[Liu Junyuan]

Also Yulong, if we're thinking Chinese brands.


But the nouveau riche were seen as "dirty peasants" by the landed gentry; they had the ticket price of entry into high society, i.e., money, but not the native upbringing within it required to be accepted and thus were seen by traditionally-monied families as peasants who just happened to have a lot of cash. They were considered pretty handy to marry grudgingly if the family coffers needed a cash injection badly enough, but best avoided at all other times. "Euro-style" pronounciation, with an "u" like in "flute" and an "ard" like in "card" (or possibly "ar" like in "fast")  sounds like old money.

I'm just not feeling the "custard"-rhyming, though. It sounds like a combination of the name of some guy that rides around on the back of a Brooklyn garbage truck and the word "retard", neither of which you're likely to associate with pleasant sounds.

Even "Gusto" would be better. All positive associations, and implies the units enthusiastically go about their tasks. If they fix the name and adopt some decent, style-matched front panel designs, they could become a real force in the budget high-end market. All cases the same width for stacking, etc, and looking like they all come from the same product line. They need to consult with a young and hungry design firm or something.


That's what's rumoured, and nothing else would really make sense, so it seems promising.

I don't have time to write at length, but I must say I genuinely like the name "Gustard" and do not find the same negative associations you do with the word.

 

[ansi]

For all those that care about the company name, it is actually pronounced like "custard" with a G. The name was given to them by a friend who they assumed was good in English, from their Chinese name (Geside). Yes, I asked them about the name but left it out of my report earlier. I just didn't have the heart to tell them it sounds dumb.

 

[Amleth]

I don't have time to write at length, but I must say I genuinely like the name "Gustard" and do not find the same negative associations you do with the word.

 
What is it you like about it? Do you still like it in light of ansi confirming it rhymes with "custard"?
 

  For all those that care about the company name, it is actually pronounced like "custard" with a G. The name was given to them by a friend who they assumed was good in English, from their Chinese name (Geside). Yes, I asked them about the name but left it out of my report earlier. I just didn't have the heart to tell them it sounds dumb.

 
I assume the Chinese version is pronouned something like "Geh-see-deh"? Or maybe "Geh-shi-deh" (some of the romanisation systems can be pretty treacherous)?
 
If so, "Guest" or "Gusto" are both closer in sound, and I think better sounding as a brand. Warming to "Gusto" particularly.
 
I just don't see how the "ard" part got in there from a native English speaker (or how "geh" became "guh", for that matter). I guess the original Chinese sounds a lot different to what I assume?
 
Although really, if they weren't going to use their Chinese name in the west, they should have made up a brand totally from scratch instead of limiting themselves to something that sounds "similar". (And it's not even very similar at that, as the only sound really in common seems to be the "g" at the start.)
 
It'd be awesome if they let Head-Fi vote on or suggest new options. I bet they could parlay an open naming competition into a ****load of publicity. Not likely to happen, though. :c

 

[Liu Junyuan]

What is it you like about it? Do you still like it in light of ansi confirming it rhymes with "custard"?


I assume the Chinese version is pronouned something like "Geh-see-deh"? Or maybe "Geh-shi-deh" (some of the romanisation systems can be pretty treacherous)?

If so, "Guest" or "Gusto" are both closer in sound, and I think better sounding as a brand. Warming to "Gusto" particularly.

I just don't see how the "ard" part got in there from a native English speaker (or how "geh" became "guh", for that matter). I guesis the original Chinese sounds a lot different to what I assume?

Although really, if they weren't going to use their Chinese name in the west, they should have made up a brand totally from scratch instead of limiting themselves to something that sounds "similar". (And it's not even very similar at that, as the only sound really in common seems to be the "g" at the start.)

It'd be awesome if they let Head-Fi vote on or suggest new options. I bet they could parlay an open naming competition into a ****load of publicity. Not likely to happen, though. :c

Yes, I disagree with ansi that it sounds dumb, but this is all subjective. I think you are trying to find reasons why the name is objectively unsavory by appealing to socio-economic genealogies and etymologies, producing the illusion of consensus in how it ought to be pronounced. I do not think of it in the aristocratic, landed-gentry sense of goostard that you anachronistically reimposed on a name that ironically did not take much thought at all and which has zero anchorage in European contexts.

It would be more convincing to consult the Oxford English Dictionary, perhaps, which indicates the word had early modern origins and exists as a variant of "bustard", an alternative usage for a kind of fowle presumably we would call "goose." But since the English translator may not have been aware of this real etymology within the English tongue, unlike your new richish speculations associating the name basely with the pejoratively inflected "retard," I considered making sense of what gooses mean in Chinese literary memory.

