Well, technically and legally there is nothing preventing Uli from taking the design as Robin himself admitted.
However, from a moralistic aspect, yes, it would be “right” for Uli to meet some of his demands. For the record I’m not really siding with either side in the grand scheme but rather commenting on what I believe is Robin’s poor handling of it all.
I literally just had a two hour long job interview/negotiation over the phone. Not once did I consider critiquing their business choices and when it came to compensation, I went high, they went low and we met at a very good middle. Now I get to start a whole new chapter of my life.
What I saw in that exchange was a negotiation that failed; happens all the time. Robin chose to burn the bridges. Poor choice imo. Everyone knows that Behringer is a Goliath and flinging dirt at them won’t do a damn thing in the end. And it wasn’t like he had any moral qualms working with Behringer.
I think they could’ve met somewhere in the middle, honestly more towards Uli’s side, mainly due the lack of patents/rights and the fact that Uli seems all business and too be fair kinda shameless; most titans of industry are…actually probably all of them.
To be fair he didn’t post anything about it until behringer posted that image on facebook… even if they didn’t make the image they were obviously interested in making a 303 with the DF mod because they approached him, them posting an image is likely them gauging if they want to go forward with it or not with out him. Accepting the 15k to have your name and good will on a product that isn’t built to your standards and you have no creative control over is terrible for your brand, his offer was a bit much probably but accepting the 15k wouldn’t be worth it imo if they plan to try to continue as a business.
He actually asked for 303k, haha.
Wow that “negotiation” mail from that devil fish guy was a painful read, but at the same time almost comedic. Probably not an easy character to conduct business with … I think the red flags were not just because of the unreasonable demands
This 100%…
perhaps Robin might have been completely taking the p1$$. asking for 303k 
, the new product name with Whittle in it (bwdf was it?), dissing behringer, being extremely arrogant, and those wild demands. he was never going to reach a deal.
if he was messing it’s pretty funny. if not, he’s dillusional. it’s hard to tell tho 
What went on in either parties head is pure speculation…
But I speculate exactly this. I think Robin knew exactly what he was dealing with and took the opportunity to troll hard.
it does seem like he might indeed have gone into troll beast mode 
the alternative seems absurd.
Yeah, it’s all a big guerilla marketing scheme to build his brand, purposely making some of their conversation public so that Uli gets angry and releases the rest of his carefully crafted troll emails to the public. 
Or maybe, but just maybe, he is just a regular nutjob with talent who doesnt know how and/or doesnt want to make a business out of it.
From this perspective, it’s a beautiful performance. Both pedantic and flattering and passive aggressive with absurd requests.
Perhaps why Uli cut off negotiations so abruptly. Or it was never genuine to begin with.
Yes. Fact of the matter is we don’t know but there is no agreement.
Hmmm… That’s not the way I recall that story ending. And my name is David btw 
A masterclass in how not to negotiate.
He went high. That’s how you do it. Uli could have come back but chose to cut it off. I don’t believe Ulis reach out was sincere.
Uli was most certainly trying to see if he could lowball a sucker. It also seems that he bailed out at the first sign of pushback.
I think this reflects really poorly on Behringer & exemplifies their whole approach.
it’s a shame, because even I would’ve found a Robin Whittle endorsed product, with his circuitry inside a Behri chassis hard to resist - the Devil Fish name is synonymous with the ultimate 303 in terms of features & sound.
Robin was right to stick to his guns, but UB will just blaze ahead & do what he wants anyway, because he can. It’s not a good look IMHO.
Exactly. He offered blood money. If he had been genuinely interested in a collaboration he would have countered.
On the face of what’s in the public domain it looks like it’s robin who’s pulled out and then published the emails, hence burning his bridges. The B email reads that they couldn’t do business on the proposed terms, not that they could never do business period.
All speculation based on what’s out there.
Behringer are damned if the do and damned if they don’t on this one. Do they a) let robin say what he wants and do potential damage to the brand as well as further the ‘B is the devil incarnate’ argument or b) give their side of the story and get mauled for being unprofessional? Genuine point.
I read it differently. There was no counter offer. Only an abrupt end to negotiations. That doesn’t come off to me as B interested in continuing the negotiations.
B could have told their side to the story akin to how DF played. Instead, the acted very unprofessionally by releasing the correspondence in full.
That email Robin wrote was ridiculous, are you telling me that you personally would pursue any further communications in a business relationship if you were Uli and received that email? I know it’s funny to think that he was trolling, but it does not read that way to me at all. I think the offer was genuine, it went instantly off the rails, and Uli bailed.
That is my interpretation only. You have yours. Fact of the matter is no one knows for sure but that there is no agreement.
If I were Uli and genuinely interested in a collab I would have countered. Maybe with a bit of tone policing.