Erez: [00:00:00] I think a lot about the contrast between what looks great on a web page or in a catalog some products are very aspirational and they look awesome in theory, right? And then you buy them and you live with them.
And the actual lived experience is quite
different.
[00:00:16] Introduction
Andrew: hello, welcome to the DevTools FM podcast. This is a podcast about developer tools and the people who make them. I'm Andrew. And this is my co host, Justin.
Justin: Hey everyone. Um, this is a really special episode today. I'm actually incredibly excited about it. Uh, so we have Erez Zukerman on. Um, so Erez, I would love you to, uh, sort of introduce you to our audience or introduce yourself to our audience, but also I kind of really, really want to talk about, uh, your background and how you got into the current thing that you're doing.
So, uh, yeah, would you like to tell our audience a little bit more about yourself?
Erez: Yeah, sure. Uh, I make weird keyboards. Uh, that's, that's been [00:01:00] my thing for the past few years. Uh, I am the CEO and Co-founder of ZSA, uh, Americans sometimes call it ZSA, but I call it Zs a uh, zsa.io. Uh, we make the erox cz and the moon and the plank easy. Uh, no, we used to make the plank qz. That is, we no longer do that nowadays.
We make the voyager. Um, yeah, so that's kind of where we are today. How I got here.
[00:01:26] Manufacturing the ErgoDox
Justin: Yeah, so, while I was preparing for this episode, um, Like, so I have an ErgoDox, uh, EZ, which I bought in like 2016. It's a, it's a fantastic keyboard. Um, and I'm like really into the mechanical keyboard space, which is kind of the topic of this, this conversation. We'll, we'll dig into a little bit more about like what's different in this space.
But I, when I was reading your background, I noticed that you were like, Doing web development and a lot of writing and you sort of transitioned over into having a hardware company. Uh, and I was like, what was that transition? Like, how did you [00:02:00] get from like writing web code and articles, uh, for like tech magazines and stuff and like getting into, okay, now I'm going to like build a hardware product to sell.
Cause that's a very, what I think is like a big transition, a very different industry.
Erez: Yeah, um, that's interesting. So yes, so if you look at, you know, work wise, yes, I used to be a writer. I wrote for PC world. I was a writer and editor for, uh, make use of, um, and I used to, uh, do web development. I used to code, uh, rails and react, you know, garden variety stuff. And I always wanted to have a business.
I always felt, um, In previous businesses that I worked at, uh, obviously there were always various things that I didn't quite agree with. Like, I wouldn't do it like that. Nothing major, right? Like, all companies were good. But, I, I always have this thought in the back of my mind, well, I would do it maybe a little bit differently.
Or I had, you know, I had, I have [00:03:00] many opinions. Um, And at the same time, I was really passionate about keyboards. I always have been. I don't even know why. I guess it's something, you know, when there's a device that you use for. You know, 40, 50, 60 hours a week sometimes, you kind of, again, get to have opinions and you get to have maybe wishes, I wish this was a little different and whatnot. But, what really happened was I got super lucky. That's the real answer. Because I'm obviously not the only guy around who had an idea, Oh, you know, I wish I had my own business. Oh, I wish keyboards work differently. The idea part is easy. Where I got incredibly lucky is with my business partner. And that was, that was the real, uh, I didn't know we were going to talk business.
I thought it was going to, it's going to be more technical, but this is more of a business question. So I got to share that was the breakthrough [00:04:00] because. Usually when you see like a typical crowdfunding or hardware startup story, you got a guy, guy plus idea. Okay, great. I have this thing. Maybe, maybe some degree of market validation.
Oh, other people want it too. Okay. Now let's make it. And at that point, the stories starts actually start actually converging on a fairly common path, which is let's go to Shenzhen. Let's fly to China and find a factory. You know, and you get all of these, uh, heroic and I'm not being, uh, sarcastic. They really are heroic stories by, by founders, you know, just going door to door in China, looking for the right factory, trying to get it made.
And then there's production issues and they have to fly. We've all seen that. I had none of that. None. Because my partner is my manufacturer. Long before, we talked about my background and we said I was a writer and all that. Long before then, when I, [00:05:00] you know, before I worked for PCWorld, I actually worked for this company called Tebow.
And this was before remote jobs were a thing, but they took me on remotely. I'm talking like early 2000s. And, uh, they're a Taiwanese company. High-end manufacturer of industrial equipment stuff like at the time it was, uh, serial to IP converters and things like that, like industrial gear. But very nicely done. I worked for them for several years. I was a technical writer. I did stuff there and then I moved on, but I, I moved on, you know, on on very good terms. Like we, we left and we're friends and all that. Then a few years later, I had this. Keyboard idea. And I said, well, I know who should make it. I know like the perfect company to make it.
