Earvana Drop in nut for warmoth neck (whats your thoughts?)

[Firebird211]

This is probably never going to happen, but it would be cool if Earvana could get the licence, everything would be back to normal other than Earvana not making as much money on the nuts they sell.  Earvana made a name for themselves, almost a household name for guitarists.  EB should always consider them the best choice of partnership to sell the crap out of those nuts. :sad:

 

[Superlizard]

On a related note, those who remember IOMega's "Zip Drives" saw the same thing happen. They came up with a way to pack several orders of magnitude more data on a floppy disk than the general industry could, and patented it. Then, they wanted to keep the technology to themselves so they could overcharge for it, even though it cost little more than a standard drive/disk did using freely available technology. So, while everybody else wanted $20 for a drive and $.20/ea for disks, IOMega wanted $250 for a drive and $10/ea. for disks. Takeup was minimal. They could have sold jillions of the things if they'd have priced them right, but they were too greedy, and it kept them from ever making any serious money.

Apple did the same thing with Firewire. It was a far superior serial communication scheme to USB, but they wanted $.25/ea for every port implemented on a motherboard or peripheral, while USB was free. Since there are literally hundreds of millions of ports implemented annually, can you see the mistake? Where's Firewire today? Even Apple is using USB.

Sony has done it numerous times, with the "Beta" video recording scheme being the most egregious mistake they've made. Again, they wanted to keep the technology to themselves, or would only license it for exorbitant amounts of money, while VHS was free. As a result, dozens of manufacturers made VHS machines, while Sony was nearly the only one selling Beta machines. We all saw what happened there. Even though the Beta format was superior in many ways, it never gained any market share.

Even governments are guilty of it when certain party philosophies are dominant. When tax revenues are down, the tendency is to raise taxes. The problem is, higher taxes reduces the number of taxpayers as businesses fail or reduce employment or pay scales, so revenues go down when taxes go up due to reduced participation. Better to have a lower tax with more payers, as the revenue is higher.

Well said!  :icon_thumright:

 

[Cagey]

I'm sure Earvana will have the same opportunity to license the design from Ernie Ball that everybody else has (assuming EB offers licenses), but unless they have other products to sell, it's doubtful they'd be able to make enough money at it to sustain a company. After all, EB was awarded the entire profits Earvana made from making the things for X number of years, and it was still less than a quarter million dollars. Earvana may be well-known amongst guitarists, but they're not widely used. They've always been too expensive while only returning a marginal benefit. It would be like inventing a string that lastes 10 times as long, but charging $75 a set for them. Some people would buy them, but not many.

 

[bagman67]

I'm sure Earvana will have the same opportunity to license the design from Ernie Ball that everybody else has (assuming EB offers licenses), but unless they have other products to sell, it's doubtful they'd be able to make enough money at it to sustain a company. After all, EB was awarded the entire profits Earvana made from making the things for X number of years, and it was still less than a quarter million dollars. Earvana may be well-known amongst guitarists, but they're not widely used. They've always been too expensive while only returning a marginal benefit. It would be like inventing a string that lastes 10 times as long, but charging $75 a set for them. Some people would buy them, but not many.

Another case of misjudging where to stand on the Laffer curve - I reckon if they'd priced lower over the years they've been at it, they probably could have spurred much wider adoption and made considerably greater aggregate profits, despite making less per unit sold.

Bagman

 

[Cagey]

Perzactly.

 

[Firebird211]

They were definately too expensive for most people to consider to try, but in defense of that the Earvana nut was a much cheaper alternative to the buzz feiten system.  I'm not saying the Earvana nut is as effective in fixing intonation, but effective enought that it wasn't just an ordinary nut.  They can't stay in business now unless they come up with different merchandise, your right about that, nuts are all they sell.

 

[Cagey]

This award sets a precedent, so I wouldn't be surprised if EB goes after Buzz & Co. as well. The only thing that could stop EB would be if somebody with really deep pockets like Fender, Gibson or Martin decided to file suit to invalidate EB's patent(s). Prior art and obviousness are on any litigator's side. But, that's difficult and expensive, and there'd be little to gain by it. I doubt there are many years left on the patents anyway; design patents only last 14 years.

 

[jay4321]

Lot of fuss over a guitar nut. I like the things but damn 

 

[swarfrat]

I still fail to see how the system could be so screwed up that Joe Luthier with 10 cents in his pocket trying to represent himself  couldn't walk into a courtroom to answer EBMM and their lawyers (or even Microsoft and their vast hordes of lawyers) with a piece of paper and an affidavit or two and just blow them all out of the water with prior art. I mean, prior art is prior art, but evidently that doesn't matter in today's Patent/Legal system.  F EB - I will not buy any of their products. Nor MB, G, GT or any other company who's abandoned making and selling products for suing people over patents obtained by FRAUDULENT means. Yes. Fraudulent, as in maliciously and willfully obtained under false pretenses.

 

[Cagey]

On the surface, it would appear to be that easy and straightforward. But, the defendant's lawyers will bury you under a blizzard of paper, filing motion after motion that each must be answered, and you have to appear for each one or risk a default judgement. Since you need at least a lawyer, if not some qualified experts, every bit of attention required turns into billable hours, and lots of them. Plus, there will be travel costs, court costs, living expenses, etc. They can drag it out for years, and often do if there's enough money involved. If you do manage to prevail, then they start with the appeals, adding years to the fight and duplicating a great deal of what's already been done and paid for. So, unless you stand to recover millions, it's rarely worth it to even start the fight. Usually, the only ones to get ahead in these kinds of fights are the lawyers who get paid whether it's win, lose or draw.

