, where Neumann Lawyers can stop WARM Audio or GoToToolz and Rode NT2 on the 87 /67 Headbasket shape but China doesn't seem to care about being sued and makes them all year long.
Like Rob said already, China probably doesn't really care and ignores the Lawyers, China business probably only worry's about being tossed in their own prisons by their Govt.
(I wonder why, if the 67/87 headbasket is copyright protected, why wasn't the U47 body an headbasket? )
As for stealing information I think most US company's handed all that details and schematics to China. One job I had , turned into me shipping boxes of technology papers and parts, to Taiwan for a couple years! as the company offshored to Taiwan and closed the US factory. Oddly it was a American / Korean owned company in Taiwan...lol
crazy the shell games played. Of course the management told everyone in the factory "they will only be doing our overflow work" which is a common lie when offshoring the factory. The only thing left is a small group who do QC on the foundry, keeping them honest....because the foundry gets money off parts shipped, so QC failing parts reduces the foundrys income....I heard stories the foundry was caught de-calibrating tools so everything passed !! and more parts shipped!! and then the parts were sent to the End User who installed the parts in their TV's and the TV;s were failing and being returned.. I saw recently they are now moving the company to US 20yrs later (China attacking Taiwan threats I suppose-.
house of cards , QC unknown. ...what if the product was foundried from the US to Taiwan for a Korean company who then moves the Korean company to US soil, does it become a US product again? lol
TalismanRich
Well-known member
I suspect if you are simply making a headbasket and body, without any internals, Neumann might have trouble bringing suit on trademark infringement anyway, since you're not really selling a microphone. Sell them to DIYers, who can then add a capsule and circuit board as they please. Make a enough of an adjustment so that it's not an exact copy and you can be clear.
Rode is one of the few new companies that brought things inhouse so that they have control over every part. They also automate as much as possible so they keep costs under control (robots don't ask for annual raises or retirement). They are confident enough in their processes that they offer a 10 yr warranty, which is far more than most. I've been very happy with my NT1 and M5s. A friend has an NTK that he uses for vocals.
I still find it somewhat funny that people dump on Rode as "cheap Chinese microphones". They probably complained about those cheap junky Japanese cassette decks that Nakamichi made too!
Rode is one of the few new companies that brought things inhouse so that they have control over every part. They also automate as much as possible so they keep costs under control (robots don't ask for annual raises or retirement). They are confident enough in their processes that they offer a 10 yr warranty, which is far more than most. I've been very happy with my NT1 and M5s. A friend has an NTK that he uses for vocals.
I still find it somewhat funny that people dump on Rode as "cheap Chinese microphones". They probably complained about those cheap junky Japanese cassette decks that Nakamichi made too!
rob aylestone
Moderator
I suspect one problem has been that the Chinese have also been making very good products for other manufacturers for a very long time that got rebadged - the original meaning of OEM. I note recently some very expensive japanese products are now available from sellers in China. Sony professional video products - that cost upwards of thirty grand now available for less than £1000/$1000. Clearly, nobody is going to set up the kinds of production equipment to make this kind of stuff for budget money, so the question is - where did they come from? My guess is they were made in China, quietly, to be sold to the broadcasters and professionals for serious money badged as Japanese. The models seem to have all been discontinued 5 years ago, so maybe surplus stock was embargoed, and now released? It's tempting to buy one, but just too much to spend on a whim?
CoolCat
Well-known member
China making better stuff over the decades, makes sense.
Its common sense the ones "doing the work" become the experts, the ones making the parts become the skilled.
The business side people have that perspective. Usually profits...
But then the cost-cutters, even create fake WIMA's and Fake everything so? Are foundry mics with WIMA for example, real WIMA?
It gets to a point a person doesnt even know what they are buying.
For me, it becomes like buying a print of a original work, thats cool.....but sometimes there are originals that pop up, like Chandler Limited, or the AustiaAudio OC818..RODE going all in house....refreshing to at least feel like I know what I bought.
