Re: feedback/features/new loopers...

["Kris Hartung" <khartung@cableone.net>]

> Kris,
>
> > if I had been the
> > program manager for the development of the unit, I would have done what
any
> > program manager in marketing would have done with the development of a
new
> > product, namely conducted a series of focus groups
>
> Ah! Built in mediocrity. I'd much rather see the result of Bob's vision
> unadulterated, than some marketeer's compromise.

Please validate your claim. Are saying there is a better and more efficient
way to design a product that doesn't involve communicating directly with a
decent sample of potential users, documenting the list of features, and 
then
prioritizing them?  Have you worked in a future product marketing team? 
They
work hand in hand with R&D. One can't function without the other.

> Why do you think the loopers
> coming from the big-name companies are so lame?

I don't believe I said that, so you'll have to retract your statement.

> Focus groups and market-driven
> design ... Great Art rarely gets made by committee.

Committee? What do you mean?  And I did not limit the data collection
process to focus groups alone. Product marketing research uses various
tools.

> And before you ask, yes I work in advertising ... ;-)

Advertising and product marketing are two entirely different functions in a
corporation. Product maketing is designing the product with R&D even before
the proto-type phase, when it is still a concept. I've worked with both. As
I said, product marketing folks are the voice of the customer need for R&D.
I corpration would have to be comprised of idiots, in my opinion, to design
a product with no data on customer need.  I don't no of a single 
corporation
who doesn't design products this way. It's the basics of marketing, the 
Five
P's - product, place, promotion, etc...

Kris

>
>   Ian Petersen
>
>
>