PavlovsCat

Ha! I founded and edited a publication for a decade and I have had a long career in marketing where I've handled a good deal of trademarks and worked with IP attorneys. But, as I explained earlier, I have a deep history with the Wurlitzer company and the Wurly that makes this intriguing to me. I believe this new site (in my OP) comes from the same guy that approached Acoustic Samples last year and demanded money for their use of Wurli "trademark" or they'd sue the developer. He claims that he bought the IP rights to the Wurlitzer trademark from Gibson in 2021, but he doesn't hold a USPTO trademark for the use of the Wurlitzer brand name for pianos or electric pianos, and he doesn't have a US federal trademark for Wurli/Wurly/Wurlie. Gibson, bought the Wurlitzer company when they purchased Baldwin a couple of decades ago and still maintains active trademarks for the Wurlitzer brand. So if this guy bought the Wurlitzer trademark, why does Gibson still maintain active trademark claims? Sure, they could have sold the IP rights to some guy with a home-based business out of Germany, but you'd expect they'd have modified their trademark records to reflect that. Here's another big piece of investigative journalism that makes this German fellow's claim even more suspect. He claims to have purchased or somehow gained the rights to the Wurlitzer trademark from Gibson in 2021 (it's stated on the below linked website), however, the USPTO registration claims to the Wurlitzer trademark are dated prior to 2021 -- they're dated 2020 or earlier. Perhaps Gibson and this man didn't initiate the paperwork and he's made claims before his IP purchase, but it all looks pretty sketchy. Or perhaps Wurlitzer has developed time travel technology and that can explain his trademark registration pre-dating his stated date of purchasing the IP rights from Gibson??? I kid, I kid. He indeed could be a home-based entrepreneur who bought the IP rights to Wurlitzer for cheap. It is possible. I would just question why Gibson still keeps the trademarks active and why the company has made no statement. The guy's website does state that "The original Wurlitzer family re-secures the rights to the brand for multiple music and consumer electronics categories and regions." I suppose that could mean that the guy thinks that his mere registration of the name Wurlitzer in various country trademark databases gives him IP rights. FTR, I suspect that is the case. But that's pure speculation. On a side note, the IP violations of the guy's below website are pretty over the top. He's using images of Billy Ellish, Olivia Rodrigo, John Lennon, John Baptiste and other images unquestionably without proper licensing. So this doesn't reflect a legit business that respects IP rights. it comes off as highly suspect and combined with trying to shakedown developers of Wurly sample libraries for money, and it looks a lot like a scam. https://www.wurlitzer-brand.com/

A good deal of the presets / banks at Preset Galaxy are for other developers' synths and plugins (Omisphere 2, AD2, XO, etc.), so they're third-party and that's why they're not included with the original product. As for the Orange Tree Samples libraries presets -- which I'm guessing is what you meant -- my guess for the reason that Greg is sharing them through this community is because updating each of those KONTAKT Player libraries with the presets would mean going through NI's process for public release and that would mean committing time, resources and costs to add new presets, which would be a lot of work and costs that would likely need to be passed on to customers. I know from numerous developers that they all end up creating their own presets, and commonly composers who make demos will come up with their own presets as well. But due to those presets being made AFTER a KONTAKT Player has been approved and processed by NI, it's too late to make it into the official release, so the reality is, the customers usually don't get those presets. But let's ask @Greg Schlaepfer. I'd also like to ask a related question: Greg, will at least some of the Orange Tree Samples presets at Preset Galaxy be included in future updates for those libraries or will they always remain exclusives made especially for the Preset Galaxy community?

Okay, as I mentioned, I finally had a chance to try out the Evolution presets, and they are fantastic. Orange Tree Samples could easily have charged for these and I think people would be very happy with them. Tomorrow, I'll add this to my recommended freebies list, For anyone who owns Orange Tree Samples Evolution libraries, these presets are a must have, IMO. And yes, I'm friends with Greg, but anyone who knows me even a little, knows that I don't give false praise. If any other Evolution library users that try these out weigh in, I bet their reactions will be very is similar to mine. The presets are superb.

It's still available. He brought it back after I showed him the evidence the guy trying to shake him down didn't own a trademark for Wurly -- Gibson was the last owner but they abandoned the trademark.