Gooses are ubiquitous in Chinese poetry and painting. Depending on the artist and dynasty, the device of the goose obviously served different functions. Yet what seems common to most early deployments of the goose is its association with either the experience of exile (itinerant wandering into foreign lands) or with a carrier of messages (like the wing-footed Mercury from the Western antique tradition). These associations became especially popularized in the late Han wars with the northern nomadic Xiongnu kingdoms as well as the venerable Tang Dynasty poet Du Fu.

All of this would be a better way of approaching the word than speculations on European attitudes toward middle-class dialects that accompanied the bourgeois rise of mid-17th-18th century mercantile capitalism. Yet actually even these speculations into Chinese usages seem baseless given the arbitrary nature of the appellation "Gustard" that Geside's English-speaking friend endorsed.

The "e" in pinyin sounds like "uh" in English. That is probably why the initial "e" in Geside became the "u" in "Gustard." Unfortunately for you perhaps, this does not take the "oo" as in goose that you have wittily attributed to the outdated elite in Europe. Instead, it might be how a "retard" of the new rich wound say it according to such decontextualized, ahistoric, though admittedly fascinating standards your analysis of "Gustard" attempts to apply.

 

[abartels]

Yes, I disagree with ansi that it sounds dumb, but this is all subjective. I think you are trying to find reasons why the name is objectively unsavory by appealing to socio-economic genealogies and etymologies, producing the illusion of consensus in how it ought to be pronounced. I do not think of it in the aristocratic, landed-gentry sense of goostard that you anachronistically reimposed on a name that ironically did not take much thought at all and which has zero anchorage in European contexts.

It would be more convincing to consult the Oxford English Dictionary, perhaps, which indicates the word had early modern origins and exists as a variant of "bustard", an alternative usage for a kind of fowle presumably we would call "goose." But since the English translator may not have been aware of this real etymology within the English tongue, unlike your new richish speculations associating the name basely with the pejoratively inflected "retard," I considered making sense of what gooses mean in Chinese literary memory.

Gooses are ubiquitous in Chinese poetry and painting. Depending on the artist and dynasty, the device of the goose obviously served different functions. Yet what seems common to most early deployments of the goose is its association with either the experience of exile (itinerant wandering into foreign lands) or with a carrier of messages (like the wing-footed Mercury from the Western antique tradition). These associations became especially popularized in the late Han wars with the northern nomadic Xiongnu kingdoms as well as the venerable Tang Dynasty poet Du Fu.

All of this would be a better way of approaching the word than speculations on European attitudes toward middle-class dialects that accompanied the bourgeois rise of mid-17th-18th century mercantile capitalism. Yet actually even these speculations into Chinese usages seem baseless given the arbitrary nature of the appellation "Gustard" that Gisede's English-speaking friend endorsed.

The "e" in pinyin sounds like "uh" in English. That is probably why the initial "e" in Geside became the "u" in "Gustard." Unfortunately for you perhaps, this does not take the "oo" as in goose that you have wittily attributed to the outdated elite in Europe. Instead, it might be how a "retard" of the new rich wound say it according to such decontextualized, ahistoric, though admittedly fascinating standards your analysis of "Gustard" attempts to apply.

 
For me, ( I'm Dutch) Gustard sounds very French and to my ears it sounds good.
Further I think the brandname is NOT sounding dumb or strange, and even it would, it's not for us to judge.
 
Regards

 

[abartels]

Btw, is there any news about X20? 

 

[Liu Junyuan]

Do you have the X12?

 

[abartels]

Do you have the X12?

 
No i don't have an X12, I have a CS4398 based upsampling dac but want to upgrade to High Quality DSD Dac within a few months.
That is why i was so interested in X20, i opt-in for the first 200 batch btw
 
Regards,
Alex

 

[Amleth]

Yes, I disagree with ansi that it sounds dumb, but this is all subjective.

 
Well, of course it is, when you consider whether you or I or any individual like it personally. But it's not about that when choosing a brand. You try to pick something that that is likely to appeal to as many individuals as possible, or at the very least, avoids actively repelling any. That means being aware of local etymological connotations, and indeed, exploiting them. It all translates to real sales levels. Geside were aware of this to the point that they felt it was better not to use their local name internationally, but even if they have chosen a different brand for international use, they haven't exactly put much effort into it by ansi's account.
 
 

I think you are trying to find reasons why the name is objectively unsavory by appealing to socio-economic genealogies and etymologies, producing the illusion of consensus in how it ought to be pronounced.

