In a new video, Behringer publicly attacks music tech journalist Peter Kirn (CDM) and shows his attitude to critical journalism & media content.
It is not easy to be a media entrepreneur at this time. I only say accusations like: everything paid, fake news, etc. Social media are an asset to our world but also a huge problem. Here everyone can spread messages, whether true or false. With a bit of money, you can even send the so-called fake news to even more people. It becomes all the more dangerous if such news comes from politics. A person who follows and supports something like that is sitting in the White House in the USA and drinking his coke. But good that this is only possible in politics, wrong!
There is also this in the music tech area. Behringer released a video today announcing a KIRN Cork Sniffer Synthesizer (the video is offline again maybe due to the number of dislikes). This is not a new product but an attack on the journalist and colleague of mine, Peter Kirn, who runs the Create Digital Music (CDM) website. They show him what they think of his criticism. According to the motto: we tolerate no criticism.
I have also been attacked several times by Behringer and presented as fake news although leaks came true after a few weeks. As a reminder, Midifan from China or people on the Gearslutz forum were also attacked by B.
I don’t want to overcook the whole thing here, but it is important for me to say that such methods are NO GOs. This was a clear targeted attack on free or critical journalism. Media like CDM or myself should be there to uncover possible problems and no to convey a beautiful, ideal music tech world. That’s the job of marketing and PR. Our job is not only to publish the fantastic news but also to highlight problems and critics. If you are only interested in good things, please read the website information and official videos. There are no critical notes there.
Product reviews, in particular, should be unpaid and critical. A video that only shows me how awesome everything is not a review. The media should be able to test products in detail and show where there are weak points. That is why we are here. If a supposed review on YouTube or website sounds very positive and praises everything “best thing,” game changer “…), please ask yourself whether this is a review or sponsored content. There is no perfect instrument / effect / Plugin … otherwise, it would be boring.
Thanks for your support!
Tom
Publisher of SYNTH ANATOMY
More information: Behringer
What a drama for a bad joke.
It’s not a joke, it was an attack to free journalism.
Bloggers, putting shame on other companies for money or, as you’ve mentioned, payed reviews — how this is qualifying as free journalism?
maybe bad expressed but I want to support critical journalism where media can make objective reviews with critics and not “mind blowing, best…” reviews which don’t qualify for good content. Only reviewing product that you love isn’t a review but a biased presentation.
“attack to free journalism” laughing my ass
Stop over-reacting.
Stop under-reacting, that’s what makes difference between alive and non-alive.
Those who doesn’t find it ridiculous can be as well mated by a flock of seagulls (or are different Uli’s accounts)
if behringer would LOVE synthesizers they would develope new ones and surprise us with innovations…..
the video : https://twitter.com/canitambient/status/1234512854428065792
To behave like Behringer did is really childish and worrying.
To attack a person like that, even if it’s intended as a joke, is really bad behaviour and something that should be avoided.
If we take this so called joke and add how Behringer treated the guy behind the devilfish mod things are starting to look quite bad. Either they have internal problems or maybe they just don’t care – and if they don’t care then they probably don’t care a lot about their customers and resellers.
It is important to see thing from a wider and more mature perspective. If this behaviour continues then we might have to think twice about where we put our money, cheap shouldn’t come with that sort of bad quality. In the long run we all benefit from acting mature and support them those who behave in that way to.
Behringer, grow up.
We can still see the video, here:
https://m.imgur.com/a/MSgtVwe
Shameful.
Given that you want opinions here, I thought would say Uli is a locust, a blight on the music-tech community who does far more harm than cheap (and usually still overpriced given the component quality and history of radical unreliability and his poor behavior toward employees) knock-offs of very old synthesizers still being made or remade by some of these companies – the right way, paying the right people, using copyright and trademark elements to which they have a right rather than just appropriating and stealing – can possibly counterbalance. But then I realized this would be unfair and harsh – to a or even to a swarm of locusts ready to descend on a ripe field of crops. After all, the locusts are just looking for a meal and being locusts.
As far as I can tell, UB acts a lot on thin-skinned anger and endless grudges. I would sooner burn my money than to finance the realizations of his revenge fantasies.
and here i was, saving moneys and just $150usd or so away from buying the behrinder d and neutron, but now i’ll just use that on the dreadbox erebus v3. seriously, people can just ignore it as a “bad joke” or whatever, but this along with the lawsuits against forum posters is pretty pathetic from them and has completely turned me off from them now.
