THD107 Quadrature Function Generator PCB's HAVE ARRIVED!

[mosc]

[Coriolis]

Hmm...to be absolutely fair to Randaleem, someone did make assumptions about someone's character - can't blame him for taking a slight offense to that, can we? I don't want to stir up anything, but Randaleem felt he had been attacked, and can understand what he means...


C

[mosc]

It is understandable how anyone might feel attacked. Forums and email lists are notorious for these kinds of misunderstandings that can turn into multi-year feuds. We don't want or need that, so lets try to put this behind and move forward.

Let's support each other and treat everyone with respect.

[Coriolis]

I wholeheartedly agree, mosc!

C

[softfin]

Did the boards arrive yesterday? Please update the status of the boards, Randal.

[Coriolis]

Yes, please give us an update!

C

[Randaleem]

Hi Softfin, Coriolis, all,

Yes, I did hear from the board house and to make a long story short I don't have QFG boards in my hands.

I'm driving down to their facility tomorrow to deal with this face to face. If they cannot produce the boards for me immediately, I will place a short run, quick turn high priced order elsewhere to get the QFG portion of my order completed so that boards can be shipped this week. (My order with them was for thousands of boards, not just QFG's.)

This will assure that the QFG PCB's ship this week regardless of what the current mfr does. I'm hopeful they will have boards for me, making the expensive quick turn backup run unnecessary and redundant.

Kind regards, Randal

[Danno Gee Ray]

Thanks for the update.

[Danno Gee Ray]

Any updates for us? What happened at the board house? We woyld really love to be kept informed!

[Usine Karate]

I was just about to ask the same question How'd it go Randal?

Usine

[elektro80]

[Editor's note: Private information removed. Nov. 8, 2007 --mosc]

[Randaleem]

Ah Yes, Yet another "helpful" moderator post...

For the record, The GeoMusa.com website is not open at this time. Customers of the PCB's already have been told that it would open after the boards are received. There is currently a simple placeholder at the home page you linked. So right now it's a waste of time to go there.

For the record, The email address to use when inquiring about this PCB purchase is randaleem AT yahoo.com. But as you say customers already know that. And I have posted that a few times now. Everybody seems to find it working.

For the record, this synth-related PCB offering has nothing at all to do with cncresource. It is true that a paypal account was shared when the first orders were accepted. Beyond that, no connection. And as you point out, customers already know that.

For the record, why don't you post YOUR personal phone number openly on the worldwide web so that people who would like to respond to your posts towards me can contact you directly and let you know what they think. (BTW, usually people prefer to have spaces or "AT" style coding between portions of their openly posted contact info to avoid being harvested by webcrawlers and spammers. But you did no such thing for me in this case; thank you very much.

(Or maybe I should just go around and post whatever I think should be posted "on your behalf" based on my own feelings and beliefs about you? Without any direct contact or conversation with you beforehand? I don't know about Norway, but In the USA that's considered bad form. We generally try to talk directly with a person before spreading manure around them.)

For the record, the phone number you posted is for the webmaster of the cncresource and geomusa.com websites. It is a great way to get information or share problems about the website, not so good if you're wanting to know timeframes for PCB delivery or other PCB-related information. Because he doesn't know. Please use my previously listed email in that case. FWIW, that's what he'd do if you call: He'll send me an email summarising what you'd said. So if you want to cut out the middleman; just email me directly.

For the record, ALL who have used the randaleem email account or PM'd here have been answered promptly. EACH AND EVERY ONE has said they were satisfied with the answer received and the only negative comments I'm seeing are from people who did NOT buy boards... (And moderators of e-m like yourself)

So, Electro80 of Trondheim, Norway, co-owner? of this site PLEASE!? allow me to work with my customers without your "helpful" interruptions and veiled innuendo's. You might refer to your co-owner? Howard's comments a few messages above for guidance.

Because I have been getting more than a couple questions about your actions towards me in this thread and others (like the FATAR keyboard buy. Which is progressing nicely without your input thankfully.)

The fact is that the CUSTOMERS have been great through all this! It is only a few e-m moderators who seem to have an axe to grind with me.

For everybody who has been patiently waiting (which is 98 per hundred literally!), please accept my grateful thanks and please excuse the actions of those who'd like to paint or infer a sordid picture.

