Musikmesse 2011 - Dissapointing once more?

[Compyfox]

we ran into linplug, cableguys, sonic charge, sugar-bytes, arts accoustic, snap, anthony rother and god knows who (i fried my brain later that night). and of course there were my friends from access, waldorf and celemony (latter without a booth too)

Aren't they always only running around in "groups" to meet up colluegues, drink some coffe and do some small talk?


It's hard to believe that the Studio Hall (5.1) is full again after the events from the last couple of years. Packed in terms of visitors I can agree on, usually always on weekends. But exhibitioneers?

Now don't tell me, despite all other rumors, that NI was there again.


Oh and MrMagneto:
Nobody sticked to the rules at the fair. They ran arround with SPL meters, but didn't do anything. At least at times while I saw them (and the readouts on the meter - if they even understood them ).

Hm... Karaoke... must have been fun, in an own cruel way, hehe.

[Urs]

It's hard to believe that the Studio Hall (5.1) is full again after the events from the last couple of years. Packed in terms of visitors I can agree on, usually always on weekends. But exhibitioneers?

Believe it or not. 5.1 was completely full even without NI, Apple or Ableton. Even though Korg was in a different Hall. Other companies rocked the show, many of which I have never heard of before. That's why they are there, I reckon?

Every day was like Saturday in terms of visitors. I haven't been there on Saturday. It seems that the regulations for Fachpublikum were dropped considerably, as if everyone could get in.

[Compyfox]

THIS is what gives me huge concern. I don't know when I first saw other visitors rather than "Fachpublikum" on weekdays, but it sure raised through the years (which was the very reason why I went for the trade visitor days rather than the public visitor ones. Less crowded, more time to talk to people.

It's as with the old Toy Fair in Nuremberg. First it was locked out (trade visitors), and through the years I saw more and more non-traders or professionals in that area.


Looks like I need to save up on money for next year. Though I really hope I don't pay 40Euro for a 1-day-ticket now (plus train ticket and possibly a hotel as well!), and be dissapointed yet again.



And where was Korg? Hall 5.0 together with ROLAND again?

[hibidy]

Thanks to MMU for the link, I'll check it out.

As strictly a consumer, it's hard to keep up with these things nowadays. For one thing, 97% of it is boring. Instead of something groundbreaking it's seems like a rehash of stuff we were over 5 years ago. "Oh look, it's the same midi controller with a new color" "oh look, (insert guitar company here) are making the exact same models, as cheaply as they can with nothing cool or providing GAS" "Hey, wasn't that company here 3 years ago promoting the same thing?"

It surprises me that these things get bigger and bigger when it starts to look like a blur.......I guess that is why I'm not rich.

[Compyfox]

Actually THE only thing I wanted to see, was the new Behringer digital mixing desk. Yeah, slap me in the face, but with the vanish of the first digital incarnation a couple of years ago, I wanted to see Behringer's own stab at things rather than "copy" this time (old DX looked terribly similar to the Yamaha x01).

Else... dunno, studio wise I've seen everything already through NAMM. Maybe I should take a look at the MusoTalk Musikmesse 2011 coverage?

[Urs]

Looks like I need to save up on money for next year. Though I really hope I don't pay 40Euro for a 1-day-ticket now (plus train ticket and possibly a hotel as well!), and be dissapointed yet again.

No worries, the Saturday ticket was 20€ I think, a normal one was 28 or so. It's affordable.

And where was Korg? Hall 5.0 together with ROLAND again?

Hall 3. Loads of hands-on things, literally. They had iPad stuff, monotribes, wavedrums, controllers and all those things that they do.

[MountainKing]

I visited the Messe on friday.

Boah ... everytime again: sound mash up +1000. It's not a real pleasure struggling with all that noise and all of the tim all day long.

But well, all in all I wasn that much impressed.

New stuff? I don't know where it had been hiding. OK, there was:



- Line 6 - M5 ... new board pedal.

- Yamaha - they launched a new series of Acoustical guitars (the "A" series if I'm right). Very nice and well priced. It works with three different impulse responses (two Neumanns and one Ribbon mic). The performances was cool and the sound was amazing.

http://news.hitsquad.com/Acoustic/Yamah ... ic_Guitars


Since the Boss RC50 loop pedal is out of stock at the big german stores I REALLY was hoping for the new RC60 (?) to be seen at the Messe. But nothing. The RC30 hit the market already a few months ago.

[bM3w]

Uh oh another Complainyfox thread...how boring...

Seriously, what do you expect? Nowadays pretty all technology fairs have hard times creating that moment of excitement, since almost everything has already been announced or rumored elsewhere beforehand. No not at NAMM, but at this place they call the Internet. Yes, the Internet is the true killer of trade shows.