A load of over-reacting, virtue signalling muppets attempting to prove they have the moral high-ground. Embarrassing. Peter Kirn IS NOT Innocent in this. He’s a “stuck in his ways” gear snob that thinks because he can afford £3000 a synth, the rest of us should have to also. He’s been overly critical of Behringer Synths since the start and the called him out. Now you “journalists” are throwing hissy fits and trying to conflate Uli’s behaviour with Donald Trumps. It’s utterly pathetic. About time you all dropped the “offended/scared” act. It’s BS.
If you read CDM on a regular basis, Peter constantly profiles tech that is not expensive at all, often free. For god’s sake, he manufactures and sells the MeeBlip for $129! You sound like a child who has little knowledge of the history of Behringer’s illegal behavior. They have been sued successfully, many times, kinda like trumpie. So how about you drop the BS defensive act for a POS leader who constantly rips off the ideas of others and acts like a petulant child when facing any deserved criticism. He’ll probably try to attack/sue me for this post. F*ck Behringer.
Good article tom. B made some intersting and affordable synths but i know from your youtube comments b were not open for respectfull and honest (critical) reviews. They are big players and try to silence all unbiased opinions. B are important for the synth Conpetition and the unbiased press including synth anatomy is very important, too!
Greetings from gernany TOM
20 years ago or so I worked in a studio and we experienced a customer service nightmare with Berhringer – according to our dealer at the time, we couldn’t get replacement parts for shoddy mixer faders due to litigation over intellectual property infringement. The studio owner felt deeply burned by Behringer and we all said “never again”.
But 20 years later, Behringer managed to regain my attention and maybe even my trust. I even began the mental gymnastics required to justify Behringer’s incessant lack of innovation. But bully tactics and intimidation combined with weaponizing trademarks to cripple Peter Kirn’s life and business is out of control and squarely conflicts with the “tribe” vibe they pretend to be going for.
Do what you will, but I choose to ignore Behringer for the rest of time.
One poor joke – and bloggers loses their sh¡t. Welcome to generation snowflake were “journalist” gets offended and outraged on behalf of others whom perhaps aren’t too offended themselves. “Bu-huh Ulli bullied my someone like me” – well get over it! If you dish out you should expect to get some in return. Mr. Kern got an enormous free PR boost for his website cause of this. He should be very happy indeed. People who never heard of CDM now do. Jeez it’s tiresome with all these whining Twitter tw@ts getting attention.
> I don’t want to overcook the whole thing here
oh boy. i find it shocking that intelligent people like you and moogulator didn´t recognize the obvious scandal immediately. kirn, a jew, was presented in a antisemitic fashion, bearded, with a long nose like in nazi propaganda papers like “der sturmer” or “volkischer beobachter”. so uli behringer has come out as an anti-semite. THAT is the story here.
Those stupid people are over reacting than Peter himself lol. Grow up guys. If ur a critic to anyone be prepared to get the same thing. Thats their right to defend their products/company. You cannot just say whatever u want on anyone and call it free press bs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IrwqNS9dFI
you can get mad or you can get creative.
Anti semitic?? WTF. 😀
https://www.adl.org/education/references/hate-symbols/the-happy-merchant
you seem to have no clue about hate symbols.
Ulli’s joke fell a bit flat from my perspective but I think sometime spending time online we can develop a sense for assuming where another person is Implicitly coming from that further crosses the wires. Without referencing any politics I think some words can have positive or innocent connotations to one person but negative overtones to another.
I’m not a regular CDM reader in the same way I’m not a clubber or someone who regularly buys hardware, but I do remember one really inspiring article about DKon and His use of Renoise that I sometimes go back to for pep.
Peter is well within his rights to cover stories about manufacturers, even the less positive or more rhetorical subjects. That being said I think Behringer weather a lot of criticism for reissuing equipment that is really accessible, often using designs that have been out of copyright a long time and that major companies have sometimes flat out declined to revisit. The funny thing is, I’m much more interested in their new synths like the Deepmind and Neutron and as someone who doesn’t have the same historical or emotional connection to older gear I just see a lot of those reissues as crowd pleasers and a good source of cash for development.
I know these things have a different significance to different people but I think Ulli is just navigating a new market – cork sniffers especially and hitting the odd bum note in the way a mass producer might. I think it’s also good, whether you are pretty spiritual or not at all, to not get too wrapped up in the world of things. Ultimately a lot of our anxiety stems from fretting about how to spend our money and doing so conspicuously when friends, family, nature, music in general present a much more ‘ordered’ landscape to the fickle one of changing fashions, materials, opportunities, income and the fear it seems to require from you 24/7.
If you don’t want your TD-3 because it doesn’t match your ethics, that’s totally fine – but don’t break it, give it to some kid you know who is crazy into beats or a school or sell it and save up for the ‘Rich Ho’ Edition 😀