And I reached out to Dima, Dmitry Slepov, uh, who is Tibo's managing director. And he was my boss. It's a small company and we were friends. I go, listen, I got an idea. There's this weird keyboard. It's an existing design. It's the Orgadox. [00:06:00] What do you think? Can we do something? And he's like, yeah, that's kind of interesting.
And, and then we started looking into it and he bid on an Ergodox on eBay. This is an Ergodox, like a hand built Ergodox that somebody made out of a kit and offered. And he was outbid at 400. And that's when he said, okay, there is something here, like, people, I guess, want this, let's, let's do it. And things moved on from there, and I can talk a lot about the crowdfunding and all that, but the upshot is that is the perfect partner.
He is so amazing, like, being able to have an equal partner, a hardware, partner. This is not an OEM relationship. It is a true partnership. Their logo is on our product. Uh, you know, there is on our website, there is a video showing how it's made. It's their offices. So I never had to worry about this kind of, it's almost like, uh, A conflict of interest with [00:07:00] not a conflict of interest, but rather different priorities, shall we say, in the traditional OEM relationship, where the OEM just kind of wants to get rid of you.
They want to make a bunch of your stuff and move on with life. And, you know, then next batches whenever make another big order and they don't, the care is not necessarily there. With Thiebaud. And with Dima, my partner, I had to do none of that, right? Like he really, really cares as a person. He really cares about the product and they are an amazing company for making the stuff we do.
They have such deep, deep. Technical expertise and all the nitty gritty, like, uh, CE and FCC certification, which is not always straightforward. You, you make a product, you make the PCB, you make everything, you take it to the lab, and then they zap the heck out of it with something a little bit like a cattle product.
And. And there's a lot there in terms of like, okay, how, you know, it doesn't pass certification. What are you going to do? And so on. So [00:08:00] having the right partner to really take ownership over that aspect of the business unlocked everything for me, uh, because I am not really, first of all, I'm not an engineer of any type. And I'm also, you know, Not a deep hardware guy. I'm, I guess you could say I'm a little bit more of a product guy. I have, again, clear ideas of what I would like. I have many opinions. That doesn't mean I have the technical know how to make those things happen. Or, or that when I make an ask, I don't always know I'm asking for something super complicated and impossible, or, Oh no, we can do that.
Or here's another creative solution where we can get what you want, but a little bit different. All of that stuff, you're not going to get with an OEM. So that's really the big multiplier here. It's, it's partnership with the right person.
Justin: It seems like very, very fortunate. Um,
especially because. It does seem like there's a lot of like time and expense on just like managing OAM relationships or just like getting someone [00:09:00] that you can trust, I guess, to really manufacture things. Um, I had worked at a hardware company in my last job, uh, Oxide Computer Company, and they had a manufacturing partner.
And even though they were like, they had engineers embedded at the manufacturing partner, it was like always still problems that go on. And then usually the manufacturer, you're like not their only customer. So they're like, you know, there are other timetables and schedules to take into account. So it's interesting that you're able to just like directly partner with them.
Erez: It's incredible. And it's also, they're exactly the right scale because often when you go to Shenzhen, when you go to, these are very, very large operations and we are not large, we're kind of boutique and we, we needed that scale. So yeah, it's, it's important.
Andrew: So
Justin: yeah, go ahead, Andrew. Go for it.
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[00:10:06] Making Crowdfunding Work
Andrew: So having a successful crowdfunding campaign is not something that's easy. Like every single one I've seen on Kickstarter ships late or just ends up never shipping at all. And it seems like a lot of your success came from that partner that you had, but can you share a little bit about your experience going through crowdfunding and how it set up your company up?
Erez: Of course. Yeah. So. Again, there is, there's a lot of luck there and a lot of working with others and knowing other people.~~ So, ~~so Dima was, uh, outbid, uh, and he said, okay, let's do something. Let's, but we need capital. We need, we need startup money. What are we going to do? And that was kind of the heyday of crowdfunding and Indiegogo.
And so it was again, knowing the right people. I happened to know I was in Israel at the time I was living in Israel and I happened to know, uh, someone who. Ran, previously ran a successful crowdfunding campaign. So I was able to reach out, [00:11:00] Hey, you know, what did you do? What worked for you? And. And he really showed, it was me and Yara, my wife, we were doing this together.
