swldstn wrote:
I know it is important for Sony to stay tight lipped and secretive about their approach to camera and firmware development but it’s also important to their customers that we understand what we are buying and how a product will be supported. The purchase of one body like the A1 is a small fraction of the owners costs incurred when you buy into a brand. Overall the body cost is probably only one tenth or one fifth the system cost. A proper balance needs to be achieved and as on owner of more than 17 Sony A7x, A7Rx, A9x, A1, and A6xxx I’m not sure these days I’m comfortable with Sony’s openness on their priorities and their willingness to share these. Not sure what the have to do but it seems their user community is frustrated with them....Show more →
Good publicity doesn't spread as fast as bad publicity. Look at all the "whining" (me included) in various forums, FB, YT, etc, some of which came from ardent Sony supporters too. This can't be a good thing for Sony.
swldstn wrote:
I know it is important for Sony to stay tight lipped and secretive about their approach to camera and firmware development but it’s also important to their customers that we understand what we are buying and how a product will be supported. The purchase of one body like the A1 is a small fraction of the owners costs incurred when you buy into a brand. Overall the body cost is probably only one tenth or one fifth the system cost. A proper balance needs to be achieved and as on owner of more than 17 Sony A7x, A7Rx, A9x, A1, and A6xxx I’m not sure these days I’m comfortable with Sony’s openness on their priorities and their willingness to share these. Not sure what the have to do but it seems their user community is frustrated with them....Show more →
I was surprised to see that most camera manufacturers don't have any kind of roadmap. I guess I could see that as a sort of "showing your hand" type thing but I come from computer hardware and while they don't give hard commitments you can kind of get an idea of what they will hit each time. AMD for instance gave a fairly detailed roadmap all the way into their AM5 platform years ago so you'd know what to expect. Even on lens stuff they don't seem to have any kind of real roadmap that I've found though I believe Nikon does try to show a kind of "expected" thing on their lens selection.
Jerky_san wrote:
I was surprised to see that most camera manufacturers don't have any kind of roadmap. I guess I could see that as a sort of "showing your hand" type thing but I come from computer hardware and while they don't give hard commitments you can kind of get an idea of what they will hit each time. AMD for instance gave a fairly detailed roadmap all the way into their AM5 platform years ago so you'd know what to expect. Even on lens stuff they don't seem to have any kind of real roadmap that I've found though I believe Nikon does try to show a kind of "expected" thing on their lens selection....Show more →
Nikon had to show the roadmap to keep its users from migrating, Sony doesn't feel they have to worry about it...
At the moment, Sony is sitting in the driver’s seat—highly developed eco system, best in class AF, sensor technology that is prevalently used, and what appears to be advanced AI. The rest of the field is playing catch-up.
Jerky_san wrote:
I was surprised to see that most camera manufacturers don't have any kind of roadmap. I guess I could see that as a sort of "showing your hand" type thing but I come from computer hardware and while they don't give hard commitments you can kind of get an idea of what they will hit each time. AMD for instance gave a fairly detailed roadmap all the way into their AM5 platform years ago so you'd know what to expect. Even on lens stuff they don't seem to have any kind of real roadmap that I've found though I believe Nikon does try to show a kind of "expected" thing on their lens selection....Show more →
Understand that Sony is in a very different position than Nikon. Sony's challenge is to sell cameras and lenses to new users. These new users will take two forms. One new people getting into high end photography, existing photographers migrating from another system. Market share numbers show just how incredibly successful Sony was at this. Now that the mirrorless market is maturing the mass brand migration of existing photographers will not be as big a driver as it was in the past. So, I expect we will see some changes in Sony's practices over the next few years.
Nikon on the other hand was in an entirely different situation. They were behind in mirrorless and the whole mirrorless infrastructure. They didn't have competitive products to sell. They had to do something to convince their user base to stay with Nikon. The roadmap was a way of showing them that if they were patient, stayed with Nikon, they would eventually have a Nikon system competitive with Sony.
Douglas L wrote:
Good publicity doesn't spread as fast as bad publicity. Look at all the "whining" (me included) in various forums, FB, YT, etc, some of which came from ardent Sony supporters too. This can't be a good thing for Sony.
Go to any brand board and you’ll hear the whining. Just like bad publicity spreads faster than good, people whining is much louder than content people. Sort of the loud minority.
I don’t know anything about that; I’m a Sony user and this is a Sony thread in a Sony forum. I do know Sony has a 200-600 that a lot of people can’t get to work correctly and they’ve done nothing to address it. And then there’s the reports of poor A1 firmware. But as a Sony fanboy, please continue to bash everyone else and kiss Sony’s butt.
osv2 wrote:
so nikon has been working on that 200-600 vaporware for three years now, and they still can't get it right?
j4nu wrote:
Nikon had to show the roadmap to keep its users from migrating, Sony doesn't feel they have to worry about it...
Up until just recently I think that was true...but I think Sony is going to have to start worrying about it....in fact the super early pre-announcement of the 300/2.8 (supposedly not out till 2024) is a sign they may be waking up. (granted SAR says they may be announcing that by end of this month which would imply an accelerated timeline).
Now maybe there aren't enough customers out there like me who will quite readily jump ship and do a complete system switch. I do think most will stick it out with their invested system. I think Sony was able to pull a lot of switchers over to the system only because Canon and Nikon were lagging in MILCs and people saw they were going to have to make a full investment in new lenses eventually with Canon and Nikon MILCs even if they stayed with their current DSLR brand of choice. However, I don't see that trend being sustainable as people make the full investment into Nikon Z lenses and Canon RF lenses. At that point the investment in the given system will keep them there. Sony is going to have a lot harder time getting customers to switch over to them if they've already gone full MILC/lenses with Canon or Nikon.
