Music just for musicians?

[KingsleyD@aol.com]

Jon's comments about the regard in which Leni Stern is held in the NY
musician community begs one question - do those people respond to an ad in 
GP
(or Musician, or E-Musician, or whatever) or do they pick up on the Jam Man
from talking to Leni, or observing her putting one to use? If they all 
called
Jon because they *talked to* Leni, then what did the ads accomplish?

I've had a lot of interest in my own Jam Man from local blues and rock guys
who see it as a great practice device - instant rhythm guitar, y'know? 
Those
guys have no idea who *any* of the people were in the ads, nor did they
perceive the capability just described at all, even tho' Leni alluded to it
in the ad. So who missed the boat here? I suppose that's a problem with any
"new" device in the market - if you look at the JM primarily in terms of 
its
genesis - being a "looping device" as relating to music such as Fripp/Eno,
Torn, et. al. - it seems clear that you're limiting yourself to a pretty 
tiny
percentage of the (not very big to begin with) MI market. Could someone at
Lex have forseen the alternative possibilities and marketed the thing
accordingly? Or were they done in by their apparently narrow range of 
musical
taste and vision? (wot, no Chet Atkins fans there?!) What do you think, 
Jon?

The price argument reminds me of Prior's Double Dark, a wonderful
Philadelphia-brewed beer available for $2 - $3 a six back in the days when
there were *no* drinkable American beers. Some marketing guy decided that
they'd sell more if they were priced and sold more like imports -
specifically Guinness - and all of a sudden the beer came in 4-paks which
cost $6. Within a year, no more Prior's in any form. So what was the 
problem?
Ahead of their time? Misguided marketing? Recession of '82? From *my*
perspective as a loyal Prior's fan prior (;->) to their marketing suicide,
the whole thing stunk. They took a perfectly good product - one which had
basically no competitors - and $%#$$ed it over with a misguided marketing
strategy. Can you imagine how well they'd have done if they had just held 
on
at the level they were at, and caught the micro-brewery wave? My gut 
feeling
is the JamMan is a perfectly good product, reasonably priced even at
$350-400, that needed to wait for its market to develop.

"But that's just my opinion, I could be wrong."
--Kingsley