[Beagle]

Maybe you should stop kickstarting stuff for a while...

Maybe they should call it nudgestarter?

 

[Sordel]

I know this will sound like a bitter old man, but that's because we live in an I WANT IT NOW society nowadays. You want to get a hold of someone NOW, you text them or call their cell phone. Want to know information, you fire up Google and the world's information is available NOW. You want directions NOW, you pull up Google maps on your phone.

It's become an expectation to have everything NOW, not a luxury or nicety.

While what you say about society in general is true, I feel that it has very little to do with Kickstarter. In the first place, when you kickstart something you immediately tolerate a lead time of months. Then the first delay is always greeted by a lot of people saying 'thank you for letting us know, we know that there are delays, really looking forward to it when it's ready' etc. The Kickstarter community is not naive about this stuff.

But then (I'm not talking about Ora here, it's way too early to criticize them) the project starter goes to ground and there are more delays but now no one's talking to the community. And this is also something the community’s seen before, but now it's not just 'every Kickstarter runs late’ but 'this reminds me of Kickstarters that never delivered at all'. Because anyone who's been on Kickstarter for a while has seen the dreaded non-delivery.

The problem with the Kickstarter model is that it has so little consumer protection that it wouldn't have been tolerated by any previous society. No ‘shop’ is allowed to say 'give me your money, I'll pass it along with your order to our supplier after deducting a fee and he or she will deliver to you at a time that suits them or not at all and, by the way, you will have no assurances as to durability, fitness to purpose etc.’. I don't think that Millennial impatience is pertinent when there are creators out there who seemingly have no compunction about taking the money and never fulfilling pledges in the least.

Creators should always be aware that however hard they personally are working get their project completed, there is a huge amount of suspicion there from backers ... not because we're instinctive misanthropes but because we've all actually been burned before.

 

[Currawong]

The idea though is that instead of trying to find a company to back your design, you can ask ordinary people to do so. They face the same risks. The thing is, I don't think many people have any idea either how hard it is to produce a product, or how high the likelihood of failure is.

 

[audionewbi]

I look forward in seen a non bluetooth iteration of this IEM, or better seen their driver used in something like the TH900. I personally have no love for bluetooth.

 

[Roll]

Save $50 of the headphone- in the current issue of AudioXpress February 2018 for the link.

Exploring Graphene Speaker Development
by Mike Klasco and J. Martins

Clip from her:

Since ORA Sound was formed, its research team focused on optimizing three variations of GrapheneQ for three specific applications.
ORA Sound now has a low-density material targeted toward full-range cones, a very stiff material for tweeters, and is working on a material with increased thermal conductivity for microspeakers.

As Dr. Robert-Eric Gaskell, ORA’s Co-founder and CEO explains, “Currently our GrapheneQ material provides the stiffness of aluminum with the damping of paper at a density that is less than typical polymers. With further work we are confident that we can approach the stiffness of Beryllium but with lower density and significantly better damping.”

The ORA GQ Headphones come equipped with ORA’s GrapheneQ membranes, providing improved efficiency and up-to a 70% increase in battery life over standard wireless headphones.
To demonstrate the benefits in terms of better power handling, the headphones were designed with both wired and Bluetooth wireless operation.
For wireless operation, ORA expects to be able to provide 26 plus hours of playback time on a single charge, having adopted Qualcomm’s CSR8675 chip, with integrated support for aptX, aptX HD, and Qualcomm TrueWireless stereo, in the production model.
The company also reported adding features such as a gesture control track-pad, a digital MEMS microphone, breathable lambskin leather, and an ear-shaped design optimized for sound quality and isolated comfort.

 

[Beagle]

I know this will sound like a bitter old man, but that's because we live in an I WANT IT NOW society nowadays. You want to get a hold of someone NOW, you text them or call their cell phone. Want to know information, you fire up Google and the world's information is available NOW. You want directions NOW, you pull up Google maps on your phone.

It's become an expectation to have everything NOW, not a luxury or nicety.

When I was growing up, if you wanted to know something you went to your local library and looked up a book in the card catalog, then went and found the book on the stacks (or looked it up in a set of encyclopedias, usually that were years out of date). You wanted directions? You pulled over and asked at the nearest gas station or looked it up on an Atlas you kept in your trunk. You wanted to write someone? You wrote a letter and waited for the post office to deliver it. You wanted to call someone? You called them and if the line was busy you tried again later (and if they had an answering machine you left a message and they called you back later that night).

Basically we've become so spoiled everything is GIMME GIMME GIMME NOW NOW NOW. It's the sad reality that it's like this nowadays. I try teaching my teenage daughter that "patience is a virtue" but she just laughs and makes some comment about how old I am.

Well, this is today's society mindset in a nutshell.

BRAVO! Great post!

 

[Midgetguy]

I look forward in seen a non bluetooth iteration of this IEM, or better seen their driver used in something like the TH900. I personally have no love for bluetooth.