I enjoy the WARMBEESKNEEZPELUSOGAPGTZHEISERMANADVANCEDAUDIONUDETELEFUNKENDACHMANFLEAVINTAGEKINDKIWARAUNITEDSTUDIOTEMUALIBABAWAGNERADKPEARLMANBOCK3U and all cloners too- using decent back ground studying of a Neumann U47 tube or a U47 Fet....
Its common sense the ones "doing the work" become the experts, the ones making the parts become the skilled.
The business side people have that perspective. Usually profits...
But then the cost-cutters, even create fake WIMA's and Fake everything so? Are foundry mics with WIMA for example, real WIMA?
It gets to a point a person doesnt even know what they are buying.
For me, it becomes like buying a print of a original work, thats cool.....but sometimes there are originals that pop up, like Chandler Limited, or the AustiaAudio OC818..RODE going all in house....refreshing to at least feel like I know what I bought.
I enjoy the WARMBEESKNEEZPELUSOGAPGTZHEISERMANADVANCEDAUDIONUDETELEFUNKENDACHMANFLEAVINTAGEKINDKIWARAUNITEDSTUDIOTEMUALIBABAWAGNERADKPEARLMANBOCK3U and all cloners too- using decent back ground studying of a Neumann U47 tube or a U47 Fet....
P
polarity
Member
I'm late responding, but I was just having this conversation the other day. It seems we are only ever a few years away from brands that were a joke becoming the norm. It wasn't that long ago (I guess it was, but I'm old) that Kia the car company was a joke in the USA. No one wanted them, they were purchased as a last resort when you had to have something and didn't have money for a "real" car. Now there are tons of people who want a Kia. Same thing happened with Behringer. They were making cheap knock off crap, I guess maybe they sold enough to get their funds up and now people just regard them as a normal brand. It feels like it almost happens over night, like yesterday everyone hated Behringer and then today the x32 is great and people would kill for it. I haven't figured out if their quality is going up or our standards are going down.
TalismanRich
Well-known member
Ha! I remember when Subaru had a car, the 360, that you couldn't give away. There were thousands imported, but they didn't sell. Consumer Reports gave them a "Not Acceptable" rating. It had a 3 cylinder 2 stroke engine and suicide doors. You didn't want to get hit in one. Zero to 50 times were over a half minute! That's not good for hitting the merge lane at rush hour.
Then the 74 oil embargo hit. The 360 got 35 to 40mpg vs most US car at 12-15mpg, and those cars that had sat for a year or two went like hotcakes for about $12-1500. They were still junk but served a purpose for a short time.
Then you have the Yugo.... take a Fiat and half ass things to make it more unreliable. One interesting fact is that both the Subaru 360 and the Yugo were imported by Malcolm Bricklin who also built his own car, the SV-1 gull wing sports car.
Today, Subaru has very good ratings for safety and makes some innovative vehicles.
A company can shed a bad reputation if they continually improve their products.
Then the 74 oil embargo hit. The 360 got 35 to 40mpg vs most US car at 12-15mpg, and those cars that had sat for a year or two went like hotcakes for about $12-1500. They were still junk but served a purpose for a short time.
Then you have the Yugo.... take a Fiat and half ass things to make it more unreliable. One interesting fact is that both the Subaru 360 and the Yugo were imported by Malcolm Bricklin who also built his own car, the SV-1 gull wing sports car.
Today, Subaru has very good ratings for safety and makes some innovative vehicles.
A company can shed a bad reputation if they continually improve their products.
rob aylestone
Moderator
When you start to build relationships with the sellers over there, you start to get access to more stuff. Pretty much anything is available - my contacts are essentially an office and a small workshop space. The other day, I noticed in one list, behringer P16 personal mixers and the mic stand brackets. Got a price quoted for some P16's then two hours later a cancellation - they were no longer available, but they could supply the brackets. I suspect the factory front door has stock coming out to go to behringer, but the rear door has the same items going out to people like my supplier.