For myself, the camera superiority (IMHO) of the Sony A1 is enough to keep me in the system for the foreseeable future. The Nikon lens selection was so tempting but buying that Z9 for a second time showed me the lenses weren't worth the compromises with the body. Canon has nothing interesting in lenses nor bodies at this time. R1 will probably be interesting but there are no lenses that would interest me more so than my 600GM and 400GM.
But Sony A1 body is expensive. Assuming A1II will come in at the same price point, I may need to be tempted by some sort of roadmap that shows some DO/PF lenses or built-in TC lenses coming in the future in order to spend on the A1II.....well in reality, probably not...I'll still spend on the A1II anyways but I'd be all in if I had a hint of future lenses that were competition to Nikon's selection.
arbitrage wrote:
Up until just recently I think that was true...but I think Sony is going to have to start worrying about it....in fact the super early pre-announcement of the 300/2.8 (supposedly not out till 2024) is a sign they may be waking up. (granted SAR says they may be announcing that by end of this month which would imply an accelerated timeline).
Now maybe there aren't enough customers out there like me who will quite readily jump ship and do a complete system switch. I do think most will stick it out with their invested system. I think Sony was able to pull a lot of switchers over to the system only because Canon and Nikon were lagging in MILCs and people saw they were going to have to make a full investment in new lenses eventually with Canon and Nikon MILCs even if they stayed with their current DSLR brand of choice. However, I don't see that trend being sustainable as people make the full investment into Nikon Z lenses and Canon RF lenses. At that point the investment in the given system will keep them there. Sony is going to have a lot harder time getting customers to switch over to them if they've already gone full MILC/lenses with Canon or Nikon.
For myself, the camera superiority (IMHO) of the Sony A1 is enough to keep me in the system for the foreseeable future. The Nikon lens selection was so tempting but buying that Z9 for a second time showed me the lenses weren't worth the compromises with the body. Canon has nothing interesting in lenses nor bodies at this time. R1 will probably be interesting but there are no lenses that would interest me more so than my 600GM and 400GM.
But Sony A1 body is expensive. Assuming A1II will come in at the same price point, I may need to be tempted by some sort of roadmap that shows some DO/PF lenses or built-in TC lenses coming in the future in order to spend on the A1II.....well in reality, probably not...I'll still spend on the A1II anyways but I'd be all in if I had a hint of future lenses that were competition to Nikon's selection....Show more →
I really don't know how much pressure they feel or will feel. We are so photo centric in this forum we forget that a number of users and especially the ones I see at sporting events are shooting video and stills or video only with their Sony bodies. Sony probably knows the data on how many users are getting their cameras for video and how important those features are to their base. So all of this lamenting lack of firmware updates for photos may be for naught as it may be very low on their priority list of features to add or fix. Frankly, the number of folks I see shooting birds with the a1 and 200-600 is almost nil. While we may have many in this forum, I wonder what the percentage of their users this combination is important to compared to their entire user base.
it's not specific to sony photo gear like the 300/2.8, sony is just taking a page from the nikon playbook, for instance they are pre-announcing an uncoming xperia product announcement.
osv2 wrote:
it's not specific to sony photo gear like the 300/2.8, sony is just taking a page from the nikon playbook, for instance they are pre-announcing an uncoming xperia product announcement.
lol man 5 days wait.. that is super early to have it up.. guess they are trying to generate hype but the problem with Sony phones ironically is the same problem apparently with their cameras. They don't keep the firmware up to date and that should be a lot easier with their phones frankly since someone else literally gives them most of the code and they just customize it a bit. They also charge a very nice premium but refuse to commit to more than 2 years of updates while the rest are going much longer these days.
Jerky_san wrote:
lol man 5 days wait.. that is super early to have it up.. guess they are trying to generate hype but the problem with Sony phones ironically is the same problem apparently with their cameras. They don't keep the firmware up to date and that should be a lot easier with their phones frankly since someone else literally gives them most of the code and they just customize it a bit. They also charge a very nice premium but refuse to commit to more than 2 years of updates while the rest are going much longer these days.
sony posted that video over a week ago, so more like two weeks wait.
for what these xperia phones cost tho, it's reasonable to expect at least a couple of o.s. updates... people fail to realize that sony is not trying to compete with the general smartphone market, the xperia phones are designed to interface with sony cameras, as productivity tools for acquiring content.
I am worried about the trolls who used to bash Nikon and Canon all these years and what they will do
once Nikon and Canon have caught up to Sony. I hope they will find employment elsewhere.
The loudness of our chatter will mostly likely fall on deaf ears. Even the influencers are powerless. Sony has a philosophy and a strategy to fulfill that philosophy—it's what got them to their current success in the imaging business.
It was obvious to me when Sony flatly refused to backport something like the red AF box to the A7Riii that they simply don't care about their customers once they have their money, when compared to other brands.
That said, FW bringing features for years into a product's life is a fading concept. It used to be Fuji's speciality but even the lauded Kaizen model is long dead.
Consumers must be savvy enough to realize that they should buy the 1.0 product for what it can do at launch...there are no guarantees to any future improvements on any brand anymore. If a 600 page thread on a $6000 flagship camera languishing in bug hell isn't enough to wake you up...well...
