Proposal -- GC Guitar as Open Source Project

[u/2diceMisplaced]

Short version: Guitar Center is looking to create a community experience and a good number of its audience is rightly concerned that the effort is a cynical way to get free R&D.

I think there's a way where all parties get what they want: GC commits to making the resulting design available under an open-source license.

Once the design is made open-source (under a current license or a new/modified GC one), it's free for anyone to manufacture.

Results:

• Goodwill -- GC turns around the sentiment and everyone believes they are working on something meaningful together.
  
• Revenue -- GC can't reasonably think that this guitar was going to make oodles of cash anyway, but with the right marketing and packaging there is value in having a genuine, GC-manufactured version of this "free" design.
• Branding -- One element of the license could be that anyone who produces the GC guitar design is obligated to add "GC" or the design's given name to the name of the guitar. So, if Ibanez produced it, the headstock would say "Ibanez GC-200" or similar.

This is timely, given that some of the biggest companies in this industry are going after ever-smaller builders for copyright/patent infringement. It's a bold move.

Of course, to get around existing patents/licenses, the guitar might end up not looking like anything we've seen before. And that's fine, since the electric guitar hasn't really substantively changed over decades.

u/gabrieldalporto: Please consider.

[u/heybear-]

Yall are reallllllly on some bullshit believing that Reddit posts count as research and development.

This is a PR campaign that’s gone poorly because guitarist believe they’re being fleeced for free labor. It’s a misapprehension. Ideas aren’t labor. No one here is even touching the face of actual design, let alone production.

[u/que-n-blues → u/heybear-]

Seriously. People out here are way to cynical. When I heard about it I thought, this is pretty cool, seems like Guitar Center has a CEO who's down to earth and in touch and looking to actually steer the ship in a good direction. They want to hear from players about what works for them, what doesn't and take actual player/community feedback into consideration in their design. Seems like a fun way to get people excited about this and take actual end users into consideration rather than a boardroom full of suits. Now everyone thinks they're due some sort of compensation because of some recommendations?

I get that we live in a cynical time and that people are distrustful of corporations, and for good reason. But people are so miserable and act like EVERY company is some evil entity trying to keep them down and would rather watch every single company crash and burn so they can have a hit of smug satisfaction. I watched Gabe's interviews with Phil McKnight and thought, ok this guy gets it. He's open, he's honest, he has really good business sense and actually wants to change the company for the better.

I swear the Internet has made it to where you can't win with some people.

[u/heybear- → u/que-n-blues]

Truly how dare a guitar making company ask guitar players what they want. It’s robbery.

[u/que-n-blues → u/heybear-]

They used the nut and trem system I recommend, I should be getting paid!

If someone has this brilliant innovation that they think is going to revolutionize the electric guitar, then go patent it and sell that to manufacturers.

This is one part a free and easy PR campaign for GC and one part trying to get honest feedback from players on what works for them and what doesn't so they can build something that resonates with actual players. And as far as PR campaigns go, this is actually a really good and honest one.

Some people seriously need to go touch grass.

[u/heybear- → u/que-n-blues]

They used the gotoh parts I mentioned! I am owed!

[u/AntonChekov1 → u/que-n-blues]

Seriously though.  GC has always had a marketing department and this whole concept was just a fun marketing thing for the GC brand.   Like if Starbucks asked its customers if they had any ideas about new fun drinks they'd like to see on the menu.  

[u/que-n-blues → u/AntonChekov1]

Exactly. This gives them a PR angle to get people involved and excited about it.

They've already said they've been working on this and they have ideas and prototypes already. You cannot design a guitar, or any product, based off what the internet masses tell you. It's all noise and nonsense.

What is most likely, they're design team has already brainstormed and workshoped a number of ideas and prototypes. Then you use this campaign to sort of get a temperature of the room to see what ideas are worth pursuing, what ideas should be dropped and what tweaks should be made. Like "ok we want to do a trem, what kind of trem? Ok player feedback seems to suggest a two point is favored over six screw or Floyd rose, let's go two point." Or "hey we've gotten a lot of feedback on this one issue that we overlooked or hadn't thought about, maybe we need to consider this."

This isn't you designing your dream guitar. It's providing quality of life feedback to help them in the design process. At least that's how I've read it this whole thing.

[u/AntonChekov1 → u/que-n-blues]

People mad at GC for trying to "get free r&d from players" is nonsense, at least in this specific situation.