My conversations at the Serato booth (Itch content)

Ok,

So I spent quite a bit of time every day at namm talking with the guys at the Serato booth. Very approachable guys. Very professional. Very much fans of music and all of them, dj's themselves.

While I didn't get any gigantic bomb dropping leaks I did get some very important conformations.

a) 2011 is going to be a year of lots of focus on the Itch product. Or as they put it, repeaditly over all 4 days "2011 is going to be a very good year for itch users" *insert huge wide eyed smiles*

b) There are 2 dev teams at Serato. The Scratch Live team and the Itch team. While the Scratch live team codes for 5 products from 1 company, the Itch team codes for "currently" 9 products from 5 companies.

c) The bridge product seems to have a lot of work being done by Ableton themselves.


Like I said, not exactly bomb drops. But at namm, when you go to a booth every day, you start to build little friendships that are kind of their own little microcosm unto themselves. Not once did I get the impression that my leg was being pulled or they were just trying to hand me pr bs. When they couldnt talk about something, they wouldnt. When they wish they could talk about something, theyd flat say they wished they could. These guys seemed to be busting at the seams about a few things but seemed to be reassured in the fact that everyone would get the big Itch news "soon".

So there you have it. I hadn't posted this info here and nobody else had so I figured, you guys might be interested in it.

*my opinion*
I dont believe Pioneer would have stepped into the game with Serato if they didnt know a big push would be coming for the Itch product. I'm sure they werent thrilled about the idea that Rane has exclusivity on the Scratch Live products. So for them to go ahead with an Itch controller, especially at the price point its at (more expensive than their Traktor controller) there has to be some vailidity of "big things coming to Itch soon"

Based on these conversations I decided to hang in there and keep my VCI-300. What I personally hope for soon is more features in line with the SSL product. The bridge, the sample player, video sl to some extent (that that ill every dj videos ever).

Regardless, with Itch updates coming, Torq 2, and the next version of Traktor. I have a feeling this is going to be a VERY fun year for us here on the community .


Heres to the future.