EDP Footpedal vs. FCB1010 ? ?

[Adrian Bartholomew <adrian@bartholomusic.com>]

From: Adrian Bartholomew <adrian@bartholomusic.com>
Date: September 13, 2005 11:22:41 AM CDT
To: Loopers-Delight@loopers-delight.com
Subject: EDP Footpedal vs. FCB1010 ? ?

kim, u sound like i did when i did marketing/advertising.

the client would outline their market target audience and also, like u, through statistics, provided by 3rd party companies, i had to pinpoint who they were by their race, socio-economic strata, age, sex and musical tastes (i also did jingles or commissioned them out).

if the marketing didnt work, what then?

do i challenge the advertiser to enlighten me with a better idea based on a sarcastically appointed imaginary marketing degree i suddenly hinted that they might have? that wouldve been....bad. jobwise and karmawise.
do i blame the public for not "getting it"? tempting, especially after all the working hrs, love, sweat, sleepless nights, attention to detail and scientific "facts" presented in the project.
sometimes i was stubborn too.

but no.

all we can do is recall the vehicle and try something else based upon new information eg. data from questionaires given to random groups within the target market in a controlled environment.

because THE CUSTOMER IS ALWAYS RIGHT.

now i do also have quite a lot of engineering experience so i completely understand u and ur company's reasoning behind the design of the footpedal. i, however, believe that a lot of ur customers would prefer, and indeed even pay more, for a product that didnt go bad so relatively quickly (WITHOUT SELF SERVICING) even though it could be fixed easily. the moment onstage is gone.
try building a powered, midi controller with switches based on different technology for more money and see which sells more. designed BY gibson. that would be awesome.
im not alone in this. how many of ur beloved EDP users have complained about ur footpedal.
come on kim. they're EDP USERS. how many others want it and cant afford it. ur users are already in the category of, "im buying it cause its the best, not because its cheap".

i dont quite swallow the... faultyness of all switches used on a regular basis... theory. we all use many switches in our lives that never fail, though some do. i have keyboards that are as good today as they ever were. every key on the keyboard is a switch isnt it? what about the program buttons. they too are switches. the keys on my computers never went bad. laptop or desktop. the lightswitches in my house. my gtr pedals, volume sustain for my keyboard. NEVER. i know others may have  different experiences but i could safely say that lots of folk never had problems with any of these above switches.
reliability is in the hands of the beholder not just in engineering calculations.
i will try to clean my edp footpedal switches. thanks for the tip. im comfortable with electronics.  but i guarantee u this. no matter HOW easy it may be for me ...and u...and others like us, most of ur customers will never be comfortable opening up an electronic device. they dont want to have to.

___
Adrian Bartholomew
Leawood KS