On April 14, 2007 at 10:57, Theaterworks said...
I'm not sure I agree with you on this. I've been thinking
about this for a while.
Vendors that post publicly here run the risk of having
their laundry aired in public. Any cranky CI who had
trouble with their product (rightly or wrongly, bad product
or bad installation), any CI that didn't get a friendly
or timely return call from a rep, or anybody who disagrees
with the vendor's marketing policy, who they do or do
not distribute to, who they do or do not sell, can beat
them up in public here. It has happened countless times
in the past five years I've been watching.
So, the vendor gets beat up, and they face the RC Catch
22. Respond, and they get dragged into a public debate
with (often) anonymous CI's with triple letter pseudonyms.
Now wait a minute Owen :-)! That's cute, but with the exception of some jabs from time to time at Control4, and a frank discussion of PHAST along with every other person who ever sold it, I can't recall many times I've ever taken off on a manufacturer. I don't believe I've EVER aired my dirty laundry here.
They can respond reasonably, and get hammered in turn
by impolite or just-plain-wrong posters. What is the
up side to this?
Or, if they don't respond, they are called out on it,
asked why they're silent on the matter; "What's the matter,
did I catch you in a lie?"
I think you are ignoring one major fact. THEIR behavior, i.e. THEIR CLAIMS about themselves and the competition. As I just pointed out over at AVS, why is it that some individuals manage to participate on forums regularly and are held in high esteem by almost everyone. Buzz Goddard from NeStreams, Paul from Triad, Brent from Etherial, Mark Seaton from Seaton Sound to name a few.
The reason is that these are stand-up guys who conduct themselves with decorum, don't shill for their product in every thread, and don't make constant exaggerations and false claims about their own products while making misstatements about the competition. They also have some marketing sense. They understand the market and understand how to present themselves.
