Is it me or BF2023 is crazy ?

[funky lime]

tons of great deals for someone who doesn't have (much of) anything yet. not sure if it's just depression or if i'm actually just full up on goodies already, but nothing actually appeals to me this time. i budgeted a decent amount and honestly, not a single thing has even made it to my "maybe" list. my weed guy's having a sale though, guess he's getting my plugin money.

[xphen0m]

I've done plenty of Black Fridays in the audio world, and I agree, this one is definitely better than normal.

I jumped on that UAD Signature Bundle deal.

[Uncle E]

I haven't bought one BF gizmo yet.

Just sayin'

Bruh, you bought a gigantic reverb pedal...

[Uncle E]

U-He synths at 50% ==> first time I see that.

Not the first time either, as they had 50% off deals with NI in the past.

They didn't offer Filterscape, which is the one most people are buying.

[Bombadil]

I haven't bought one BF gizmo yet.

Just sayin'

Bruh, you bought a gigantic reverb pedal...

First, it is a reverb tank. By definition, it won't be a 'pedal' because I won't be stepping on it. Exactly what I am going to do with it is still being considered.
Second, I paid regular price, no '90% off, when it's really only about 25%' garbage.

[Uncle E]

You're right, something that massive can only be described as a tank.

[zerocrossing]

Inflation has hit everyone hard, and retailers are worried that people will do dumb stuff like focus on food and healthcare instead of stuff, so they're lowering prices. Makes sense, really. I just heard a news story that stated that in no other time in history have so many people dipped into their retirement accounts before retirement, saying they have some sort of hardship. Unemployment is low, but at the same time, pay increases have only effected a fraction of the work force. Meanwhile, corporate profits and executive pay rates are continuing to skyrocket. I don't mean to say that it's effecting the companies who make our gear and software, though.

I don't know about all of you, but I do OK, but I have not received a raise since the mid 00s. Let's just say for the last 20 years. My wife's take home has come down in recent years, and for the first time ever she was told she's getting 15% of her bonus because of company earnings, even though she hit all her metrics and then some. Meanwhile, there is weekly talk about how great sales are, so I have no idea how to reconcile that.

I'm not complaining, I'm just pointing at a trend. We're fine, but I imagine a lot less fortunate people are not.

[kidslow]

My wife's take home has come down in recent years, and for the first time ever she was told she's getting 15% of her bonus because of company earnings, even though she hit all her metrics and then some.

Keep an eye on what percentage of their bonus the Execs are paid. If it's a public company, that becomes public knowledge.

I left my last corporate job (hopefully ever) after the crony BoD rewarded a failed CEO by terminating him with a luxury parachute and all bonuses intact ... and then almost immediately the compensation committee voted to renege on the 3rd year of a retention bonus (that was promised after a private equity takeover and flip to the failed CEO's company). f**kers. Told them in my resignation letter exactly this, but I'm sure nobody read it except my manager who already knew how I felt. He got screwed on that retention bonus too.

ObOnTopic: I have seen deeper and earlier discounts in 2023 than in the 5 or so years I've been paying attention. My sense is there is a mad scramble to collect some cash from strapped consumers before 2024 reveals what's behind door #2.

[PebbleInAStream]

Well, the good thing about this year's BF is desiring shiny new pixels finally gave me the push to sell some stuff I didn't really use/need much at the last moment to try to pull together some cash Is it that crazy compared to last Black Friday? I don't know. Maybe I'm just the one who's crazy for paying money for those shiny pixels. Of course that's not really why we pay is it, it's so our favorite developers can make a living and continue to help us find new ways tickling our ear drums... is it crazy to be in love with sound?

[Jac459]

Inflation has hit everyone hard, and retailers are worried that people will do dumb stuff like focus on food and healthcare instead of stuff, so they're lowering prices. Makes sense, really. I just heard a news story that stated that in no other time in history have so many people dipped into their retirement accounts before retirement, saying they have some sort of hardship. Unemployment is low, but at the same time, pay increases have only effected a fraction of the work force. Meanwhile, corporate profits and executive pay rates are continuing to skyrocket. I don't mean to say that it's effecting the companies who make our gear and software, though.

I don't know about all of you, but I do OK, but I have not received a raise since the mid 00s. Let's just say for the last 20 years. My wife's take home has come down in recent years, and for the first time ever she was told she's getting 15% of her bonus because of company earnings, even though she hit all her metrics and then some. Meanwhile, there is weekly talk about how great sales are, so I have no idea how to reconcile that.

I'm not complaining, I'm just pointing at a trend. We're fine, but I imagine a lot less fortunate people are not.

In which country are you living, out of curiosity?

I don't know exactly how to feel about my own company (a bank). I think salary are below average but my bonus always increased even when we lost a shit ton of money due to Greece liquidity crisis. At this time I was sure I would not have any bonus and when I got it, it felt like Christmas.

Now we are making money like never before but pay rise are super shitty because we are "bracing" for impact on international crisis (Ukraine, Gaza, ....).

It may be the case of many big corporates, in particular banks who are very dependant of geopolitics....

Again, somehow if makes me upset... But somehow I also partly understand it.

[foosnark]

Inflation has hit everyone hard

Sales of music gear, both hardware and software, were way down this year compared to the height of the pandemic. I'm not surprised to see a bigger Black Friday as a result.

