Seems like Ernie Ball sent them a cease & desist and Sire chose not to fight it. I would love to see someone challenge their claim to a trademark of a tuner layout, but there's probably little incentive to do so.
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Seems like Ernie Ball sent them a cease & desist and Sire chose not to fight it. I would love to see someone challenge their claim to a trademark of a tuner layout, but there's probably little incentive to do so.
Well, the 3 to 1 mechanics, the round scratch plate, the banana shaped control plate etc. maybe it was a bit too much at all for Mr.Ball not to react 
. For myself I don't need a scratch plate or a banana control plate, as long as Sire doesn't change PUP design, placement and electronics. That's where the sound DNA is.
. For myself I don't need a scratch plate or a banana control plate, as long as Sire doesn't change PUP design, placement and electronics. That's where the sound DNA is.I picked up a Sire Marcus Miller V5, after a suggestion here at talkbass. My local music store had a batch they received brand new, so I picked one up. It sounds fantastic out of the box, didn't need a setup. It's a purely passive bass which is what I wanted.
I am happy with it so far.
I am happy with it so far.
now all you have to do, per the TB rules, is post a pic
I absolutely will it was early in the morning when I looked like junk and had 15 mins before walking out the door to get to work. Once I get back home I will post a pic.
The new bass silly 
Hello guys ! I'm a (born again) Sire lover. I had a V7 5 string 1st generation in the past, and I've acquired yesterday a beautiful Ash V7 Natural (2nd generation).
I'm loving the bass right now but I have a small issue with it : the neck pickup seems to distort when playing the E string, you can hear it a little bit with both pickups on, but it's really noticeable when soloing the neck pickup.
I've tried to lower the neck pickup (it's between 3/16 and 1/4 on the bass side) because I know sometimes a pickup too close to the strings can "distort" a little bit, but it looks like it's still the same.. I'm going to try a lower it a bit more to see if it makes things better, but I would love to hear anyone that had a similar experience, before bringing the bass back to the store.
Thanks a lot for reading, and you guys keep rocking !
edit : I can send audio to clearly hear the issue
I'm loving the bass right now but I have a small issue with it : the neck pickup seems to distort when playing the E string, you can hear it a little bit with both pickups on, but it's really noticeable when soloing the neck pickup.
I've tried to lower the neck pickup (it's between 3/16 and 1/4 on the bass side) because I know sometimes a pickup too close to the strings can "distort" a little bit, but it looks like it's still the same.. I'm going to try a lower it a bit more to see if it makes things better, but I would love to hear anyone that had a similar experience, before bringing the bass back to the store.
Thanks a lot for reading, and you guys keep rocking !
edit : I can send audio to clearly hear the issue
If you haven't, change your battery.
Nice looking bass!!
I would say, if it ain't broke, don't fix it...
Grass looks greener on the other side...
I'll stop there
Sha
You're right...
Looks like they're hiding them for some reason... Or someone in marketing screwed up...
Maybe they want to avoid a scenario that looks like Wal-Mart the day after Thanksgiving!?
People are ready to fight for their new Sire Z's
Don't think the Z's will be collecting dust in the music stores!
Shark,
You're right...
Looks like they're hiding them for some reason... Or someone in marketing screwed up...
Maybe they want to avoid a scenario that looks like Wal-Mart the day after Thanksgiving!?
People are ready to fight for their new Sire Z's
Don't think the Z's will be collecting dust in the music stores!
Sha
Shark,
You're right...
Looks like they're hiding them for some reason... Or someone in marketing screwed up...
Maybe they want to avoid a scenario that looks like Wal-Mart the day after Thanksgiving!?
People are ready to fight for their new Sire Z's
Don't think the Z's will be collecting dust in the music stores!
I'm sure they got a letter from Ernie Ball about the 3+1 tuner arrangement. They have a trademark on it so Sire will have to decide if they want to take it to court or just change the head stock. I'm assuming it will be the latter. It's interesting because they are already in production. The people who got a 4 string Z series at NAMM may have a rare collector's item.
That seems absurd. No one else can have 3+1? Gimme a break. It's like a 4+1 but with one less string on the one side 
This kind of stuff has the effect of making me avoid the company doing the suing.
This kind of stuff has the effect of making me avoid the company doing the suing.
That seems absurd. No one else can have 3+1? Gimme a break. It's like a 4+1 but with one less string on the one side
Copyrights and trademarks can seem silly to us mortals, but having an image is absolutely worth money, and I totally understand companies trying to protect that. Heck, not so long ago, a few here on this forum were wishing Sire would make a Stingray. Clearly, this will cut into Ernie Ball's sales, and they have every right to try to minimize that -- that's what copyrights and trademarks and patents ("intellectual property") are FOR: so the developers of a new idea can be the only ones to profit from it.
I can understand protecting the shape of the headstock, but the arrangement of tuners in space isn't something that should be able to be trademarked.
Business practices and law are rather bizarre, to put it as nicely as I can. What is lawful isn't always right or just. What is unethical or amoral isn't always illegal. My response to this protectionism is, make your product better and less expensive. Innovate.
Agreed. It's about as absurd as trying to trademark the concept of a circle. The amount of greed in our environment these days is just ridiculous.
In this case you are telling Musicman to "innovate" whilst letting Sire off the hook for almost directly copying Musicman's product. I love my Sire, but for them to miss the legalities on this one is incompetence. It would be simple to make a musicman "sounding" and "feeling" bass without making it look so close, but that won't drive sales as well. Sire more than competes on price, but maybe they are the ones that need to "innovate" in this particular case. The funny thing is they knew not to copy the Fender headstock but somehow didn't know not to copy the Musicman one.
Intellectual property is all based on whether the concept already existed. You can't copyright a circle because it was around before you. Apparently nobody ever put 3+1 tuners on a bass headstock before, so it's a new design, and therefore copyrightable.
So, we as intelligent humans evolve in a world where everything new is copy-righted for greed purposes.
Nice.