 
I think you're looking at my reply to another poster who said that pronouncing "Gustard" with European-style vowels sounded "nouveau riche", and reading way too much into it. I replied that that style sounded more like old money, because I imagine a "nouveau riche" approach to branding would be more obvious, like "Invincible" or "Perfect Amplifier Co" or something. Gustard (as "Goostard") sounds like a generic European family name, which is more traditional for a business name of that period.
 
And nothing I ever said tried to establish any sort of consensus, illusory or otherwise, let alone equate consensus with reality. I don't know how you got there. I pointed out the ambiguity in my initial post about the name, another user replied that they were wondering which was correct also, and then that was the sum total of discussion on the topic until a while later ansi confirmed which version was intended.
 
 

I do not think of it in the aristocratic, landed-gentry sense of goostard that you anachronistically reimposed on a name that ironically did not take much thought at all and which has zero anchorage in European contexts.

 
Neither do I. I thought of it in terms of the ambiguous pronounciation, and of the two alternatives, I preferred the one the option which sounded like it was from some unidentified European language, rather than the one that sounds like a gluggy bowl of dessert goo.
 
 

It would be more convincing to consult the Oxford English Dictionary, perhaps, which indicates the word had early modern origins and exists as a variant of "bustard", an alternative usage for a kind of fowle presumably we would call "goose."

 
Bustards look nothing like geese, but I'm not sure why you've brought that up anyway. Until you mentioned that "geside" apparently means goose (I thought "Geside" was an abbreviation built from their full company name in Chinese; doesn't the "de' part come from "Electricity"?), the only other mention of "goose" was that one possible pronouciation of "Gustard", and one that we now know to be wrong, sounded a bit like the English word goose. Hardly a reason to go looking up its etymology.
 
 

But since the English translator may not have been aware of this real etymology within the English tongue, unlike your new richish speculations associating the name basely with the pejoratively inflected "retard,"

 
Basely? "Retard" and "'tard" have been colloquial insults for decades. As a noun, the word doesn't have a non-pejorative use anymore, and as a verb, it's pronounced differently. If you're manufacturing a word from scratch to represent your brand to an English-speaking market, local language sensitivity would suggest avoiding the use of the letters "tard" together unless as part of an existing word. Maybe it doesn't exactly jump out but it will have a subconscious effect on some percentage of consumers.
 
 

I considered making sense of what gooses mean in Chinese literary memory.

 
Again, without knowing that meaning was associated with the original brand, there's no way to recover it from the English version.
 
 

Gooses are ubiquitous in Chinese poetry and painting. Depending on the artist and dynasty, the device of the goose obviously served different functions. Yet what seems common to most early deployments of the goose is its association with either the experience of exile (itinerant wandering into foreign lands) or with a carrier of messages (like the wing-footed Mercury from the Western antique tradition). These associations became especially popularized in the late Han wars with the northern nomadic Xiongnu kingdoms as well as the venerable Tang Dynasty poet Du Fu.

 
It's interesting that, now that ansi has cleared up the ambiguity, we know that the correct way of saying "Gustard" is the version that rhymes with custard, and the not version that evokes geese. Strangely ironic, but then the "goose" sound only came into it by coincidence, anyway, not design.
 
 

All of this would be a better way of approaching the word than speculations on European attitudes toward middle-class dialects that accompanied the bourgeois rise of mid-17th-18th century mercantile capitalism.

 
It was originally approached by analysing how "Gustard" sounds within the context of the English language, and thus other English words, as this would be the design criteria for a brand aimed at an English-speaking market. I leaned more towards the alternative pronounciation style for aesthetic reasons, and because I felt it had more appeal as a true "International" brand with its European flavour (though it quite likely sounds silly in other languages too, just by law of averages). Turns out that's not the officially "correct" way, though. The fact is, however, that either option is pretty clumsy-sounding in English, and sadly, the correct way more-so than the alternative.
 
The whole "class attitudes" part stems from one reply I made adding context to another person's comment that you seem to have latched onto for some inexplicable reason, ignoring all the rhyming word element discourse or the original point of the whole thing which was to clear up the ambiguity and find which was the right way to actually say the name.
 
 

Yet actually even these speculations into Chinese usages seem baseless given the arbitrary nature of the appellation "Gustard" that Gisede's English-speaking friend endorsed.

 
They do.
 
 

The "e" in pinyin sounds like "uh" in English. That is probably why the initial "e" in Geside became the "u" in "Gustard." Unfortunately for you perhaps, this does not take the "oo" as in goose that you have wittily attributed to the outdated elite in Europe. Instead, it might be how a "retard" of the new rich wound say it according to such decontextualized, ahistoric, though admittedly fascinating standards your analysis of "Gustard" attempts to apply.

 
You seem to be taking this really personally for some reason.
 
