Greetings!
 Due to the
Thanksgiving holiday, there are just THREE WORKING
DAYS left until the early bird deadline for Winter
Symposium registration.
The online registration system will continue
working over the holidays so you can still sign up at
early bird rates up until midnight on November
30th. The online registration portal automatically
takes into account early bird rates and capacity for the
training classes, so it is important to get your
registration completed on time to secure your space
and the reduced rate.
Although the ALMA office will be closed this
Thursday and Friday, I will endeavor to return emails
and phonecalls on Friday, so if you have any questions
about registration, please call the ALMA office or email
me.
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Papers
 Our technical papers have now
been selected. They are:
- How to cope with production noise during
end-of-line testing, by Stefan Irrgang
& Wolfgang Klippel, Klippel GmbH
- Loudspeaker Production
Variance by Laurie Fincham of THX, and Steve
Hutt.
Woofer Design using non-linear BL(x)
curves - Peter Larsen,
Loudsoft
More
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5 Reasons to Exhibit at ALMA in a
Recession
 Its often hard to justify
marketing activity in a recession. However, a recession
is often the time when you should
be promoting your products. Why? Here are five
reason to exhibit at ALMA when business is down:
- If your competitors are there and you are not,
people will be speculating that you are going out of
business, or going through tougher times than your
competitors. Regardless of any truth in this, your
customers are likely to turn to the companies that
they perceive as 'more stable' or doing better.
- Its not what it costs, but what you save. A
regular ALMA exhibitor once told me that the reason he
exhibits every year is because he gets to see 10 of
his major customers in two days, with just one flight.
To pay his regular courtesy visit to all of these
customers individually would cost him approximately 6
times the cost of his ALMA booth, flights and hotel
rooms.
- Customers shop around in a recession. They feel
the pinch too, and are under pressure to cut costs.
Your customers are more likely than ever to be talking
to your competitors, and their customers will be keen
to speak to you.
- When business is booming, engineers are so busy
that they do not have time to look for new ideas and
specify new products. When business is quiet, they
investigate new products and technologies. They have
time to implement new test systems and test new
components. Even if they are not spending money right
now, they are making decisions and specifying products
that will affect future spending. You need to know
what your customers are up to!
- ALMA is, and always has been a very cost effective
show. A booth is a fraction of the price of AES, CES
or other audio shows, and there are no high union
labor fees, carpet charges etc. Lunches are included,
and hotel rooms are cheap. And on top of that, you are
in the right location for a quick walk around CES to
research or talk with more customers. If your show
budget is cut, this is the one event you should fight
to hold on to!
In conclusion, perhaps you
should not be asking 'Can I afford to be there?' but
'Can I afford not to be
there?'
Exhibitors that have
already signed up include: Dr. Kurt Muller GmbH,
Ferrotec, G.R.A.S. Sound & Vibration, LC
Components, Listen, Inc, Loudsoft, NWAA Labs, Nuway,
Phase Design, Prism Sound, VoiceCoil, Danville Signal,
Henkel Corporation, Klippel
GmbH.
More about Exhibiting
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Training Course:
DSP
Paul Beckmann and Al Clark will be teaching
"Applied DSP for Loudspeaker Applications. This half-day
course provides an overview of Digital Signal Processing
with an emphasis on audio applications. It
includes basic theory on filters and filter design, and
discusses practical issues faced when implementing
algorithms in real-time on a digital signal
processor. The material is presented in an
easy-to-understand format with a heavy emphasis on
practical application. The course is ideal for engineers
with a basic understanding of signal processing seeking
an introduction to digital processing
concepts. Full
details |
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Call For
Tutorials 
You asked for it - you've got it!
In the post-show survey last year, several of you
suggeted tolerancing as an interesting topic for a round
table discussion. This year's subject is "Tolerating
tolerances: Measurements that add value not cost".
We also have a new format for the round table. Rather
than everyone discussing the same question, we have
5 tables of 8 people, each discussing a different aspect
of tolerancing. This means that when the results of each
discussion are presented at the end, there will be 5
totally different presentations which should result
in more useful information being disseminated. You can
secure your spot at the table when you sign up online -
just select the round table and pick your topic.
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Online
Attendee Registration
Register Today! Don't miss the
early bird deadline. Please note that in order to
register at member rates, you will need to enter your
member code. This has been emailed to the main ALMA
contact at your company. Please call ALMA at
617-314-6977 or send us an email if you are a
member and need your code (or if you are not sure if
your company is a member). If you have any problems at
all with online registration, please contact ALMA at the
number above for assistance. | |
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Review of 2008 Event
Did you miss last year's event? With record numbers of
attendees, it was one of our most successful events to
date. Read all about it
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ALMA is
happy to issue invitation letters to help you get a visa to
travel to the US. Please email ALMA if you require an
invitation letter, and let us know if you would like to attend
as a visitor or exhibitor.
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Exhibitors - Maximize your return on
investment - advertise here. Call ALMA for details.
617-314-6977.
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