Srsly? Unless
@FractalAudio and Fractal workers are generously funding the operation of the company with their personal money/labor (and not making enough profits as a company to survive) then it’s us — the Axe FX customers and
especially the repeat buyers who at some point flip their older units at a loss — who provide Fractal’s profits and support their continued operation. No, Cliff doesn’t have to listen to anyone at all ever but it would be damned foolish not to — and that’s one thing I am absolutely certain he is not.
Do you know Fractal Audio's history?
Back in the early 2000's, Cliff left his lucrative sonar engineering job to create a revolutionary guitar amp and effects modeling system that ran the most sophisticated code on the best possible hardware. That product, now known as the Axe Fx Standard, has established digital modeling as a viable alternative to analog amps and effects.
He did it all by himself in the beginning, from reading all the necessary books about tube circuits, to engineering the whole unit. He put a very substantial amount of his own time and capital into it and he still listened, on the old setbb forum mind you, to customers in a way that no other company did. And with no other company.... I really mean not a single one.
I agree, it would be foolish to disregard customer's opinions completely, but sometimes, it's not about disregarding opinions, it's about making tough decisions and compromises that might anger some customers and benefit others.
Cliff has released the MK I model 3, almost 4, years ago, and, at that time, he wasn't thinking about FullRes IRs, in fact, he told us in a forum post way back, that he mostly even preferred shorter IRs. That's because he was mainly interested in delivering the best possible studio/recorded guitar tone. Over the years, customers started to long for the amp in the room tone, and, since those customers started to grow in numbers, Cliff took it upon himself to find a way to appease those who are obsessed about the room tone.
He didn't know that he would implement something such as FullRes IRs down the road, especially since we already had UltraRes IRs. The MK II was released in order to provide more memory for these new IRs. There's still the same space for regular FW improvements on both the MK I and II, it's just that the FullRes IRs might not be accesible to the MK I crowd.
How is it not Cliff's full right to release a new hardware unit that better accomodates new technology and offers some code that is only available on the new hardware unit? Why is he obliged to listen to us in that scenario? He isn't actively seeking for reasons and features to profit more off of existing or potential customers in a way a typical corporation would do. He's just pushing the boundaries once again.
In my opinion, Cliff has given us way more meaningful updates to his products than all the other competitors combined, and he shouldn't get ANY backlash for technological progress. Yet, since the days of the standard and the ultra, people have been complaining about minute differences. There are bound to be little differences between the Axe II XL and the + version, the standard and the ultra, the MK I and the II, otherwise, these hardware upgrades would be meaningless. Technological progress happens, and it sometimes needs better/additional hardware to function. That's all there is to it.
If you want 100%, not 98%, of Cliff's cooking, you might need to pony up from time to time and pay that extra dollar.