ZMF Verite Closed-New Closed Back ZMF Flagship.
May 1, 2021 at 8:35 AM Post #5,956 of 12,391
IMHO - both the current system and the proposed lottery systems just seem like stress-inducing needless methods.

I think what's reasonable (and I am not even interested in stabilized, I have my two ZMFs) is that it should just be a waiting list.

1. Zach opens it up for say Verite Closed stabilized, makes it known.
2. You register, you have your number on the waiting list.
3. When a batch opens up people are invited in order to select and if you are not happy with what remains when their turn comes, then you go back at the top of the waiting list for an even better spot selecting your unit next batch. If no longer interested, you say so or don't respond by a deadline and the next person on the list gets invited.

There is no need to fret and think but I will be number 5000 on the list. Surely the overall demand is in the hundreds, and your turn will eventually come up. You could say, yes, but I could wait 2-3 years. But what's the alternative. Really wanting one and missing out one batch after batch because of ultra-fast orders from others and bad luck? Seems like unnecessary stress and this hobby should not be stressful.

Just my 2 euro cents.
 
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May 1, 2021 at 9:18 AM Post #5,957 of 12,391
IMHO - both the current system and the proposed lottery systems just seem like stress-inducing needless methods.

I think what's reasonable (and I am not even interested in stabilized, I have my two ZMFs) is that it should just be a waiting list.

1. Zach opens it up for say Verite Closed stabilized, makes it known.
2. You register, you have your number on the waiting list.
3. When a batch opens up people are invited in order to select and if you are not happy with what remains when their turn comes, then you go back at the top of the waiting list for an even better spot selecting your unit next batch. If no longer interested, you say so or don't respond by a deadline and the next person on the list gets invited.

There is no need to fret and think but I will be number 5000 on the list. Surely the overall demand is in the hundreds, and your turn will eventually come up. You could say, yes, but I could wait 2-3 years. But what's the alternative. Really wanting one and missing out one batch after batch because of ultra-fast orders from others and bad luck? Seems like unnecessary stress and this hobby should not be stressful.

Just my 2 euro cents.
Nice, maybe even better ... Less stressful for sure. And a higher chance to get one you really like rather than the second or third favorite. Also less exciting though..
 
May 1, 2021 at 10:10 AM Post #5,958 of 12,391
I vote for single-case auction!
 
May 1, 2021 at 10:32 AM Post #5,959 of 12,391
IMHO - both the current system and the proposed lottery systems just seem like stress-inducing needless methods.

I think what's reasonable (and I am not even interested in stabilized, I have my two ZMFs) is that it should just be a waiting list.

1. Zach opens it up for say Verite Closed stabilized, makes it known.
2. You register, you have your number on the waiting list.
3. When a batch opens up people are invited in order to select and if you are not happy with what remains when their turn comes, then you go back at the top of the waiting list for an even better spot selecting your unit next batch. If no longer interested, you say so or don't respond by a deadline and the next person on the list gets invited.

There is no need to fret and think but I will be number 5000 on the list. Surely the overall demand is in the hundreds, and your turn will eventually come up. You could say, yes, but I could wait 2-3 years. But what's the alternative. Really wanting one and missing out one batch after batch because of ultra-fast orders from others and bad luck? Seems like unnecessary stress and this hobby should not be stressful.

Just my 2 euro cents.
The downside is this process may be slower overall with people holding up the line for several days because they aren’t making a choice, and potentially causing the wait to grow exponentially.
 
May 1, 2021 at 11:08 AM Post #5,962 of 12,391
The silver upgrade cable is sold out. Any recommendations for not too expensive upgrade cables for VC? Need a 7 footer.
The OFC sounds amazing. This is coming from a guy that owns a silver cable.
 
