What happened to SONY?
 

I remember when SONY was THE name in home electronics, people would gladly pay more for SONY products. Where and how did they go wrong?

They still make some awesome cameras.

I bought a 60 inch Sony TV about 10 years ago. It was one of the first on the market of that size, that style. Three years later it started having problems. I don't remember the exact details, but basically there was a giant blue blob on the screen and over time it grew. This happened to be a common problem with that line of TVs. They knew about it and released it anyway.

A Facebook group was formed by someone and people started getting replacement TVs or rebates. My TV was pretty much garbage at this point. You could not watch it. This was three years in, keep in mind.

I contact them. I explain the problem. A representative contact me and says he will get back to me with more details of what they can do. A couple days later I get a phone call, and he says that I can buy a refurbished TV with a $200 discount. That was my offer.

I replied that my TV was only three years old. I had no intention of spending more money on another TV at this point. They owed me a replacement. Send me the refurbished TV and I'm happy, does not need to be new.

Guy says no. My only option is to purchase a refurbished TV with the discount.

I told him that I would never buy a Sony product again. And I haven't. And I won't.

My Panasonic TV I bought that same year as the Sony TV. Works just as good today as it did 10 years ago.

All of their divisions went downhill in the last decade, including the gaming division thanks to the PS3 launch failure. even if the PS3 is selling now sony will never recover all the billions lost for the earlier PS3 failures.

The last Sony product I bought many moons ago was a digital8 camcorder. Shot about 2hrs. of footage...its been collectin' dust on my filing cabinet ever since.

Perhaps they just haven't kept up with the changing consumer market and electronics evolution. If I shoot personal video now - it's just with my SGS4 cell - the big Sony cam is an obsolete relic.

Downstairs we have a 52" Sony CRT projo - bigass dinosaur. Still works, but we haven't turned it on in ages. Instead we watch a 42" Samsung flatscreen in the bedroom upstairs.

Ebbs and Flows, Swings and Roundabouts.

I remember when AWA were the best radio brand, when Kreisler was the best color TV on the market, when Sharp made the best reel to reel consumer tape decks, when Tascam made the best prosumer tape decks, TDK produced the best tape, BASF made great video tape, National Panasonic made the best portable electronics, Sony made the best Beta video recorders, JVC made the best VHS.

None of those names are big anymore.

The best color TV I remember was a Zenith console that lasted me 25+yrs (without service or repairs) - now we're lucky if a flatscreen lasts more than a few years without service or replacement.

Agreed with the TDK for best tape - I liked both their cassette and videotape. BASF was good for awhile prior, though.

Sony was the industry standard for Beta recorders - it was superior to VHS - and SVHS still didn't quite rival it.

Best cassette I remember (for audio quality) - Nakamichi...but they were prone to breakdowns. I had a nice Luxman K112 - but it broke down often and I only kept it a year.

I remember when Blaupunkt was all the rage for hi-end car audio - but are they even around these days? When they hit the market you would only see them in audiophile retailers...but then I started seeing crap versions of them at K-Mart and Canadian Tire.

I think think the truth is some companies were on the cutting edge but modern technology has leveled the playing field in a huge way.

Need an example? Hyundai, which I thought was a joke of a car, now has heated mirrors that fold in when you turn your car off. That kind of stuff used to be reserved for much nicer cars like BMW and Mercedes.

I had a similar experience to Sly's. I had a 40 something inch Sony that after 2 years developed a yellow irregular spot that slowly grew larger and larger.

I also had a Sony Artisan color correcting monitor that would periodically "pop" while you were staring at the screen really surprising you and fucking up your eyes.

Sony refused to warrant either one. Fuck em.

Dunno if its so much sony going bad, as much as its other companies getting better.

There was a time when if I wanted something, Sony was my default choice. Not so much these days - I'm happier to look at other brands to see what suits me, cause they are often better quality for what I want

Any chance you listened this interview? :)
https://gfy.com/fucking-around-and-pr...o-tribune.html

Trump was briefly talking about that, said that shareholders or bosses had some conflicts etc

SONY Camera
 

Bought a SONY SRL camera for about $400. Month later the display screen wouldn't work. The store said the screen was wet from user damage. B.S. Sent it to SONY and they said they would fix it for $800.

Hey SONY,"never again."

I have a Sony 70 inch and haven't had any issues with it. Apparently they've split off their tv division, or are getting ready to, after 10 years in a row of losses.

I think Sony had a billion dollar loss last year but expect to make a billion in profit in 2016. Shedding their horrible pc business was probably a good start.

i would wager that Sony is what happened to Sony. snobbery leading to resting on their laurels.


my 2008 pickup truck has heated auto folding side mirrors.

cutting edge tech hasn't leveled the playing field at all. tech trickles down from the top and ends up in more and more cars, anti-lock braking, power windows, etc, et al, on&on.

the E-class mercedes-benz is still the tech leader for autos, you won't find evasive maneuver assistance on any hyundai, while it's a standard feature on the E-class. it will ultimately end up in a hyundai, but it's wrong to think tech has leveled the playing field.

Does not even non luxury 10+ years old European cars like peugeot 206 or 307 have that?
Pretty standard feature for a while.
Ps: they fold when you lock your car, not when you turn off the engine, so maybe not the same thing.

My daughter bought a Sony laptop once and I've never seen something come so bloated with garbage software and borderline spyware / adware crap from the factory. You almost needed to format the thing once you got it home.

Hyundai and Kia produced what they called 'grocery-getter' cars - bland pieces of disposable junk.

But that all changed when they hired Peter Schreyer from Audi and basically gave him a blank cheque to re-design their entire lineup.