Um, and, um, and he showed us, uh, what he did, like kind of really a playbook of what worked well for him. He introduced us to someone specifically at Indiegogo to work together. And, and then, okay, there was the video, how am I going to make a crowdfunding video? So. Lucky enough, I had a filmmaker friend, very talented filmmaker.
So she set us up with a location and a shoot and makeup and like the whole teleprompter, like everything. Uh, obviously it, it cost, but it was a very good price because again, she's a friend, she's a good friend. Um, and then we were able to launch and we really did it by the book, uh, meaning ~~we ~~The most important time in a campaign, at the time at least, was the first 48 hours. If you're able to get good traction in the first 48 hours, then [00:12:00] Indiegogo puts you on the newsletter. That's a big thing. They have a big newsletter. In order to do that, we needed to get like a pre order list or an interest list, and we did that.
I set up the landing page and all that. We launched, we got the big spike, and then somebody Emailed Indiegogo. I told this story on another podcast. Somebody emailed Indiegogo, I don't know who to this day, and said, oh, these guys are scammers. Like, Indiegogo, you're, you're enabling a scam here. Like, This guy cannot deliver the keyboard.
This is not going to happen. And Indigo stopped everything, which was interesting because I had already been connected with them on a personal level. Like we had multiple calls. They knew me and no, like it must've triggered something and they stopped. They froze our money. And, uh, And then we had to have calls with them, actually.
So again, this is Dima, my partner. We had to have a call with them. It was Skype at the time. This is in the days before Zoom, I think. It was a Skype call. [00:13:00] And no, like, this is a real person. Look, T Boy's a real company. And he spoke, and I spoke, and we kind of advocated. And then they said, Okay, yeah, we're going to let you continue.
And then we continued. Then, A few days later, suddenly the Ergodox Infinity launched by people, again, who were much better known than I was. I was not known at all, right? I'm just a guy wanting to make a keyboard. And we started getting these emails, Oh my gosh, like there's another Ergodox that's launching.
It's much better than yours. Uh, and it came from like, uh, You know, from the right people and so on and people started wanting to cancel orders. So, okay, of course we canceled orders and all that, but we kind of kept going and we made it in the end and we made it, we made our 80, 000 goal in two months, which was what we needed.
It's not a huge amount of money these days, but it is really what we needed. Uh, which again, comes to the relationship with people because the [00:14:00] prices were not inflated. Like they were very clear about what is actually needed from them. Yeah. To make this, you know, to have a good start. Um, and then, yeah, so this was, we started the campaign, if I'm not mistaken, around March, we sh we ended the campaign around may.
Although if you go to the Indiegogo crowdfunding page, now it's still up. It will show a much higher number. This is just Indiegogo padding the numbers because after the campaign ended, they allowed people to continue buying. So really what we did like in the crowd, like in the campaign itself, it was 80, 000, but then we kept selling through Indiegogo.
And that's the higher number you see there that took longer to get to. And then December came and we shipped when we said we would, which is again, Having the right partner because, you know, Teebo really overcame a lot there and they were able to do what they said they would do. And the keyword shipped and, [00:15:00] um, Dear Godox Infinity did not.
But that's a story for another time.
Justin: Interesting. Interesting. There's like a, there's an interesting segue here. So, um, I guess we should, we should also like clarify. So the Ergodox is a split mechanical keyboard. Um, so it's got a left side and a right side connected by a cord. Um, it's like great for ergonomics. But Ergodox originally, was an open source design, uh, the schematics were online, you could buy the components yourself and if you could solder and like 3D print stuff, you could like make one yourself or maybe buy a kit.
Um, a lot of the mechanical keyboard world. Kind of like works in this way for like various custom specialized stuff. It's like you buy a kit If people have heard like of a corn keyboard or something like that There's a lot of different models out here But at the time you're doing this there was like none that you could just like buy off the shelf This is a really good design So y'all took on that work.[00:16:00]
Do you think the the people who were like, oh Emailing Indiegogo saying oh, this is a scam. Do you think that they were like being very reactionary to? You Someone making a commercial version of the open source thing. Or do you think they were just like trying to put you off? Or like, do you have any thoughts on
like what the motivations were?
Erez: Yeah, yeah, this is actually, um, an interesting story about, uh, about reframing and perspective for the longest time. I had a bit of a chip on my shoulder about that because it nearly tanked us. It's a very, it was a very vulnerable time for us. And It was very touch and go for a while there, and I went around feeling as though I have been wronged.