May 1, 2021 at 11:25 AM Post #5,963 of 12,391
Warning: the below is an exercise in silliness. 1) This is ZMF's business and they are clearly capable. We can all opine on "great ideas" for their business but that is silly really. 2) Almost certainly simplicity is single most important aspect for any small business owner. One cannot deny the impressive popularity of their bespoke, beautiful, rare, hard-to get, gorgeous headphones - so why not play for a moment whilst I am admittedly a bit jazzed up on caffeine ...
  • The current "market design" for these headphones awards headphones to 1) those who are aware of the headphones. There is a whole world of (sad) people who won't even be aware of them! 2) Those who are keen and ready to buy the moment the product is available. 3) people who are quick with a mouse/keyboard/etc, 4) People who aren't working or in some odd part of the world/asleep, 5) some part luck (did some browser cache evict, is my internet provider fast, did someone else click at the same time). I'd argue that only #1,2 are desirable market characteristics.
  • There are common designs for for product marketplaces. Auction is straight forwards, ala eBay.
    • ZMF starts with a minimum bid per headphone.
    • Customers bid for the headphones vs each other and the bidding stops at a certain predetermined time.
    • The market sets the price in the end.
    • The downside of this scheme is it advantages those with more money, so there is some social imbalance. This also benefits technically advanced users.
      • It is fair to say that people paying thousands of <currency-units> are not poor. So you may or not feel badly about such a social imbalance.
      • There are well known "sniping" tactics/bots to advantage technically savvy participants, which is undesirable.
    • This would also benefit ZMF as they would be paid a higher price (presumably) in the face of competition for the scarce headphones.
    • People would bid more for time immediacy. This is also like "buy it now" on eBay. It the markets, if you want to trade now, you cross the spread (pay a premium for immediacy). If someone wants to "end the auction early", you just offer the high "buy it now" price and it is over. ZMF could also prioritise these 1st and offer them time-prioritised.
  • Another alternative is the Dutch auction. Basically the headphones would start at a very high price and decline until someone pays the asking amount.
  • So - this leaves Zach and co with the question - what kind of properties do we want for our very successful market for these highly sought after awesome headphones?
    1. It must be simple for THEM to operate and deliver on. This is the most important criterion.
    2. It should not advantage people with small technical skills. If my mum who is slow with her iPad wants some sweet stabilised wood headphones, it shouldn't disadvantage her because of her relative technical weakness.
    3. Ideally allow "OCO" one-cancels-other prioritised orders. This covers the case; "I want headphonesA, if I can't get them, thenI want headphonesB", etc.
    4. It shouldn't disadvantage people who aren't available in a small 5 minute window (maybe sleeping, maybe working, unaware that it would last 5 mins, etc).
    5. This point can be debated, but ideally it would yield the best profit to ZMF. Again, this prioritises people with more money (but so does most of westernised life).
    6. It needs to start and end at pre-determined times (to enable the lifecycle, manage inventory/project manufacturing)
    7. I'm sure there are other goals, but let's leave those?
  • What would achieve many of those goals? This is one that might work well enough. I like the idea of overt randomness vs all the other miscellaneous reasons to grant people headphones.
    • Users register as customers at ZMF
    • A headphone batch (i.e. 50 new lovely headphones) would start at fixed time 0, and end at fixed time T (i.e.; start 1st Dec at midnight and end 10th Dec at midnight).
    • Headphones have fixed prices as they do now. Additions and preferences can still be added (materials, cables, etc) but they don't impact the matching process.
    • Each customer enters an interest in 1-n headphones. Customers should be able to see the # of users "bidding" of a given headphone so they can see where they may have a higher probability of winning (i.e.; I want to bid where there are few other bidders so my probability of winning is high). (This doesn't really handle ranked preferences, but that could be made to work I'm sure.)
    • When the fixed market time ends, random allocation happens in the 1st randomly selected headphone pool with all users equally weighted. The winner is removed from all other headphone pools so he can't get selected 2x, protecting them from overpaying. (Of course it is possible to create > 1 user account but that is fine, you can just get 2 headphones max in that case.)
    • After "headphone pool 1" is complete, the same process follows on for each set of headphones, randomly selecting a winner, removing the winner from the subsequent rounds.
    • Additionally, always keep a small # of "buy-it-now" headphones available at significantly higher prices (~50% maybe) so that people who want immediacy can be the ones that, for a fixed portion of the market can get it. This limits the advantage to the wealthier customers as it is only a subset of the total product universe AND it allows ZMF to benefit from the high demand of the product whilst offering a way to get the headphones promptly.
    • This little design addresses most of the issues/ disadvantages of the other models. Of course - it fails the A#1 criterion of SIMPLICITY!
So - as promised, that was ridiculous, but I had fun anyhow. Sorry if you read this far! I am sure there are several better market designs, but I'm done being silly for the moment.... Clearly, Zach should just keep doing what he is doing!
 
