I did some research on the Mackie/Behringer lawsuit

[Chris Tondreau]

There has been a fair bit of discussion lately on Behringer stuff - particularly mixers - and the corresponding rhetoric that typically accompanies discussion regarding Behringer gear. I thought I'd try to find specific details regarding the accusation that Mackie made against Behringer regarding design infringement of the 8-bus mixers. My sources are as follows:

Resume for lawyer who defended Behringer in suit - see fourth paragraph

A legal description of the details of the decision

A summary:

The charges brought forth against Behringer were all but completely dismissed by the Judge. There was a settlement made between Mackie and Behringer, but the details have been kept secret.

The reasoning for the dismissal of the charges had to do with copyright/design-right language in the laws between the USA and the UK, and what essentially amounted to a loophole provided therein. It seems, though it is never explicitly said, that the Behringer design was a copy of the Mackie board. Regardless, the language within the governing laws did not allow Mackie any leverage against Behringer.

That said, if the design circuitry is the same between the two mixers, then it can't be fairly said that one is crap and the other is not - they're both essentially the same.... or am I missing something?

Also, since then, surely Mackie, and other corporations would have clued into this ruling, and sought to protect themselves accordingly. Would it not be fair to say, then, that other companies would logically take steps to ensure that Behringer (or anyone else for that matter) would NOT be able to blatantly copy THEIR designs too - something that is frequently alleged on this and many other discussion groups?

Just some thoughts.... I'm sure a few of us will have comments.

Chris

 

[crosstudio]

when the plaintiff and the defendent settle the lawsuit out of court, the court dismisses the case. the fact that the case was dismissed means nothing. the fact that behringer settled out of court tells you that they had some culpability. to what extent we don't know.

behringer being crap or not, would actually have more to do with the parts and craftmanship used in the design than the design itself. since Mackie's president is stepping down, and the company is going to start using Asian parts, the difference between Mackie and Behringer in my opinion will become slim.

i don't buy pirated software, and i don't buy pirated hardware. that's my beef with behringer.

during the day, i am a software architect for IBM. I'd be pretty pissed off if someone else stole my Model-View-Controller with Command bean UML design patterns and pawned them off as there own.

 

[coloradojay]

What is sacred?

I am torn.

I grew up fairly poor, and am still not exactly loaded. I have made lots of bootlegs in my life (here come the 'rot in hell behringer-using bootlegger flames), not for profit, but for my own consumption. I do think that there is a difference between bootleggers that sell videos on the street corner (read Behringer), and someone that makes a dupe of a CD thier friend bought, or they got on a radio station. How does one with limited funds justify buying a cheap low quality bootleg at a fleamarket with the 5 bucks they've got, when Sam Goody wants 20? [The new Micro$oft O$ co$t$ how much!? Damn! Mine was free.]

I have shared my music for free in my life, which once it's out there, could easily be stolen, and rebranded as someone elses. I can say for sure it's not enough of a factor to stop me though. On that topic, what is original music anyway- ever done a cover? Man that new song "you just wrote" reminds me a lot of...

After reading the swizz-army cable tester thread about the Behringer bootlegs, I'm thinking more and more that it's not a company that I *want* to support. For that matter, when I can, I like to buy American anyway (says the hypocrite who mostly prefers foreign car models that are unequalled by US manufacturers -so far). The other side of me though, wants to get the most flexible music tools together for the least amount of $ debt $, so I can continue to develop and share my own music, as well as help friends, family and aquaintances with thiers (to me money and music decidedly don't mix well- ouch that's a tough one- but that's only me- Hey wait, maybe they do as long as you've got a lot of both).

I am an American; the schematic for our land looks an uncanny amount like one that some other, more earth-centric peoples used to have a few hundred years ago, long before my people were here.

I'm not sure how much of a soapbox I can justify being on while supporting this capitalist system. These threads are at least thought provoking, and they can be effective for causing change. They are another side-effect of "our" country's basis, known as free speech (where that plays into *intellectual* property theft is an interesting pondering as well- but I won't go there).

Crosstudio, isn't Tiles built on STRUTS? If IBM sells a package based on STRUTS (and repackages the STRUTS source), are they stealing from McLanihan? (yeah I know, it's open source). Then on the other side of the dichotamy- I'm working on a STRUTS based project too, it's bringing in a paycheck- is capitalism good? right? moral? I bet the Chinese guy who solders those low quality Behringer boards has a different perspective than most of us. Hmmm, Maybe we can come up with JCP-like community designed recording equipment... Would we ever ship/complete anything? Which system causes more progress? But then what if I add a knob and rebrand and sell it!!!??? What if it's a really good knob? What if I just undercut your, or her, or their design, and make it cheaper. Will Sun, or Mackie be forced to invent a better product to stay alive?

I think we all play the game to some extent, and have some roll in this money-driven, soul-lacking, litigious world.