I said it before, if you have given me an order for these boards you WILL get them. If you have an issue with me or with this PCB order, please use my randaleem@yahoo.com email as that is by far the best way to contact me. (PM's here at E-M also work, but the inbox is only 100 deep so there is a chance of having messages deleted accidentally.)

Kind regards, Randal

Now to do what I actually came here to do!
Update:
I placed a quick-turn order to supplement the boards coming from the orig. supplier. I will have boards Friday, and if both come through, I will have a LOT of boards. When we spoke face to face I was given plausible and to me acceptable explanations of what had happened. But I also need your QFG boards, not explanations. So I decided to cover my bet with an additional 2nd sourced QT order to ensure a Friday receipt. We're almost there!

One more thing: With certain people seeming repeatedly to only want to stir things up, I have taken to using a minimal-post response. Because everything I post is potential fodder for the detractors cannon. All who have written direct have been answered quickly and completely. Based on their replies I have to believe that the words getting posted here by those UNinvolved do not reflect those who actually are customers.

Wasn't I defending myself this same way last week with a different detractor? It's getting old. And my tolerance for supporting DIY and enduring e-m attacks is fading quickly. Much easier to simply build completed modules and sell them to dealers 25-50 at a time.

[softfin]

Still participated in the board order

[Coriolis]

Randal, could you please either post a confirmation here, when you have the boards friday, or pm us.

C

[EdisonRex]

As one of the MODERATORS who is also a CUSTOMER (or trying to be, check the first page of this thread were I try to order two of these boards, on July 7th) I feel I might be qualified to explain the some of the frustration a moderator feels, with the authority of a CUSTOMER (by Mr. Lee's definition).

The moderators/janitors of this site volunteer their time to make sure that the site lives up to a certain high standard. We aren't hired, and we don't own anything here, except the music, graphics and schematics we post. By and large, we are hobbyists, musicians, and artists. All of us support ourselves by other means. You may think there is some sort of highly organised, structured corporation here. It isn't. We're all individuals here. We frequently disagree with each other too.

One of the standards we collectively feel we need for this site is to make sure people show outward honesty in dealings with the community. This may be a departure from many other darker corners of the Internet, but it is the light we look to. My other sites, you may find, also reflect this, so I am fairly committed to the concept. It is this principle which attracted me to electro-music.com in the first place, and why I chose to accept the offer to be a janitor here. I have some pride in my honesty. You may find I am somewhat militant about it.

We have many esteemed members here. They agree to stay here, for two reasons. One, the site values their knowledge and the people who come here seeking knowledge get it, which is valuable to them.
Comparing this site to others which purport to offer the same, I chose this site for the overall honesty and candor of the longtime members, and the great trusting attitude of the community.

Neither the site, or the moderators are attacking you, Randaleem. The moderators are concerned that not enough information is going out to community members who have paid real money for your not-yet-deliverable boards. I can add something that should be obvious. If you want to sell boards without electro-music.com's facilitation, norms of behaviour, or "interference" or "detraction", you are free to advertise and communicate using your own mechanisms, away from the site. Nobody here wants, or is trying to be a "detractor", in your words. Actually, speaking for myself, I'd just like to get the boards, like your other 99 customers.

Anyway, you can listen to me or not. I'm not attacking you. I am simply trying to explain my concerns. We last spoke on the subject on August 24th, you had said it would be a week to production then.

[tomcat]

Still the way electro80 acts is a no no for a serious mod.

Posting phone numbers and email adresses in a way that every spam bot can catch these...

[softfin]

[Randaleem]

[Randaleem]

[softfin]

[Randaleem]

[Randaleem]

Hi Softfin, thank you for your reply. All of it, not just this part I'm quoting.

[quote="softfin"]But please , next time you offer PCBs or sell other stuff<S>

Already done. That was a one-time setup. Future orders will be handled using a regular store and checkout at the GeoM website.

Let me try to clear something up here. I did not expect to be offering PCB's so soon. My goalpost was/is NAMM. The TH QFG project was something I jumped at when it became available because I am one of those poor souls Peter Grenader speaks of as "having had his first dance with a PAIA synth" in the mid 70's. From there I built a moog modular 35 styled synth with better circuits, and became aware of Thomas Henry's work in Polyphony, and his books.