You also wrote a hell of a lot without answering the main question I asked, about what it is you like about the name. I didn't ask if you agreed with ansi that it was "dumb"; you'd already made that much clear. I asked if, in light of us now knowing the "custard" way of saying it is the right way, whether you liked that particular version of the name, because up to that point, there were two pronounciations floating around to choose from, and the one you liked could have been either, or both.
 
I've gone on at length about what I dislike about both versions, but you haven't expanded on why you like either.
 

   
For me, ( I'm Dutch) Gustard sounds very French and to my ears it sounds good.

 
Which version sounds French to you, though? The one rhyming with "custard", or the one said like "goostard". I preferred the unidentifiable French/Italian/Spanish vowelage going on there, but it's apparently not how they meant it to be said. Gustard-like-custard doesn't sound very French to me personally, unless you work the "ar" to make it rhyme with "petard", I guess.
 

Further I think the brandname is NOT sounding dumb or strange, and even it would, it's not for us to judge.

 
Since brands are created to sell a product to a market, as the intended market, it is specifically for us to judge the efficacy of the brand, even if only by choosing to buy it or not. Whatever they call themselves when marketing to their home market isn't for us to judge; we have no context and are not the intended target, anyway. When selling to us, though, the only thing that matters is what we (collectively, as an overall bias) think. By all accounts, Gustard make some excellent value, well-performing products, so I personally feel sad to see them sold under a brand I feel will quite likely see them reach fewer customers. The only "dog" I have in this fight is wanting to see them succeed as much as possible, at least as long as they continue their "high value for money at reasonable price points" model. I hope no other Gustard fans will take my attempts at constructive criticism of a marketing choice made by the company that built some of their their stuff as a personal attack on them directly. I think the name will definitely have some effect on Gustard's ultimate market penetration in the west.

 

 

[Hibuckhobby]

At the end of the day, this whole discussion is rather pointless.  First of all, the opinions of those who a part of the Gustard thread likely reflects very little about whether or not
the product will succeed in the world marketplace.  The idea that one likes or does not like a name borders on silly.  For those "new" to the market, very few components of Chinese
manufacture are well known in the first place.  Among audio snobs (they know who they are) the fact that it is of Chinese manufacture tends to put it in a secondary catagory.
Only in the last decade (or less) have their electronics (whether knock offs or new designs) started to be recognized as viable contenders and even then will only be of interest to
those who are looking for a bang for the buck that is predicated in part on lower wages and different working conditions.
 
Secondly, if one buys an audio product or does not because they happen to like the sound of the brand name, they are using the wrong selection criteria.  Gustard is a niche
manufacturer in a niche market.  Those who think that the euphony of the name would change that have not considered that the real thing that will sell these products is
that they sound exceptionally good at their price point which actually lowers price at which diminishing returns sets in.
YMMV,
Hibuck....

 

[Schopenhauer]

You seem to be taking this really personally for some reason.

Irony!

 

[abartels]

Maybe it's a good idea to let it go, please?

Keep on topic if possible, like this thread too much to see it closed,,,,

Just my 5 cents

 

[Liu Junyuan]

LOL. I definitely will let it go. I initially was surprised that people would take issue with the name in the first place, but when I saw some pseudo-elaborate arguments aiming to cast "Gustard" as a somehow objectively obscene onomatopoeia for gooses and "retards," especially when I sincerely did not instinctually share these associations, I felt compelled to participate.

All is good on my end. Let us enjoy the music, shall we? I hope you are enjoying your Gustard gear as much as I am.

 

[stuartmc]

Maybe it's a good idea to let it go, please?

Keep on topic if possible, like this thread too much to see it closed,,,,

Just my 5 cents

 
Schopy and Capt. Stu will be tag team wrestling you officious interlopers in 3, 2, 1........ LOL!    Actually, I really enjoy the passion and enthusiasm you guys are bringing to the table. I like spirited debate, so long as it remains respectful.  The crew of the SS Gustard is a knowledgeable and welcoming bunch and all that is required to reach "swabbie" status is to own some Gustard gear and be willing to share your experiences like you were sharing them with your brothers and sisters. So far, we haven't had to make anyone walk the plank, let alone keelhauled them.  

 

[Liu Junyuan]

Schopy and Capt. Stu will be tag team wrestling you officious interlopers in 3, 2, 1........ LOL!    Actually, I really enjoy the passion and enthusiasm you guys are bringing to the table. I like spirited debate, so long as it remains respectful.  The crew of the SS Gustard is a knowledgeable and welcoming bunch and all that is required to reach "swabbie" status is to own some Gustard gear and be willing to share your experiences like you were sharing them with your brothers and sisters. So far, we haven't had to make anyone walk the plank, let alone keelhauled them.  

+1