The more I research this, the more I question if this is a scam. A few months ago I DMed the developer of AcousticSamples and asked him why he removed his Wurlie library from his site. He told me that he was contacted by a man out of Germany who claimed to be the heir of the Wurlitzer company. I knew the story was pure BS because my late mother worked for Wurlitzer and I knew they were an American company that Baldwin purchased maybe a few decades ago and then Baldwin was later purchased by Gibson. Anyhow, the guy claimed he owned the trademark and basically was trying to scam the developer for money. I told the dev this was almost certainly a scam and conducted a USPTO trademark search. It turned out the guy registered a trademark for Wurlitzer for use in sports entertainment. The last owner of the Wurlitzer trademark was Gibson. I doubt this guy even used a lawyer to file that trademark. So I went back to the developer and told him to ignore the scammer. Today, Music Radar published a story that the Wurli is back but stated it didn't know if its part of Gibson or they sold it. I am really surprised their editor let that get published without even checking the source. This would normally come In a press release and they always feature contact info. A journalist could also easily call Gibson. It appears that none of that happened. So, suspecting that this could be the same scammer creating this site to extort sample developers, I checked who was behind the website. It turns out that the Wurlitzer Company lists a residential address, a single family home in Germany, no business address. Yes, it could be a wealthy businessman, but wealthy businessmen have business addresses. Therefore, my current take on this story is that I question its authenticity. I asked my friend Dave Kerzner -- owner of Sonic Reality, musician and fellow Wurli enthusiast who is well connected in the music industry-- what he thinks and he finds I've raised some serious questions. I'll update this as I learn more.

I think you're right and it's a common way business people look at things that don't directly produce revenue. What these folks miss is that these communities keep your brand front and center in front of customers and if you eliminate these resources, you're likely going to have to spend money to drive visitors to your site. In any event, I'm glad Greg is doing this. He never told me about this until I saw the announcement, but Greg's a wonderful person and a fellow idealist. I'm not sure what his objectives are for this community, but I trust that he's the ideal kind of person to run a community like this. I suspect this may be largely a passion project. He uses plugins too. I'd love it if someone added some great SD3 presets as I use that more than anything. I've created a lot of my own presets but I don't feel like I know what I'm doing well enough to share them. I mainly tune drums, layer and swap drums and cymbals and incompetently adjust effects.

The Wurly (original trademark spelling) AKA the Wurli AKA the Wurlitzer electric piano is coming back to life in 2024 according to Music Radar. I am surprised that Music Radar's writer couldn't find out if Gibson still owns Wurlitzer or not, especially if they found this news out at NAMM. In any event, it's pretty exciting news to find your favorite electric piano is soon going back into production. EDIT: If you read my later posts, you'll find that I'm longer confident that the party behind this Wurlitzer website is legitimate. https://www.musicradar.com/news/new-wurlitzer-electric-piano?utm_content=keyboard&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=socialflow&fbclid=IwAR06lTzR7GJExVBLHWY9KTLYd76JSeiZPxI-cAKVUapIP6pS4PnrMc4GYlY

Yeah, I was just about to mention how Pianobook has basically become stagnant since Christian's departure. I don't think it necessarily means these programs are dead, Spitfire may just be struggling to find the right person to manage them. Clearly, Christian was the champion of both Pianobook and Labs and perhaps his business partner wasn't completely sold on them (as neither produces a net profit, some business people can too easily write such ventures off). But I wouldn't necessarily jump to the conclusion that this efforts are dead, it may be a struggle to finding someone with the right talents to manage them. I'd bet that Henson put a lot of effort into both and his skills as an entrepreneur and multitasker aren't easily replaced. Christian did introduce a new manager at Pianobook prior to his departure. Does anyone know if she's still actively managing Pianobook? I know that there haven't been any really stellar releases on the site in a long time (just my opinion) so you can attribute that to the community, but a mature community doesn't manage itself. I think Christian's energy and involvement inspired much of the creative activity at Pianobook and when he left, and the way he left, had a major impact (reflected in less enthusiasm and activity) for the Pianobook community-- regardless of one's opinion on the circumstances around Christian's departure.