Free the music. Spread Love.

Legal/Moral Disclaimers:

I hope to provoke some different thoughts while sharing mine- sorry about how off topic this rambling tangent may have gone.

I know this is an international board, my intent was not to be xenophobic or to express any feelings of American superiority.

Flame me if you must, I can take it. I have seen the passion expressed in other threads here, and very much think it is one of the great gifts of being alive. Emote on.

Fine print:

By reading this you are agreeing to the eternally binding policies hereforth. You are bound to non-disclosure of any intellectual, moral, or spritual properties, explicit, or implicit, within. This transmission is intended to be used by the intended, paying, recipient only. Any resemblence to actual thoughts or beliefs of others are purely unintentional. Do not pass go, and definitely do not collect $200.

-J

"...I could be wrong" -Dennis Miller

 

[regebro]

Ah, I read about the "loophole".

The fact is, that Mackie didn't have any beef on Behringer. This is because two things are protected from copying: Designs and inventions. To protect your invention, you need a Patent. Mackie didn't have it. And since a circuit layout is not a "design", copyright does not apply.

If there are any unique solutions in the Mackie mixer, then these can get patented. If not, then you are free to copy Mackies curcuits as much as you want.

It can be discussed if this is how it should be or not, but that's how it is.

After the judge decided that this was the case, Mackie decided to settle rather than to pull it into a higher court.

 

[Light]

That said, if the design circuitry is the same between the two mixers, then it can't be fairly said that one is crap and the other is not - they're both essentially the same.... or am I missing something?

Understanding that I have no specific knowledge of the circuitry on either mixer, you are potentially missing something. Even if they both have the same circuit design, they do not necessarily use the same components. Capacitors, resistors, and all make a BIG difference in the sound, and even in the signal to noise ratio, and such.

I have no idea what the situation is here, but from an electronic point of view, the same design does NOT mean they will sound the same.

Light

"Cowards can never be moral."
M.K. Gandhi

 

[Rochey]

Just a quick note on how Behringer do their design and manufacturing...

The guys in germany design the boards (or steal them - whatever)

The actual choice of components is done by their subcontractor out in the far east. At which point they have one thought on their mind - make an fast buck on each unit.

I have no doubt that the units sound reasonably good on the designers test bench. I also have no doubt that there's a huge difference once they come out of the factory.

Food for thought...

R

 

[Stefan Elmblad]

What the hell are you guys talking about? The Mackie and the Behringer desks has not even got the same functions, so can you please explain how the circuit could be the same?

Example:
The Mackie has adjustable Q on the sweepable high mid EQ. The Behringer has not.

 

[Rossi]

Rochey, I don't think that's true. If the design guys specifiy a 4580 the can't just use any compatible component, and if there has to be a foil capacitor, I don't think the Chinese guys will use a cheaper one. That said, the aim of the design team is not to make the best possible mixer but the best mixer that can be made at a given price point. And that's really their achievement.

Regebro is right, you can't get patent rights on everything, it has to be innovative. Depending on where you apply for a patent it has to be *very* innovative. Conrad Zuse, for instance, built the very first computer, a relais driven calculator, but couldn't get a patent because the German patent authorities thought it wasn't innovative enough. Apart from those instances of bad luck, there are good reasons you can't get a patent on a lot of things, most circuit designs included, and there are reasons, too, why patents become obsolete in time. If that were the case, products would never become cheaper. There just wouldn't be any competition. What if the only cars available would be Mercedes Benz?

I think what really pissed Mackie off is not the circuit design of the Behringer mixers but their blatant copy of the Mackie looks. I can understand that, and frankly, I don't know if it was too clever a move on the Behringer side, but on the other hand it's just looks. It's not like Mackie invented the 8 bus design etc. Mackie themselves were "standing on the shoulder of giants." Mackie's real achievement was to design a fairly good mixer at a fairly low price point, and Behringer designed an almost as good mixer at an even lower price point. I don't think that's a crime. I personally couldn't have afforded the Mackie, but I could afford the Behringer, which I think is a good thing. I don't think I did harm to anyone by buying and using it.

My two Euro cents on the matter.

 

[regebro]

Originally posted by Stefan Elmblad
What the hell are you guys talking about? The Mackie and the Behringer desks has not even got the same functions, so can you please explain how the circuit could be the same?

You know, it *is* possible to copy just a part, like a preamp, or a filter or the adder... You don't have to copy everything for it to still be copying...

 

[gyraf]

Yep, it's a copy allright.

I've had apart both a M8-bus and a beh, and they're not only similar in looks, but the PCB layout is minutely copied - in details.

Only difference is company name. I'm pretty sure you'd be able to take a Mackie PCB and drop it directly into a beh and vice versa.