I always appreciated the elegance of TH design's; so when the opportunity arose after only being here at e-m for about a week or two?, I jumped at the chance. When it was granted, I was lighter than air! This man i'd revered all these years was going to let ME produce one of his designs! I'd already had plans to offer both DIY and ready-made things to the synth community echoing PAIA and Blacet, MOTM and Dotcom, and thought this would be nice jumpstart along that path. Oh yeah, that path...

It was actually John S's death which cemented my return to Synths. I remembered how much those kits and instruments (regardless of their lofi reputation) had meant to me and many others, and I watched as PAIA post-John seemed to falter badly. So I decided to try and fill part of what I perceived as a void in the universe, and become a purveyor of SDIY kits. At the time, I did not know about Ray Wilson and MFOS, but it soon became apparent that at least some parts of what PAIA had meant to me was being covered by him. Well covered. So I began researching the field more thoroughly to determine if and where a niche might exist that I could fill. Discovered Doepfer. And saw the growing trend towards the smaller modules, includiong the Blacet Frac I'd known for many years.(Another John S synergy result, I think.)

As the plan to try and become an "American Doepfer" of sorts; meaning offering a wide and complete! range of readily available modules at fair prices was gelling in my mind, I saw that Doepfer was not perceived as being very ethical WRT securing permissions for using the designs of others. Having had several of my own ideas taken and used with great financial success by others, I resolved to add to MY "American Doepfer" goal the tag "but without stealing the designs of others".

Now a man needs to know his limitations and I know that I am not a synth designer anywhere near the level of Mr. Henry, Ian Fritz, or others of their ilk. So while I have done a fair bit of electronic design but not in the audio arena and I do have an extensive collection of synth resources and experiences going back 30+ years, I did not think it wise to jump into that end of the pool! But I AM a pretty good PCB layout artist/engineer, and a fairly proficient product designer (to me the product is more than just the circuit. Hopefully my QFG PCB will show this. But I also understand without the circuit there will be no product!) I know how to bring things to market and support them.

So I resolved to learn how the synth marketplace in the second half of the first decade of this new century operates, and that led me to the SDIY list and AH. I joined each briefly, but did not like the email required format, so I left having only posted a few "Why not be yahoo group" messages at SDIY and none on AH. (FWIW the total number of messages I've ever posted on either SDIY OR AH under ANY name (and I've only ever used Randaleem there) can be counted on my two hands using each finger no more than once! )

Then a few months ago I discovered this electro-music forum and its sister at modularsynth.net while chasing down something called the SNVoice by a man familiar to me (during a "reflective" search about John's death. I found Scott next and through him this site) I'd kept a Radio Shack SN chip all these years, and now there was a reason to use it!

Here I noticed that people were offering DIY projects through the forum. I also saw that Scott Stites had a very good grasp of the current state of the Synth universe, and I began to talk his ear off with questions and thoughts as I further tried to define where I might fit into the mix. Then the QFG PCB job became available. I had shared with Scott my hopes and plans of becoming a major supplier of synth modules akin to Blacet or PAIA, and others. So perhaps due to my lucky association with Scott I was granted the job.

I'd never offered a synth PCB before so I figured the permissions/licensing arrangement that Scott and TH used and asked me to agree to was the normal way of doing things. Scott suggested I "tie up" more of TH's designs, and I began to try to do so. I also asked Thomas if I could offer "Kits and panels" in addition to the PCB's under the same terms. I received a positive reply, which I only later learned he did NOT intend apply to completed modules. (Totally my mistake; I'd written "kits and panels", and that is what TH agreed to. In my mind I thought this included completed modules, I'd meant it to, but the words agreed to were PCB's "kits and panels". Thomas wrote at the bottom of the email, "I hope you sell hundreds")

I contacted other synth designers of note and offered them the same terms TH and Scott had offered me. And it was going well. several were interested and some agreed to terms in a sort of "form letter" I'd put together to ensure that neither of us would be taken advantage of. Remember, I've had MY ideas and products stolen before. I didn't want to do that to anyone. Scott even commented to me about my strong commitment to it. I was excited to have made some strong connections in this field. I laid out the QFG quickly, and put all kinds of "kitchen sink" (to use Scott's terminology) into it.

