philips: 90RL412 (90 RL 412); Limbo de Luxe 412

Many of the Philips 90RLxxx radio sets were produced by Coronet Industries Ltd. in Hong Kong, Asia. This is also true for this Philips 90RL412 set. Philips simply ordered these sets, payed the bill and sold the items in numerous countries, including The Netherlands.

At RMorg these sets are listed as manufactured by Philips Österreich, or even Philips Deutschland. Only one set (the Philips 90RL136) is listed as produced by "Philips Hong Kong". This is not the case, but the country field content is at least correct.

Is there some logical reasoning behind this? Or is "Country" just one of the countries were the set was sold, and "Manufacturer" the name of the sales organisation in this specific country?

Of course I did study the "Help screen" that can be accessed using the blue "Info Knopf". It simply defines the "Maker" (or Manufacturer) as:

< Maker
Fill in just the first word. You will later get a selection if there are several possibilities. >

For "Country" there is no explanation at all, it may be the Country of Origin, Country of Destination, Country were the set was sold, Country where the set owner lives, or even the Country where the set was manufactured. I simply have no idea. I think the third definition (Country where the set was sold to the end-user) is often used in the RMorg database.

So my question is: can anybody clarify the meaning of Country and Manufacturer in relation to the Philips 90RL412 Portable Radio Set?

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Hello John,

This is a bit of a grey area and I am sure Ernst will comment on it. The word "manufacturer" has been expanded to "maker / brand" on the home page. In some cases, brand has been further expanded to "importer / major retailer". An example of this is Penney's of the USA, a major retailer who sold a large number of transistor radios in the 60's under their own name. Many of these were in fact manufactured in Japan by Toshiba and other manufacturers, but are listed as made by Penney's of the USA. This is similar to the Philip's sets to which you refer. In cases like this, it is a good idea to add "manufactured in Japan for Penney's of the USA" and for sets such as the Philip's, "made in Hong Kong for Philips, Austria" etc. in the notes on the model page..

If we do not use this "freedom" for manufacturer / brand, virtually every set manufactured now would be listed in the future under "made in China" rather than attributed to the retailer for whom they were made. As I say, it is a gray area and a difficult one to define.

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William,

>>>As I say, it is a gray area and a difficult one to define.

Thanks for your reply. I agree with you that it is a gray area at the moment. The problem with unclear field definitions is:

- searching for a given set is difficult because the meaning of the "Maker" and  "Country" fields is ambiguous. Imagine that you search for this set, typing "Philips" and "90RL" into the search field at the RMorg home page. If you try this you will find that you have to choose from a list of 33 Countries. There is a chance of only 3% that you will choose the right Country (Österreich) and find this specific model.

- many  "Double" models (models that are virtually equal) will be created, mainly because the original model was not found in the first place, partly due to guesses of what Country means here.

- uploading of correct data for a given set is difficult, because you never know if you use the  "right" interpretation. Administrators can give no information, as definitions are vague or non-existent ("gray ").

Result of this is that a dedicated  "Simple Search" is invented in order to overcome the seach problems. And numerous Doublures can be found in the RMorg database. And uploading is time-consuming because the Uploader and the Administrators will have to negotiate which Field interpretation should be used for a given model.

I do not agree with you that it is difficult to define a field. A "Brand" field can be defined instead of the "Maker" field. That will be a practical solution for this "gray area problem". The Brand field should contain a Brand name, nothing more (i.e. Philips). A Brand name will be found on almost every set and every Service Manual. Otherwise the Brand name is  "Unknown". Besides, the  "Brand" interpretation is already used by RMorg, see the Dutch "Erres" radio sets for a fine example. Erres sets were produced by NSF, Van der Heem and by Philips. RMorg lists all these sets under the "Erres" label.

The Country field should not be used for searching purposes. This change will make the RMorg models very easy accessable, and a large number of Double (and Triple etc.) models will be identfied. The definition of Country can be  "Country where the set was produced". I am aware of the fact that the Country may be unknown, but that is far better then "Österreich" for a set like the 90RL412.

If the Name of the Manufacturer is known (Coronet Industries Ltd), this information can be saved into the Notes field. Of course a dedicated  "Manufacturer" field can be added to the database. But this will cost time, and should be put onto the shortlist of  "nice things to do in the future".

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This is only my personal opinion, but I think that sometimes in an effort to resolve confusion, we only introduce more.  To me, at least, maker means manufacturer, ie. the company that actually did the assembly.  Brand means whatever is on the nameplate.  That can be the same as manufacturer, for companies that sell radios under their own name.   I'm not sure what the significance of "major retailer" might be.  Is this the name of the store where you bought the item?  If so, is that important?

Part of the problem is that a lot of terms on the site were translated from German into non-idiomatic English, which makes it difficult for speakers of English to figure out what was originally meant.  That's not anyone's fault, but perhaps some judicious editing would help.  Just my opinion.

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Michele,

>>>To me, at least, maker means manufacturer, ie. the company that actually did the assembly.  Brand means whatever is on the nameplate. 

You are absolutely right. The maker of this set is Coronet Industries, and the brand name is Philips.

Yesterday I issued a change request to the RMorg admins. My proposal is to change the maker of this set to Coronet Industries and the brand name to Philips Eindhoven.

If this is not possible (the current situation at RMorg is that there might be only one single database field for Maker, Brand, Retailer and Country info) my advise is to use this single field for the Brand name only.

The Country, Maker and Retailer information can be safely put into the Notes field of this model.

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