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Comment by SeanLuke | Hacker News Reader

I will remember Creative as the company that purchased two of the greatest music synthesizer companies, E-Mu and Ensoniq, merged them, and then destroyed them.

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This. Creative had scale and ability to reduce costs for both E-MU and Ensoniq. These companies had extensive silicon design and fab experience (Dave Rossum is still at it in fact) that could have been leveraged and some truly innovative products could have been made.

Still computer software was rapidly eating the Audio hardware market and things like samplers started to seem both redundant and one and the same thing. (Akai s5000 and Z series were basically a pc)

I’m sure it was not an easy call to kill the hardware business for emu/ensoniq but I wish they hadn’t.

Edit: I will also forever think of this video when I hear the name creative labs- https://youtu.be/h73kd6wsBq0

The guy is so good. Amazing.

Shades of Joe Ades, that video...

I will remember Creative as the company that issued repeated lawsuits against Aureal Semiconductor (losing repeatedly), then bought their assets when Aureal was forced to declare bankruptcy due to legal fees.

> losing repeatedly

> bankruptcy due to legal fees.

Don't the legal fees get paid by the losing side?

Not in "the American system". Litigation is a rich person's game, and often used to grind down competitors: or just grift a lucrative settlement.

In the American legal system, each party pays its own legal fees unless there is (1) a statute that specifies fee-shifting or (2) a contract between the parties that specifies fee-shifting.

The reasoning behind this is that to require the loser to pay all fees would discourage "good" lawsuits. (e.g., an individual with a decent case against a big company, may be discouraged from filing because of the potentially catastrophic costs if he doesn't win.)

This is presumably why American corporations typically live in such fear of individuals with a good case and modest resources.

I know this isn't your idea @bdowling, and it's actually interesting to hear the reason, but I couldn't resist /s posting.

The "American Rule" also leads to many lawsuits of questionable merit being brought against corporations (and wealthy individuals). Attorneys take these cases on contingency, knowing that the defendant will likely just settle rather than incur a lot of legal fees, and the firm will take 33-40% of the settlement. These "nuisance lawsuits" are a big problem for some industries. If there was universal fee-shifting, these suits would be discouraged.

It can be worse though. In some jurisdictions and for certain types of claims (e.g., employer-employee wage/hour suits in California), statutes provide for "one-way fee shifting". One-way fee-shifting means that if the plaintiff wins, the defendant pays the plaintiff's legal fees, but if the plaintiff loses, the plaintiff does not pay the defendant's legal fees. Predictably, this leads to some law firms specializing in these types of cases, taking cases on contingency, discouraging the plaintiff from settling, and racking up huge legal fees that will be paid by the defendant if they win. And the law supports this. I read one article about the California Court of Appeals upholding a $250,000 fee award in a case over $20,000 in unpaid wages.

> because of the potentially catastrophic costs if he doesn't win

Well, a judge could rule how much of a company's costs are fit for compensation, also considering the material situation of the plaintiff.

Yup. And basically the day the bankruptcy acquisition closed they nuked the support website and took the drivers offline.

Creative is an incredibly scummy company. I don't know anything about the founder but generally have found the fish rots from the head on issues like this.

Was E-Mu the brand with the unicorn logo? I knew a few musicians that had racks of 1RU pieces of gear. I remember the E-Mu name and the unicorn logo, and in my brain they are on the same gear. But in my brain, things get fuzzy when reaching back further than 15 minutes ago let alone 30 years.

That was probably MOTU (Mark of the Unicorn) which is based in Massachusetts if memory serves. I just upgraded to a MOTU interface and it's good kit.

Creative apparently did some less-than-desirable things in their heyday but I was a fanboy of theirs because of their Zen and Nomad series of MP3 players. They were arguably superior to the iPod line in virtually every respect but got no recognition, i.e. a perfect combo for the technically-inclined hipster cynic that I was in my teenage years :-P

Doh! Of course! MOTU is where I was confused. Like I said, things get fuzzy.

I remember the Nomads being the defacto standard device, until iPod. I was always surprised that they stuck around for as long and new versions as it did.

I think the MP3 players from Creative were the first? Or did another device exist before that? Except, obviously the computer itself.

Edit: just checked and this is a timeline, including previous devices: https://www.timetoast.com/timelines/mp3-players-throughout-h...

There was also forcing EAX into Doom 3 by threatening a patent lawsuit over Carmack's Reverse, which both Creative and John Carmack independently invented.

https://techreport.com/news/7113/creative-patents-carmacks-r...

To be fair, quite a few music synthesizer companies of that era died. Moog, Sequential, Oberheim, PPG, Synclavier, …

Rossum is still doing synths and recently re-issued a SP2100, at $6000 a pop though... Hopefully he can get his brand name back.

I think it was Ensoniq who were ex Commodore employees responsible for the Sid chip on the C64.

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