Surely you don't mean IEM? The ORA GQs headphones are full-size headphones, NOT IEMs. Also, if I'm not mistaken (and I hope I'm not), the GQ headphones do have a cable connection (I believe there was some discussion somewhere about how the jack was going to be wired) which allows you to completely bypass the bluetooth functions. They can be wireless if you want them to, and that was the primary design, but they can be wired as well if you want to plug them into your desktop amp.

Someone please correct me if I'm wrong about that.

 

[AlwaysForward]

Surely you don't mean IEM? The ORA GQs headphones are full-size headphones, NOT IEMs. Also, if I'm not mistaken (and I hope I'm not), the GQ headphones do have a cable connection (I believe there was some discussion somewhere about how the jack was going to be wired) which allows you to completely bypass the bluetooth functions. They can be wireless if you want them to, and that was the primary design, but they can be wired as well if you want to plug them into your desktop amp.

Someone please correct me if I'm wrong about that.

This is correct. Wired mode allows for true bypass of onboard electronics and functions just like any passive set of similar design. They’re definitely overear. I could be down for an IEM from them.

I’d love future products to include an open back overear and CIEM but that’s just me dreaming and stuff. Sure hope they sound as good as the measurements suggest.

 

[jeffhawke]

The idea though is that instead of trying to find a company to back your design, you can ask ordinary people to do so. They face the same risks. The thing is, I don't think many people have any idea either how hard it is to produce a product, or how high the likelihood of failure is.

That's precisely what we did. I came across this guy, a former recording studio engineer, who started out by modding full-size headphones and then developed his own proprietary design, built a few dozens prototypes and sent them around for testing, eventually getting them back for further design changes (not many) and reselling the prototypes and a small beta series on a word of mouth basis. I came across one of the beta series units and was blown away by the way they sounded. I will not go into details as to the sound, as this is not the appropriate thread, but suffice it to say that I discussed it with a couple of (well heeled) good friends, and after a small number of listening sessions and long hours of working all together on a business plan, a decision was made to financially back the project, two weeks ago. I am not at liberty to share any details yet, but the purpose of this comment was to show that the idea exposed by @Currawong has merit and is being applied in real life. Hopefully this approach will take some hold, as it might somehow result in better products hitting the market when they are ready to go on the shelves.

 

[robert-eric]

@robert-eric Will you guys be at any of the CanJam events this year?

We don't have any plans yet. I have never been to a CanJam event. We will certainly look into it. Just got back from NAMM though - it was a lot of fun.

 

[robert-eric]

This is correct. Wired mode allows for true bypass of onboard electronics and functions just like any passive set of similar design. They’re definitely overear. I could be down for an IEM from them.

I’d love future products to include an open back overear and CIEM but that’s just me dreaming and stuff. Sure hope they sound as good as the measurements suggest.

We are definitely considering either IEMs and Open Back Over-Ear for our next products.

 

[robert-eric]

Cover the remainder of the stretch goals, maybe they'll implement it and also give us an all black colorway.

We are continuing to sell via indiegogo and we will definitely still do the black option if we reach $1M CAD (@ $886k now). I would love the excuse to do the black version - I think they look really good in black.

 

[AlwaysForward]

We are definitely considering either IEMs and Open Back Over-Ear for our next products.

Awesomeness. I think the driver material could be pretty ideal for both, naturally. I’d personally be a bit more interested in open backs, especially if you’re able to make them awesome wireless/wired. That efficiency is super attractive.

I also feel that a single driver IEM could be super interesting since the material could theoretically compete with all the multi BA drivers for resolution and frequency coverage but also provide that super efficient drivability. If you do go IEM, please consider a CIEM option

 

[robert-eric]

Hello Everyone. Thank you for being so understanding of our delay. It was brought on by several factors but the end product will be better for it. I just got back from NAMM today and I'm leaving in 2 days to visit our suppliers in Asia. I'll post pics and info as we move around Shenzhen and Taiwan.

In the mean time AudioXpress just did an article about Graphene loudspeakers that has a lot of cool info on our technology:

http://read.uberflip.com/i/924671-february-2018/1#

You have to click "Free Preview" and then you can flip through the issue. This is AudioXpress' special NAMM issue and we are honoured to be on the cover!

 

[AlwaysForward]

Hello Everyone. Thank you for being so understanding of our delay. It was brought on by several factors but the end product will be better for it. I just got back from NAMM today and I'm leaving in 2 days to visit our suppliers in Asia. I'll post pics and info as we move around Shenzhen and Taiwan.

In the mean time AudioXpress just did an article about Graphene loudspeakers that has a lot of cool info on our technology:

http://read.uberflip.com/i/924671-february-2018/1#

You have to click "Free Preview" and then you can flip through the issue. This is AudioXpress' special NAMM issue and we are honoured to be on the cover!

Good luck with the Asia visit. One more step toward the product shipping!

The free preview only shows select pages, which don't seem to include the ORA information. Regardless, congrats on making the cover!