I drive a Kia Optima EX Lux. Aside from the Infinity premium soundsystem, it has features like rain-sensing wipers (heated), auto-dimming rearview mirror (with digital compass built-in), heated and cooled seats (front and rear). Dual climate control, built-in NAV, 6-speed auto/manual transmission. Heated side mirrors. Dual moon-roof (retractable sunroof). Hell, even has a cooled glovebox for keeping drinks chilled.

Sounds crazy...but I have no qualms parking it next to an Audi A4-A5 or a Jag.

They've come a long way. :)

im still using my sony via laptop i bought over 7 years ago.

their cameras are still pretty good. lots of people love their rx 100 cameras. i have the rx 100 II and its been a good camera though i think the zoom seriously lacks.

The President/CEO and Chairman died about 10 years ago. What you are seeing are the final stages of decline where all the greatness he brought to the company ceased to exist and the company slowly dies. I shouldn't be shocking if in 10 years we are all asking "what happened to Apple?"... or if Elon Musk dies, "what happened to Tesla".

A successful founder, President, CEO etc works hard to create a culture (such as the founder of Sony), they rarely work hard to create a system where that culture will continue without them. Sony only made it as far as one leader past the founder before the company culture eroded.

Spot on, also succession planning isn't the best in Japan.

Examples: Isuzu , Olympus, Oki, Pioneer, Ricoh, Hitachi. All once great brands left to wonder what the fuck to do after their strong management heads died or moved on elsewhere.

Think I've only owned 1 Sony product many years ago and speakers had more Treble than Bass to them. Threw an old Samsung box TV by the dumpster when I moved 3 years ago that was well over 10 years old and is probably still working for whoever scooped it from the trash. Haven't really had any issues with any of the electronics I've bought over the years...

Samsung-TV
Toshiba-TV
Samsung-BluRay
Yamaha-Surround System
Harmon Kardon-CD Burner/Computer Speakers
Alpine-Car Deck
Rockford Fosgate-Car Speakers
JL Audio-Subwoofers

and a few other brands of car speakers/amps that I don't recall.

Very, very true.

So far Apple has been weathering the loss of Jobs - but they haven't really done anything exceptionally innovative.

I'd forgotten about Sony's loss of their President/CEO a decade ago. But now that you mention it, you can definitely see a steady decline in the company since that point.

Look at Chrysler's history. Same situation. They were on the ropes prior and after Lee Iacoca's tenure.

yep, his point was that he used to buy SONY TV's for his hotels and that he and others would pay a premium for them but somehow they blew it - he really didn't have an answer, he guessed mismanagement

I'm old enough that I remember as a little boy that 'Made in Japan' on anything was code for 'piece of shit crap'. I remember an aunt, she was young and single at the time, came to our house in a new tiny Toyota and everybody laughed at it.

The very mission of the founder of Sony was to change that perception - and he was quite successful at it. It's a shame to see all those decades of hard work and dedication melt away to create the very situation he toiled to change.

Steve Earle's song 'Guitar Town' had a lyric that was censored by some radio stations.

Everybody told me that you can't get far
On thirty-seven dollars and a Jap guitar.

They over-dubbed and substituted the word Jap for "cheap". :1orglaugh

Now we have "Made in China" as our mantra for cheap consumer products division.

On the home stereo side, I was never impressed with Sony. I preferred amps by Toshiba or Harmon Cardon, and speakers by PSB. For TV's, Panasonic and Samsung seemed to delver great picture for less than Sony.

I have a few old Sony Camcorders that still work great, and we have a 30 year old Sony clock radio that we paid $20 for new that, also cheap and crappy, still works flawlessly.

this reply is typed on Sony Vaio :Graucho

I bought a Sony CCD-V5 8mm camcorder the first month they hit the market in 1987. 8mm was still a brand-new format at the time. Paid a little over $2k for it.

I put that camera through hell and back for a full decade - it was a great unit. Shot thousands of hours of video with it. Never had to go in for service or repair. It went to more events, parties and functions than I did, lol.

Considering what I put it through - lasting ten years was remarkable. I replaced it with a Sony Digital8 cam (that I barely used anyways...by then I'd burned out of shooting vids).

That's what I'm saying - Hyundai (and Kia) were considered pieces of crap. Now they are making really nice cars.

It's the same thing with TVs. Before we used to have a handful of companies making TVs. Now we have all of these brand new TV companies, and they seem to be just as good.

I'm sure the hardware is top notch. I just hate all their pre-installed software.

I had a 50" with the same problem. We used to pretend it was aliens trying to show us their solar system (as it kind of looked like that) Sony refused to fix even though it started during warranty. Chucked it in the trash and learned not to buy sony TVs anymore...

In the 80s I had a Zenith that started developing a purple hue on each side of the picture. It was annoying, but still watchable, so I just lived with it for a while. The warranty was done and I didn't have the cash to get a serviceguy in to look at it.

Then I'm movin' my furniture around one day and discovered the purple hue had gone away. I thought maybe jostling the TV around somehow corrected the problem. I was partially right.

I had two very large 400w Audiosphere box speakers fairly close on either side of the TV. Turned out, the magnets in the woofers were so big, the magnetic signal was fuckin' with the TV screen and causing the purple color. I moved the speakers away...the problem went away. :1orglaugh

I liked the alien excuse, tho. :)

I've always liked Sony. I have a cyber shot and a wega and they pair up nicely.

soeting does have happedned but some of their products are still top notch, like their LED TVs and projectors , PS3 .

i am planing to buy couple of their large LED TVs and Projector