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May 1, 2021 at 12:15 PM Post #5,964 of 12,391
Hey everyone! I really really appreciate all the ideas and thoughts on how we can sell the stabilized!!!! I am truly honored in the demand and all the ideas of different auction/wait list/raising prices etc etc all are valid and truly could work.

For us right now, we are a nine person team, and have grown to that from us being three people three years ago. We are adding to our team and finding more crafts-people who can wear the many hats needed to manufacture, market and distribute our headphones. Unfortunately we do not have the infrastructure in place to do the customer service required to successfully pull of anything but a first come/first serve basis right now for the stabilized headphones. Any of the other options leads to increased customer service, an area where @BooUrns and I are already stretched thin!

Will we have the infrastructure need to play around with some of these ideas in the future? I hope so and expect to!

In the mean time we will increase our supply of stabilized wood and after this next run look for the batches to be in greater numbers with a larger variety of models available.

Coming up soon we are going to start to release video's showing an inside look at our process in different areas that should help show what we focus on here in the workshop.

Thank you thank you again!!!!
 
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May 1, 2021 at 12:52 PM Post #5,965 of 12,391
Hey everyone! I really really appreciate all the ideas and thoughts on how we can sell the stabilized!!!! I am truly honored in the demand and all the ideas of different auction/wait list/raising prices etc etc all are valid and truly could work.

For us right now, we are a nine person team, and have grown to that from us being three people three years ago. We are adding to our team and finding more crafts-people who can wear the many hats needed to manufacture, market and distribute our headphones. Unfortunately we do not have the infrastructure in place to do the customer service required to successfully pull of anything but a first come/first serve basis right now for the stabilized headphones. Any of the other options leads to increased customer service, an area where @BooUrns and I are already stretched thin!

Will we have the infrastructure need to play around with some of these ideas in the future? I hope so and expect to!

In the mean time we will increase our supply of stabilized wood and after this next run look for the batches to be in greater numbers with a larger variety of models available.

Coming up soon we are going to start to release video's showing an inside look at our process in different areas that should help show what we focus on here in the workshop.

Thank you thank you again!!!!

Happy to hear you guys are doing well! :)

For now - the simplest and most actionable idea is to put captcha's when adding to cart and another captcha when checking out. That way, everyone can be assured that even if the stabilized batch sells out quickly, at least none of them were sold to someone with a bot. I don't mind if something sells out quick, as long as it goes to a human buyer who was faster on their mouse finger than I was :)
 
May 1, 2021 at 3:20 PM Post #5,966 of 12,391
I am curious, if the stabilized drops have been getting more interest one after another or have they been fairly consistent between the drops. It's great to see interest spread for these.
 
May 1, 2021 at 5:19 PM Post #5,967 of 12,391
I would suggest a survey to see how many of us would buy a stabilized set and then plan production to meet the need. I still have no concept of how each stabilized version with different wood hardness impacts SQ.
 
May 1, 2021 at 7:03 PM Post #5,969 of 12,391
I would suggest a survey to see how many of us would buy a stabilized set and then plan production to meet the need. I still have no concept of how each stabilized version with different wood hardness impacts SQ.
I remember hearing Zach say to worry less about the wood for SQ as the differences are minimal and more so for the Aesthetic, so I’m assuming much less of a difference than Pads make.
 
May 1, 2021 at 7:24 PM Post #5,970 of 12,391
I remember hearing Zach say to worry less about the wood for SQ as the differences are minimal and more so for the Aesthetic, so I’m assuming much less of a difference than Pads make.
This is correct. Zach has mentioned several times in the past that various woods have minimal impact on the sound. I can confirm this to be true.
I had a chance to compare my Verite open to another Verite open of a different wood type. The difference was audible when going back and forth in an a/b comparison. However the differences were so minute that I ended up keeping the VO that looked better.

FWIW Zach has also mentioned several times that the stabilized VC has similar sound characteristics to harder wood with a high janka rating. Harder the wood the quicker the decay is and it slams harder.
 

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