For the components, both companies use the same semiconductors, and what looks like the cheapest variety of other components - like capacitors and resistors - in both cases.

I am not able to hear the difference myself in direct comparisons.

There may be a difference in build quality though - but I'm not sure to whoms advantage.

I've been troubleshooting quite a few Mackie 8-bus'es, and found out that they initially were built with IDC-cables (for interconnecting the circuit boards) that were the wrong size. Not by much, but enough to give you serious instability with time.

But whenever I find such a faulty 8-bus desk, and try to order a new set of cables from Mackie, they always start out by denying that there is such a problem. Only when I convince them that I've been there before, they will admit the error. Not nice.

Btw, the build quality is really a matter of setting up the assembly machine. These units are NOT hand-soldered, so you can easily use uneducated asian children from jail camps to assemble them without sacrifying build quality...

Jakob Erland
Gyraf Audio

 

[gordone]

Wow! I thought I was the only one on this board (or outside of my job/Grad School) who knows UML! My wife would ask "What did you do at work today?" and I'd answer "Drew pretty boxes and lines"

Yeah, I'd be pretty pissed if someone took my ideas - be it code/design work/pretty pictures/music

Back to UML'ing!

<snip>during the day, i am a software architect for IBM. I'd be pretty pissed off if someone else stole my Model-View-Controller with Command bean UML design patterns and pawned them off as there own.

 

[Son of Mixerman]

Not every copy is a good copy. Thats why vintage still rules the roost and demands higher prices than a knock off. Hence the term...Clone, even the best designers in the biz know that subtle variations in manufacturing can mean significant changes in funtionality and reliability. Maybe some of the first Behringers had an advantage because they were meticulous to make sure they had a customer base, then off to the slave camps for the rest. I don't own anything from Behringer. But I have an 3630 and Yamaha md8.

SoMm

 

[VOXVENDOR]

>That said, if the design circuitry is the same between the two mixers, then it can't be fairly said that one is crap and the other is not - they're both essentially the same....

I'm not very good at reading this kind of tech/legal stuff with my 3 second attention span, but I wanted to comment on the above quote..

If the manufacturing standards are not the same.... No they won't be essentially the same console...... I won't use brand names here....

If a company named "A" Builds a decent console, and Company "B" copies the design and creates a console that functions identical to company A's console... They will only have the same quality if the same compnents are used....

If company B is using crappy buttons, knobs, shitty wiring, and cheaply made weak chassis, crappy, noisy connectors you are going to have a noisy and shitty console, regardless of it being copied from company A.

I am not going to comment on whether I think this is true or not about Behringer or Mackie cause I haven't had much experience with a Behringer, but in the scheme of things the above quote is not true, cause they are not essentially the same, unless all the exact components are used

If I am wrong, correct me, I am cool with it

Joe

 

[regebro]

Originally posted by gyraf
Yep, it's a copy allright.

I've had apart both a M8-bus and a beh, and they're not only similar in looks, but the PCB layout is minutely copied - in details.

Which is interesting, since the lawsuit texts found claimed that thiswas not the case. The circuits were the same, but not the layouts, HAd teh layouts been the same, Mackie would have acase, because then it would be copyright infringement.

 

[charger]

The point is getting lost here. The Behringers that were a copy of the Mackie boards were good mixers, pretty much as good as the boards they copied. I heard recordings made through them that sounded identical.

That said, those mixers are no longer being made. That was a long time ago, and both Mackie and Behringer have moved on (Mackie to the VLZ Pro series, Behringer to their "Invisible" mic preamps). The new Behringer stuff is requiring Behringer to innovate on their own and come up with more of their own designs, and though they have a great marketing department, and their cost is unbelievably low, the preamps and eqs on their new boards are nothing special. Some would argue the same for Mackie...

 

[sjjohnston]

One quick note on the original post in this thread (I haven't waded through the whole thread):

There were apparently at least two court cases between Mackie and Behringer: the case referred to in the first link cannot be the same one referred to in the second link. There's no way the lawyer from Stoel Rives' Portland office litigated a case in an English court.

Given that there are at least two cases, there may be more. Ferreting out the full details of whatever went on between Mackie and Behringer is not a simple matter, if it's possible at all.

 

[Duardo]

The Behringers that were a copy of the Mackie boards were good mixers, pretty much as good as the boards they copied. I heard recordings made through them that sounded identical.

Have you actually tried out both boards, or just heard recordings others have done on them? I've used both, and while I didn't have the chance to A/B them the difference in quality was fairly obvious. As others have already said, Behringer does use inferior quality components, and it shows in the sound. Also, their tolerances are so loose they can sound very different from one unit or even one channel to the next.

This is all based on the units that were out a few years ago...they may have been better earlier on, and for all I know they may have improved them since.

That said, those mixers are no longer being made. That was a long time ago, and both Mackie and Behringer have moved on (Mackie to the VLZ Pro series, Behringer to their "Invisible" mic preamps).