Orange Tree Samples' founder, Greg Schlaepfer, just launched a new website, an online community for freely sharing presets for soft synths, plugins and sample libraries. It now has Greg's own presets and banks for Orange Tree Sample libraries and various soft synths and plugins. While the site currently has a modest collection of Greg's personal presets / banks, from experience, like his sample libraries, his presets are superb, and consequently, very much worth downloading. This is my cut and paste from the site's most popular presets list (it's not comprehensive, just what I found when creating this post): Soft Synths / Plugins XLN Audio XO Spectrasonics Omisphere 2 XLN Addictive Drums 2 Orange Tree Samples Evolution Libraries Orange Tree Samples Evolution Texas Twang Orange Tree Samples Evolution Hollowbody Blues Orange Tree Samples Evolution Infinity Orange Tree Samples Evolution Modern Nylon Orange Tree Samples Evolution Rock Standard Orange Tree Samples Evolution Songwriter Orange Tree Samples Evolution Stratosphere Orange Tree Samples Evolution Strawberry Orange Tree Samples Evolution Texas Twang While I'm friends with Greg, I actually only found out about Preset Galaxy from a post from Orange Tree Samples Facebook page and texted Greg to ask about it. I have his XLN Addictive Drums 2 presets and use them regularly, but I didn't have any of his Evolution presets beyond the factory presets, so I'm pretty excited to get these (I plan on downloading and installing them after this post), as I use Evolution libraries in nearly every project. Visiting this site, I immediately thought of how XLN used to have a community for freely sharing presets for AD2 (I'm pretty sure that Toontrack did too), as did NI for KONTAKT (for sharing libraries and presets), but both shut them down. Consequently, finding free presets for XLN plugins or KONTAKT libraries is just about impossible these days (I am only aware of some developers that SELL presets) and finding high quality free presets has always been a challenge, so this site is especially great to see . I've long been addicted to Pianobook for picking up free KONTAKT libraries and downloading free Vital presets at the developer's site and PresetShare.com and would love to see PresetGalaxy.com become a vibrant community of talented people freely sharing presets. It also helps me feed my unstoppable appetite for new sounds (and GAS) without spending cash. https://www.presetgalaxy.com/

Ha! Beware of publicly giving a non responsive developer a bad review. I merely shared my experience with a developer not responding to 11 months of support requests, but actually praised his work, and the guy defamed me. (I later discovered he was mocking me and customers who complain in a Facebook group for developers where a couple other developers told him they thought I was reasonable and he should try working with me (he abandoned the thread, clearly looking for them to bash customers who share bad experiences publicly); since then I found that a well known person in the sampling industry who worked with the developer told me the guy's prone to bad behavior and the late Cory Pelazzari told me he also had negative experiences with the developer. Anyhow, moral of the story? Some small developers can be incredibly unprofessional. A developer who takes an unreasonable time to respond to your requests may not behave professionally if he finds you publicly called him out. I would suggest that you send one more email, keep it friendly, saying that I'd you don't hear back that you will work through your credit card company for a refund, but you would prefer to work with him and get the problem resolved.

That's great to hear! Nice to have you back.

AI definitely can be very useful in any DAW, especially for cleaning up audio. I would expect in less than a decade from now, AI functionality will be part of every major DAW. The reaction to AI today reminds me a lot of the reaction people had to the Web in the early days (1995 -2000). It was misunderstood, overhyped by some, and written off by many. AI is a tool and it absolutely has great application for audio, as many of us have experienced for years using Izotope and Sonible tools. Looking at the landing page for this DAW, it seems pretty reasonable. Hopefully, more DAWS will be incorporating AI soon. I could imagine a great deal of sound design possibilities for AI for synthesis and samplers. FTR, I'm fresh off of writing an article on AI, so I've recently been immersed in the topic. AI has become commonplace in the medical world and business world -- in the latter, especially for its use in sales, customer support, data analytics, marketing, communications and BI. In the medical world, it's making a huge difference, especially in areas like radiology and making a big difference in developing nations. I bet Fleer could tell us much about how beneficial AI can be in the area of law. Consequently, AI's use in DAWs seems like a pretty obvious and simple application of AI by comparison.

Thanks for sharing. I'd be grateful if you could update your results here or post to a video if you do one after you spend more time (as you've said ia coming), as I was interested in this for voice-over applications. Thanks! Peter.

Have a great trip, Larry! I look forward to hearing about your adventures when you return.

I suppose I should just email Spitfire and beg them to create a library called Abbey Road Quartet. That would be irresistible (for me). With every new Abbey Road release, I keep hoping for it!

I agree with Fleer. I don't own their Piano FZ library, but I own several libraries from Xperimenta Project and every library I have from them is superb.