 

[Firebird211]

I still fail to see how the system could be so screwed up that Joe Luthier with 10 cents in his pocket trying to represent himself  couldn't walk into a courtroom to answer EBMM and their lawyers (or even Microsoft and their vast hordes of lawyers) with a piece of paper and an affidavit or two and just blow them all out of the water with prior art. I mean, prior art is prior art, but evidently that doesn't matter in today's Patent/Legal system.  F EB - I will not buy any of their products. Nor MB, G, GT or any other company who's abandoned making and selling products for suing people over patents obtained by FRAUDULENT means. Yes. Fraudulent, as in maliciously and willfully obtained under false pretenses.

That was my thought about this too.  What's the point of a patent if someone can override a working patent with some prior art BS.  I have used EB strings for at least 15 years, but I have lost my respect for them in this case.  I have no urge to buy any strings from them for a long time.  F all the suing, it doesn't do anything but fill someones pockets with someone elses money. Mostly lawyers.  Do any of these sue happy companies even care about the future of guitar and music, or do they want to make a buck at someones elses expense.

 

[Cagey]

Do any of these sue happy companies even care about the future of guitar and music, or do they want to make a buck at someones elses expense.

No, they don't and yes, they do.

Companies are cold, lifeless entities who are effectively citizens, but they're not human. They have no emotion. They exist as a legal construct solely to make money. If they can't do that, they die, just as surely as you'd die without food. Don't get me wrong, I don't think that's a Bad Thing, but not realizing that is a source of confusion for many people. They expect compassion, thoughtfulness, understanding, altruism, etc. and when they don't see it, it offends them. Not that exhibiting any of those qualities is unheard of or frowned upon, but you have to realize that when you do see it, it's just a façade to encourage warm and fuzzy feelings and therefore increase sales.

I suspect in the Ernie Ball v. Earvana case, EB believes in and wants to use that technology on their own instruments without getting sued. There was so little money involved, it probably cost them more to win than what they got. But, if they'd have just used that nut design on their guitars, they'd have ended up owing Earvana a lot more because Earvana would have sued EB for infringement. So, Earvana had to be knocked down, and because the patent was improperly issued they were an easy target. Call it a "pre-emptive strike". I'd wager if Earvana would have just let EB make those nuts for $.25/ea., EB would have never bothered to fight about it. But, Earvana was greedy, so...

One of the 7 deadly sins, greed.

 

[B3Guy]

Do any of these sue happy companies even care about the future of guitar and music, or do they want to make a buck at someones elses expense.

Companies are cold, lifeless entities who are effectively citizens, but they're not human. They have no emotion. They exist as a legal construct solely to make money.

welcome to our capitalist society  :icon_thumright:

 

[swarfrat]

Just to be clear - Earvana should've never got their patent either. But there were only two people selling this thing.

 

[back2thefutre]

Since there are no more Earvanas I guess I will have to get a true temperament neck

 

[Patrick from Davis]

You can still buy the nuts at Earvana's site.  I play a lot of open chords and found it made the things sound a lot better to my ears.  I got rid of the LSR I had for that reason.  You can get the ones that fit into the normal slot as well, so really it is just 35 plus shipping.  They are still expensive, but they did do a lot of work to get the word out.  Also the stuff to manufacture them couldn't have been cheap.  And while they were figuring out the problems, they were probably losing quite a bit of money.  All things said and done, it is a fine product, and if they become cheaper, oh darn.
Patrick

 

[Strat Avenger]

Do any of these sue happy companies even care about the future of guitar and music, or do they want to make a buck at someones elses expense.

Companies are cold, lifeless entities who are effectively citizens, but they're not human. They have no emotion. They exist as a legal construct solely to make money.

welcome to our capitalist society  :icon_thumright:

You say that like it's a bad thing. There is NOTHING wrong with Capitalism. It beats the hell out of socialism and communism by leaps and bounds.

Now there IS something wrong with greed, but there will always be greed. There's no way to completely rid the world of it. It's just an unfortunate fact of Life...

 

[B3Guy]

Do any of these sue happy companies even care about the future of guitar and music, or do they want to make a buck at someones elses expense.

Companies are cold, lifeless entities who are effectively citizens, but they're not human. They have no emotion. They exist as a legal construct solely to make money.

welcome to our capitalist society  :icon_thumright:

You say that like it's a bad thing. There is NOTHING wrong with Capitalism. It beats the hell out of socialism and communism by leaps and bounds.

Now there IS something wrong with greed, but there will always be greed. There's no way to completely rid the world of it. It's just an unfortunate fact of Life...

capitalism is better than most, I will agree, but you have to also agree that it is starting to run away from us, what with lifeless uncontrollable companies, and so many different laws that the courts can basically interpret what they want.

 

[Strat Avenger]

Do any of these sue happy companies even care about the future of guitar and music, or do they want to make a buck at someones elses expense.

Companies are cold, lifeless entities who are effectively citizens, but they're not human. They have no emotion. They exist as a legal construct solely to make money.

welcome to our capitalist society  :icon_thumright:

Very true, but saying that Capitalism is bad, is like saying that "money is evil".  Money is not evil. GREED is evil. The worship of the "almighty dollar" is bad. Taking advantage of people is bad. Cheating people is bad. You get the point.

You say that like it's a bad thing. There is NOTHING wrong with Capitalism. It beats the hell out of socialism and communism by leaps and bounds.

Now there IS something wrong with greed, but there will always be greed. There's no way to completely rid the world of it. It's just an unfortunate fact of Life...

capitalism is better than most, I will agree, but you have to also agree that it is starting to run away from us, what with lifeless uncontrollable companies, and so many different laws that the courts can basically interpret what they want.