Actually, Mackie is still making the same boards...it was the analog 8-bus series, and they haven't changed. As I understood it, Behringer pulled that particular board from the US market but continued to sell it overseas, where Mackie wasn't able to make headway with their suit(s)...I'm sure there are a few here who can confirm that.

After reading the swizz-army cable tester thread about the Behringer bootlegs, I'm thinking more and more that it's not a company that I *want* to support.

Exactly...I don't need Mackie to win their suit, or Ebtech to successfully sue, or anything to clearly see what Behringer's doing, and there's no way I'm going to support a company that works that way, no matter how good their stuff sounds for the price (luckily, it's rare to see it described as sounding good without "for the price", so I don't feel like I'm missing out on anything).

since Mackie's president is stepping down, and the company is going to start using Asian parts, the difference between Mackie and Behringer in my opinion will become slim.

Why not wait until you've heard one of the Asian-manufactured Mackie mixers to form your opinion? Who knows, maybe quality will drop, but if Mackie can keep their quality up and still compete price-wise more power to them. It's just too bad they're having to do this to compete when their mixers are still relatively cheap as it is...

-Duardo

 

[pundit]

Re: What is sacred?

... After reading the swizz-army cable tester thread about the Behringer bootlegs, I'm thinking more and more that it's not a company that I *want* to support...

For those who doubt Behringers BLATANT plagiarism....

Swizz Army Cable Tester

Behringer CT100 Cable Tester

The funniest part has to be the "Designed and conceived in Germany" printed on the side of the Behringer.

"But I swear it came to me in a dream... I've never, ever heard or seen a Swizz Army Cable Tester in my life! Now Swiss cheese well don't you know that I, Uri Spoonbender, invented the holes in Swiss Cheese?! Yes that was ME... I sat down and worked out the 'hole' process all by myself!... So now Berhinger has set up a factory in China, where under German supervision, we manufacture the holes that go into Swiss Cheese!"

"Now just go and try a patent a fuckin' HOLE!... I dare YOU!! Go on sue me!... sue me you BASTARDS!! See you can't CAN YOU?!!..."

 

[Rossi]

I recently asked some guys on a German board about their experiences with their MX8000s. The bottom line was that those who bought their mixers early on, before the meterbridge was included and the price dopped to half the original price, had no problems whatsoever. The later versions including the blue 8000A seem to be of inferior quality. Some dealer even confirmed this. This didn't really come as a surprise to me; you can drop the price to some degree, but I don't think you can sell your mixers at half price and still maintain the same quality. The MX8000 was already cheap when it came out at roughly half the price of the Mackie mixer. Of course Behringer had to cut a few edges (eg no fully parametric EQ band), but the main reason it was cheaper was that it was built in China. Since there's hardly any place cheaper than China they must have cut down on QC and quality components, I suppose.

To my knowledge the MX9000 and the MX8000 are essentially identical, there's no separate manual, either, and both sport the exact same specs. The MX8000A was sold in Europe until recently; the MX9000 was initially produced for the American market, most probably, as a result of the settlement between Mackie and Behringer. This, I think, confirms that Mackie's concern was mainly the outward design. As I said before, you can't really get patent rights on ciruit designs unless it is *really* a major innovation, something never done before. There were zillions of 8-bus mixers before Mackie. Both the Mackie and the Behringer mixers real innovation is the fact that they provide usable quality at an affordable price.

@ pundit: I think we'd have to see the internals of both units to see if they are identical, as a cable tester in itself is not really a big innovation. And even if the circuits are identical, that could also mean that both are OEM-designs by some Chinese company like all those OEM microphones. If Behringer did rip them off, they could sue them, why not? At least for copying the design of their box. But then again, their name is stolen, too. There are only two companies in the world who are legitimately entitled to use the phrase "swiss army" in their name, both being Swiss producers of knifes. And quite another question remains: would you buy a cable tester at their price?

To be quite honest, I think this debate is largely colored by patriotism. The plagiarism debate only comes up when American companies are concerned; I don't see anybody jumping around over blatant copies of Neumann's (patented) capsule designs or the cosmetics of their microphones. And to be even more honest, I'm quite glad other companies do copy their designs, since I can't afford a Neumann but I can afford a Studio Projects. I take care of my own interests and let companies take care of their interests. If there are any copyright infringements, there are courts to settle them.

Just another 2 Euro cents.

 

[nwsoundman]

Coming from a electronics mfg. background.....

They are both crap. Both built cheaply as possible. Yes I have seen/used both. I don't care if they are biult in asian sweat shop or an american sweat shop full of asians.

As far as QC goes, I see alot of electronic mfg.s cutting back in that dept. I worked in medical electronics and have seen our QC cut by over half. Now that is truly scary.

Kirk