Unfortunately somewhere along the way, things, which I still don't fully understand and don't wish to get into here, seemed to unravel WRT to my offering the QFG. From my perspective it began when a certain designer strongly rejected my offer to work together. Interestingly, this was the first time I didn't use the "form letter" spelling out all the details I'd used with success before. Shortly after that single negative response, I noticed (or just perceived?) a change in how I was treated by certain members of the community here. Now in fairness, I have no idea whether these two events are actually related or not. I only had hold of the elephant's tail, so to speak. But I became pretty quickly aware that there was an elephant in the room, and I hadn't seen him before.

(A short while later I was accused of "harvesting DIY" here and that "there would be no licensing of designs". That scalding email shook me to my core. Here I'd seen all the talk about how bad it was to use someone's ideas without permission; now I was told seeking permission was banned?!?)

Feeling more than a bit stung by the rejection (I STILL would really love to offer those circuits!), I continued to try and "work" my way through it. But feeling as though I was on eggshells somehow for this horrible thing I'd done to ask for permission (and offer compensation) to use a person's circuit(s). I even went so far as to copy all the emails I'd gotten and sent relating to these permissions in case this ever came up against me. Fearful that I might not have "enough" good designs to work with , I began trying to go after any and every good one that came up. Greatly overextending myself in the process.

And apparently pissing some people off too. I had the feeling from that PM sent to me that perhaps I'd been mistaken for a disliked someone who'd posted a lot at the SDIY and AH groups, based on the words of the message sent to me. But I was Gung ho!, going after the prize. As I told you above, I'd never posted more than perhaps ten messages and those were recent, under my own name. I continued to seek and receive permissions for wonderful things. But it was different now, and no longer did I feel the same way about e-m. I also lost track of my original committments.

I had seen the QFG as the core of an expanding line of modules of which the PWMx4 and quad VCA were the first. Then it was made clear to me that not only was I not going to get some of the designs I'd planned for (two I had carelessly gone ahead and created PCB's for prior to permission; such is the bounty of a fool.), but I also was getting flak for completely unrelated things like offering to help people get FATAR keyboards along with my purchase in support of a product I'm planning for NAMM. It was surrealistic. Uncomfortably surrealistic. I tried to find joy in continuing to help people whose questions fell into my areas of experience. I enjoy that.

The rest is pretty clearly shown in threads here, though I'm sure my perspective both allows and causes me to see some things differently than you may. It was obvious I was no longer part of the in-crowd, if Indeed I ever was. Comments were thrown into messages which would have no meaning unless you knew the back-story. And I did. I had become the brunt of subtle posted jokes about "comparators" and other things no one else would even notice.

In reaction, I buried my friend at the board house with PCB's and once running scared felt like if I was only going to get one chance at a run, it would be a "lifetime" buy. I bounced between what I consider moral versus what I'd found to be legal. I wasted a lot of time running in circles about whether I still had permissions or not and did not give clear direction to my PCB needs. (TO his credit, during this time TH posted a reassurance that I was the "real deal", which helped me greatly.) I had put out a LOT of money to get all these things into process and to keep them moving along. I over extended myself in many ways. And now I didn't know if this whole plan was fgong to fall apart for lack of key pieces. The time value of money got involved.

As sometimes happens in these cases I got depressed, I rallied, I railed, I feared , I raged. I wept. And then I got back up, dusted myself off and figured that I just needed to continue with the plan I'd originally had to the best of my ability. To become that major supplier of products to the DIY synth community out of respect and admiration for a man who quite probably defined my life's direction with his synths kits and articles of the 70's. I'll may never measure up to him, but I will do my best. And my apologies go out to those of you who've been unknowingly carried with me in this maelstrom from which I believe I am recovering.

I've written a lot the last few days. If there is a reply to all this which doesn't get immediately answered (excepting of course those about delivery and such, which will always receive top priority), please know that I really want and need to stay focused on getting all the things I've been working on out the door. I'm pretty proud of most of it. I hope you will find it compelling

The first steps toward that hope will begin tomorrow when the first of the QFG PCB's arrive. I'll post notice here when they do.

Kind regards, Randal

[keithwin]

Randal, you are ok by me,
I am in no hurry and I have every confidence in you.

I have been waiting for some PCBs from a MOTHER
of a synth manufacturer which I ordered in february this year,
they are apparently going to be shipped this week,
I can't understand why people are being so impatient with you.

Keep up the good work,

really looking forward to the upcoming projects

regards

Keith

[mosc]

[Funky40]

Hery Randal, thanks for that comment