[Bombadil]

I have not been able to sell off 2 guitars on Fleebay since May. A few others with the same make of guitar (Eastman) have also had adverts up for many months. It's a tight market, at least here in Germany.

[zerocrossing]

Inflation has hit everyone hard, and retailers are worried that people will do dumb stuff like focus on food and healthcare instead of stuff, so they're lowering prices. Makes sense, really. I just heard a news story that stated that in no other time in history have so many people dipped into their retirement accounts before retirement, saying they have some sort of hardship. Unemployment is low, but at the same time, pay increases have only effected a fraction of the work force. Meanwhile, corporate profits and executive pay rates are continuing to skyrocket. I don't mean to say that it's effecting the companies who make our gear and software, though.

I don't know about all of you, but I do OK, but I have not received a raise since the mid 00s. Let's just say for the last 20 years. My wife's take home has come down in recent years, and for the first time ever she was told she's getting 15% of her bonus because of company earnings, even though she hit all her metrics and then some. Meanwhile, there is weekly talk about how great sales are, so I have no idea how to reconcile that.

I'm not complaining, I'm just pointing at a trend. We're fine, but I imagine a lot less fortunate people are not.

In which country are you living, out of curiosity?

I don't know exactly how to feel about my own company (a bank). I think salary are below average but my bonus always increased even when we lost a shit ton of money due to Greece liquidity crisis. At this time I was sure I would not have any bonus and when I got it, it felt like Christmas.

Now we are making money like never before but pay rise are super shitty because we are "bracing" for impact on international crisis (Ukraine, Gaza, ....).

It may be the case of many big corporates, in particular banks who are very dependant of geopolitics....

Again, somehow if makes me upset... But somehow I also partly understand it.

I’m in America, so stuff like corporate greed is particularly acute here, I think.

I once worked on a a game that was in production for 4 years. I came in mid production, but I started noticing something weird. We were never done with anything. I was constantly sent off to iterate on something. It was very strange, until the parent company landed a big contract with Dreamworks. I remember talking to the audio designer and saying, “Watch. They were using us as bait to land a big contract. We’ll be sent home in a week.” We were sent home 2 weeks later. Management said, “we realized we couldn’t complete the game with the engine (Unreal) we selected, so we’re scrapping the project.” This was total b.s. We were definitely ready to go into beta. The game looked and played really well, and had a really good attribute that would set it apart from the competition and probably make it a huge hit with young gamers.

Plus, who was going to make this new game? Why not a team who had shown it was totally capable of making a great game? Why were we all let go? It made zero sense, but I’m sure some bean counter calculated that they’d save money by cutting everyone loose and then rehiring when they were ready to go into production with the new game, so that was that. That bean counter also probably figured out that they’d do better using our game as a tax write off than a commercial product. To add insult to injury, they made us all sign a contract saying we couldn’t post anything we did during those 4 years in our portfolios. I can’t even use the work I did to help land new work. Did this work ever get used in some other game? Nope. Years of amazing art and design just got flushed down the toilet.

[zerocrossing]

I have not been able to sell off 2 guitars on Fleebay since May. A few others with the same make of guitar (Eastman) have also had adverts up for many months. It's a tight market, at least here in Germany.

I’ve had my Dominion 1 and ATC-X up on Reverb for a really long time too. (I plan to keep which ever one doesn’t sell first) I priced them to sell, looking at past pricing and going significantly lower, but so far no one’s bought either. I’ve never had gear sit on Reverb for this long, especially rare, high quality, gear like this.

[Jac459]

I’m in America, so stuff like corporate greed is particularly acute here, I think.

I once worked on a a game that was in production for 4 years. I came in mid production, but I started noticing something weird. We were never done with anything. I was constantly sent off to iterate on something. It was very strange, until the parent company landed a big contract with Dreamworks. I remember talking to the audio designer and saying, “Watch. They were using us as bait to land a big contract. We’ll be sent home in a week.” We were sent home 2 weeks later. Management said, “we realized we couldn’t complete the game with the engine (Unreal) we selected, so we’re scrapping the project.” This was total b.s. We were definitely ready to go into beta. The game looked and played really well, and had a really good attribute that would set it apart from the competition and probably make it a huge hit with young gamers.

Plus, who was going to make this new game? Why not a team who had shown it was totally capable of making a great game? Why were we all let go? It made zero sense, but I’m sure some bean counter calculated that they’d save money by cutting everyone loose and then rehiring when they were ready to go into production with the new game, so that was that. That bean counter also probably figured out that they’d do better using our game as a tax write off than a commercial product. To add insult to injury, they made us all sign a contract saying we couldn’t post anything we did during those 4 years in our portfolios. I can’t even use the work I did to help land new work. Did this work ever get used in some other game? Nope. Years of amazing art and design just got flushed down the toilet.

Yes it is really corporate grid to the max.... Quite different compare to Europe (in particular Germany and France).
I live in Singapore where both type of companies are, and it is very clear. mercenaries go to US companies and people trying to build a career go to European companies.

I am really not sure on my side that the culture of ramping up and down in a very "agile" way is very good even for the company. I mean for macdo maybe but if you want to build experts, in complex environments, it takes time and it is useful to create a long relationship with your employees....