That being out of the door I must admit I keep saying every year that I'm not going anymore, because most of the booths look the same, are in the same location and are crowded by the same people. Although year after year I decide to go and of course I was there again this year as well. And you know why? Because it's cool, it's fun and it still gives you that twinkle in your eyes like I had when I got my first toy train

Did I see anything totally new? Something I haven't heard of before? Well, not really, but for the first time I got my hands on a Novation Ultranova and I love it. All the promo vids and ads didn't catch my attraction, but now after playing with it I definitely will be getting one as soon as I have the funds.

[Compyfox]

No worries, the Saturday ticket was 20€ I think, a normal one was 28 or so. It's affordable.

Wow... no priceraise... that is new.

Hall 3. Loads of hands-on things, literally. They had iPad stuff, monotribes, wavedrums, controllers and all those things that they do.

Hall 3... I remember that one being "real instruments" like flutes and the liking. Expected them more over at the Yamaha "garden", but still... Last time I was at their booth, stuff was crowded anyway with critters and the likes. So it might actually be a good thing. Now only if they'd know their stuff - I remember asking at a booth regarding the KORG MS-10 DSi version. Huge question marks above their head. A wonder that they could even "fire up" the DSi!

- Line 6 - M5 ... new board pedal.

Oh... surprise, they don't have enough yet.

Uh oh another Complainyfox thread...how boring...

Sorry that my "content" is not interesting enough for you. Sounds like someone is dissapointed.

Seriously, what do you expect? Nowadays pretty all technology fairs have hard times creating that moment of excitement, since almost everything has already been announced or rumored elsewhere beforehand. No not at NAMM, but at this place they call the Internet. Yes, the Internet is the true killer of trade shows.

Ooooh... The Evil Internet.
Nah seriously, I remember times where tradeshows were actually there to show "new stuff", non leaked, something that's being special. This has clearly changed. First, all were like "NAMM only", now it's all "dude, I've seen that already on Google".

Sad indeed.

And you know why? Because it's cool, it's fun and it still gives you that twinkle in your eyes like I had when I got my first toy train

I clearly remember that I tried to create (KVR) meetups three years in row. Other than saying "hi" to random people at Urs' booth, or meeting devs at certain arranged places, nothing.


I also had that twinkle in my eyes the first times I went to "Musikmesse". But this faded quickly after the leading light of the audio realm vanished, stuff from NAMM and the web (yes, I'm looking at you, IKM) was only "represented", then the constant pricerange while the fair itself got somewhat trimmed...

Sure was dissapointing - at least to me. And I didn't want to go to the fair just to drink some coffe/hot chocolate alone.

All the promo vids and ads didn't catch my attraction, but now after playing with it I definitely will be getting one as soon as I have the funds.

Last time that happened to me was with IKM ARC... Though I did want to get a Kurzweil K26xx as well, but never had the funds. I'm happy that my K2000 still works rock solid.

[Angus_FX]

Believe it or not. 5.1 was completely full even without NI, Apple or Ableton. Even though Korg was in a different Hall. Other companies rocked the show, many of which I have never heard of before. That's why they are there, I reckon?

5.1 was full, but >50% of it was DJ gear, and they moved some previously 5.0 companies upstairs (Alesis/Akai for example).

Every day was like Saturday in terms of visitors. I haven't been there on Saturday.

I have. Every day was not like the old Saturdays (which were, frankly, stupid - totally choked with n00bs, incredibly loud, exhausting & unprofitable for developers even if you didn't get half your gear stolen). The last 2 years it's been reasonably clued up users on all days, and a sensible quantity of them.

The problem is purely down to cost-effectiveness. It's a consumer show basically, not a B2B or artist relations thing like NAMM. And yet, for us, it costs as much to do Messe as NAMM (booth costs are the same $outrageous, flights are much less but hotels are much more unless you stay 10km away). And so to cover the cost of running a decent booth (think 10,000+ EUR for a small booth, once you include staffing costs), we'd have to make $hundreds of sales to every visitor, which just isn't going to happen at a consumer show.

Realistically, for the kind of cash involved, we could take every European dealer and journalist that matters out for dinner in the best restaurant in their home city & still have some change left over. Or we could make some damn sexy videos & spend a ton of cash on getting them promoted various places. In marketing budget terms, it's a massive sum of money.. and the nice looking booths like Presonus, Focusrite etc. will have cost a LOT more than 10k EUR to run.

Sure, you can do the "Superbooth" or "Puterbooth" kind of thing, which is not expensive & quite fun and cool in its way, but is it that much more effective than wandering the halls with a laptop and some business cards? I dunno..

The other point is, for a small company, it's actually HARDER to get new-product-buzz going on during a show, unless you have something so revolutionary that word will spread around the show audience in 2 days. Because all the big guns are announcing at the same time, and that's what everyone is going to talk about. So much better to do an online launch at a quiet time of year, than spend $$$ on NAMM press releases and get lost in the herd. IMO, of course.