There is something that’s been bothering me recently. Maybe it’s been bothering you too. Or maybe it used to bother you and now you don’t care anymore. Anyway…

The turn-around time and support responsiveness from Electrotap has been inconsistent the past couple of years. How did we get here?

Electrotap is structured somewhat like a small co-op with five or six individuals contributing time and energy in an adjunct capacity. As we’ve grown-up, added children to our families, and transitioned through different jobs and towns, we’ve continued to love Electrotap and believe in what it’s doing. But how do we provide a better more responsive support experience and also free ourselves up to do some much needed new product development?

The first part comes directly from us: recommitting ourselves to a positive and fulfilling support experience. The people who have been our customers have produced some really amazing art, music, and research over the last 6 years and we want that to keep happening. The second part of the equation comes from an upgrade in technology. Last month we opened the doors on http://community.electrotap.com — our new support site, forum, and knowledge base.

The new site is powered by GetSatisfaction, an effective and high-powered service that helps customers and their companies get quick answers to questions and keep from drowning in overwhelming numbers of queries. Especially when it’s the same kinds of question that occur over and over again. Through this change we are aiming to improve our responsiveness, make answers easier to find, increase our accountability by making these dialogs public, and foster community by providing a forum where community members can help each other instead of being solely dependent upon us.

Through this change we also are able to expand our coverage of support issues as they come up because there are now tentacles reaching out from http://community.electrotap.com to Facebook and Twitter as well as our main site. Also as a bonus: answer someone else’s question on community.electrotap.com, and we’ll give you 10% off on your next order!

Thanks to all who participated in our Cyber Monday festivities. It was fun, if exhausting. We had 40 times the usual traffic on our site, the most sales we’ve ever had in a single day, and a lot of interesting conversations with customers. We gained a lot of valuable insights from these exchanges!

If there is anything we can be doing better, please let us know. Also be sure to follow us on Twitter and find us Facebook (not to mention our http://community.electrotap.com pages). Those are the places where we really have our “ear to the ground” and are listening to feedback.

Thanks again for making this Cyber Monday a huge success!

We decided to try and have a little fun for Cyber Monday this year. We’re having a super-crazy sale on everything: Use the coupon code CYBRMON at checkout and you’ll get 40% off your entire order. For example:

• Max/MSP/Jitter (with Free Tap.Tools): save $279
• Teabox Sensor Interface: save $158
• Tap.Tools Pro: save $39
• Sensors, etc. all 40% off

It’s only one day! So if you’ve been on the fence, or have a demo that is going to expire, jump in now! More info @ http://static.electrotap.com/cybermonday.html

More than a couple of people have told us we’re nuts ;-) We hope you’ll have as much fun as we’re having!

We’ve extended our 20% discount on all orders, now through December 1.
To get the discount, enter the coupon code MAX4LIVE on our checkout page.

Hope you enjoy Tap.Tools 3.2 and everything else that’d hiding in our shop!

One of the axioms of construction is that renovating is more difficult than new construction. There are lots of obstacles, there are lots of sensitivities, and there is inertia (an object at rest tends to stay at rest). We’ve had the wheels in motion at Electrotap for over 6 years now, and its time for some renovation. And we’ve got a few big things in the works.

Relocating Electrotap

Electrotap is in the process of relocating from Indiana to Louisiana. Dr. Jesse Allison has taken a position at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge. We’re looking forward to seeing what cross-pollination and cooperation come forth from the new environment. In particular, Jesse will be sharing his experience of co-founding Electrotap with his students and working in a truly cross-disciplinary setting. We are expecting some additional exciting opportunities will develop from this new relationship over coming months and years.

Refocusing Electrotap

We initially founded Electrotap to focus on hardware development in general, and sensor/interface/audio hardware in particular. In order to give ourselves a kick-start, however, we also pulled in some existing software projects and products that we already had and threw them “into the pot”. The big example here is Tap.Tools, which had already been in existence for 4 years.

Initially this helped in our efforts to gain some credibility and critical mass. At this point it ends up being distracting and diffusing the core focus of Electrotap for working with physical computing interfaces such as sensors.

As a result of refocusing Electrotap on hardware, Tap.Tools is being spun-off. It will be maintained, developed, and supported by 74 Objects . Electrotap will continue to sell Tap.Tools, but as a reseller rather than as a developer. The first version of Tap.Tools to bear the 74 Objects name will be Tap.Tools 3.1, which should be released shortly.

Recasting Electrotap

It isn’t very often that you get a chance to reshape who you are and how you do things. It’s exciting for us to have this opportunity to revisit and revise how we work and what we do. As new products bubble up from the overwhelming list of ideas we have, we’ll be sure to share them here and on our Twitter feed . You may also begin to see some changes to the website, and now you’ll know what it’s all about.

One thing hasn’t changed: We originally set out to make the best (bar none) sensor systems on the planet for artists and musicians; and to do it in an economically, ethically, and environmentally responsible way. We’ve done that, and now we’re putting ourselves in a better position to build on it.

Electrotap is now on Twitter! You can follow us @ http://twitter.com/electrotap

Everything at http://shop.electrotap.com can be had with a 5% discount through December 31. Just enter the following discount code when checking-out:

CHRISTMAS2009

Enjoy!