I only have their Wurli 145B library, but it's top notch and has a gorgeous sound. It's meticulously sampled and the user interface and capabilities of the library are superb. You can easily dial in various characteristics, such as dirt, vibrato and various effects to create your own presets. If I wasn't on a tight budget, I'd buy this. I'll definitely buy more of their libraries in the future.

Yes, I consult to this company, but I'm a user of this stuff and find this advancement of the plugin a fascinating evolution. That walkthrough video gives you a good idea. As far as the concern over file sizes that satya expressed, that is something I would like to explore with the SoundPaint (8Dio) folks. Their roots are serving pros and making very detailed libraries, and that, of course, results in very large file sizes. But my instincts are that there's a fair amount of hobbyists who want "deep sampled" libraries to a certain degree, but not necessarily at the same degree as pros. Even more, when you look at SoundPaint’s mission of bringing high end, deep sampled libraries at a very low price point, it's very likely to attract many hobbyist users on a tight budget who likely can't afford huge file sizes (that is, the storage devices for large libraries, which can quickly add up). For example, a pro composer or a hobbyist perfectionist may insist upon pedal up and pedal down samples for piano libraries, a lot of velocity layers and mic options and is okay with the resulting very large file size -- let's say 25 GB for this example --whereas a hobbyist may not want to sacrifice the large amount of file space that detail requires and be willing to make compromises to keep the file size under 10GB. That's why I think it's a really good idea when SoundPaint offers customers the option of Ultra Deep Sampled libraries versus standard definition (okay, I'm not sure if that's the exact name they use, but that's the idea). I think it would be ideal to offer that for more libraries once they hit a certain file size. I think there's also a psychological factor that comes from the developer radically bringing down prices on deep sampled libraries. It results in hobbyists who've never considered libraries at this quality level and file sizes and may be resistant to larger file sizes -- especially given the price. I think it's worth conducting research to find out how important all of this is to the various customer groups they serve. I'd be very interested in getting people's thoughts on this, so please share your thoughts. I promise to make the SoundPaint folks aware of them.

Nice of the developer to give this away free. It sounds like a Wurli in some respects, but as a massive Wurli fan, it's just okay. I realize the developer doesn't promote this as an authentic Wurli simulation but an analog synth trying to emulate a Wurli, which seems appropriate. But I'm not completely in love with the tone (it's not bad, it just hints at a real Wurli enough to make me want to use a real Wurli sample library instead). The developer has another plugin, I think it's called Reed 200A, that comes a lot closer to the Wurli that I think sounds much better. Of course, it also comes at a price that's significantly higher than free.

It's even less of a temptation for me, because I won't even pretend that I understand how to use any of this stuff! That said, I have licenses for 4 of their plugins! I suppose, sometime in the future, I will attempt to learn how to use them. Any advice on where to start (simplest plugin of theirs to understand and get results)?

Considering that all of those developers sales are at Plugin Boutique, I'm pretty confident that it's a Plugin Boutique promotional theme. But if you're wondering what's the reason/genesis behind the theme (i.e., is it due to an anniversary or invention, etc.), it seems random, just an idea to do a promotion.

I have a few UAD plugins and it seems everything they put out is at a very high standard. I suppose people who've had their hardware and pros have known this first hand for a long time, but I've really only experienced their plugins since they didn't require their hardware and have greatly come down in price on sales. In addition to the Capitol Chambers, I have been considering Sound City. I agree with you and Craig that the Electra88 sounds excellent, but I have so many Rhodes libraries already, that I think the Sound City reverb is more appealing to me. Any opinions on their Sound City reverb (asking you and anyone else who wants to weigh in)?

FTR, I gave it a laugh because I should have known better than to ask my fellow plugin and sample addicts to talk me down. Instead you have me checking out additional plugins! But thanks for the suggestions. I do think everything we're discussing sounds excellent to my ears, but especially Capitol Chambers. I thought Abbey Road Chambers would be the be all, end all for me, but I love CC even more.

The more I listen to Capitol Chambers, the more I think it sounds incredible -- maybe my favorite reverb of all time (based on the demos). Is there any impulse response or other reverb that even comes close to that sound they captured? I'm trying not to spend anymore on this stuff, but that reverb seems like perfection to me. Someone please talk me down! I own probably two dozen reverbs.

Haha! I know Steven, but I couldn't ask him -- too much bias!