And then a few years later, I was at Computex in Taipei, and uh, and I met Jesse from Keyboard. io. Very nice guy. Uh, lovely company. And uh, and we sat down and we had a drink and, you know, kind of talked about, uh, Well, keyboards, obviously, and [00:17:00] this, this, uh, subject came up and Jesse is much, much more embedded in the community than I am.
And I think he has been for some time, even back then, like even when we first launched. And he of course knew the story, uh, but he knew it from the other side and, and it kind of came up in conversation. I said, yeah, those people thought we were scammers and they reported us and la la la And just so he says, wait, no, actually.
You're the asshole. You are the asshole. And I'm like, me, why, why am I like, what? And he said, yeah, those people have been working on the Ergodox infinity for years before then. And suddenly you come from out of nowhere and completely like beat their. their timeline and go like, Hey, I'm here. Here's an Ergodox.
You can buy it now. Here's the thing. And like, who are you even? What kind of, you know, you don't check, you don't, which, which is true. I had no idea the infinity was there. I did go around like keyboard forums at the time, but I had no idea there was anybody working on [00:18:00] this. There was anybody trying to commercialize.
As far as I knew, there was nothing. It was just like, okay, let's do this. I didn't see it. So no, I really don't think there was any malice there or any kind of like reactionary or exclusionary stuff. I think people, uh, and again, very important to say, I do not know. I do not know that the infinity people are the ones who reported ZSA.
Like I have no idea. It may well be somebody else completely. Right. It's not like. Yeah, just to be very clear on that, but whether they did or they didn't doesn't really matter because I I get it I can understand why people were suspicious because I'm really just a guy saying hey I'm gonna do this thing.
Give me your money. Okay? Which is, to be fair, this is what many crowdfunding campaigns are. But at the same time, I can also understand why people kind of stop and say, Wait, no, this is like, the Orgadox is not a brand new thing. There is a community existing here and there's like various people and all that.
Nobody knows you. Like if, if, if you can make this thing, [00:19:00] where have you been up until now? Legitimate question. So talking to Jesse about this really helped me see this in a different light and kind of understand the other side as well. So yeah, I, I'm, I'm not feeling aggrieved at all. Like it worked
[00:19:16] Open Source Keybaord Community
Andrew: Yeah, it's, it's very interesting to me. I'm not in like the custom mechanical keyboard space at all, but just the fact that. The ERGO docs existed at all, like someone put up a website, specked out an entire thing, and then a community formed around it to make the thing is a pretty awesome to me. That original design though you bought, guys are probably strayed.
pretty far from it now while making a commercialized version. So like, what were some of the things you change in the product while commercializing it and innovating with it, ERGO docs easy.
Erez: So actually the main changes were around the shell. The PCB itself, the circuit board, uh, it, it was completely redesigned for, uh, [00:20:00] for ByteDebo, but the core fundamentals are very much the same. Like, for example, it was a TNC then, and we went with a TNC still, and like, it's the same processor. TNC is the processor.
Um, and, or, or for example, The PCB was lay out in a certain way that did not take LEDs into account. And so when later, years later, we wanted to put backlighting in, uh, we couldn't, some of the keys, like the thumb cluster does not have backlight because the switches are rotated and then it doesn't work, stuff like that.
Which we kept. And kind of went with, um, because that's really the product and that's the legacy of the product. But in terms of like the, the work done, yes, the PCB is an entirely new design, but very faithful to the old, the shell, uh, is entirely different because. The original, the crowdfunded, like the box version, the kit version, I should say, not, not our crowdfunding version, but the mass [00:21:00] drop version, uh, people would buy with like an acrylic sandwich.
You get a few layers of, of acrylic and you kind of sandwich your circuit board in between them and, and tighten screws, which is a fun look, but not one. That made sense for like commercial manufacturing. So the housing and there again, Dima is a very talented mechanical designer. So he came up with the idea.
Like I said, I said, we need legs. I want to be able to tend to this thing. We need legs. And then he came up with the shape of the leg, uh, which is quite iconic now. Like people even sometimes try to use these legs. We don't sell them for other products. People somehow get them and use them on other keyboards.
Even it's a fairly, it's a thing. So that was all new by Dima for the Orchid Oxyz, which we later also used it for the Moon Lander. And the wrist rest as well, all new, things like that, the stuff
around the keyboard.
Justin: Something I think is interesting in this space, like a mechanical keyboard community in general is very interesting because it's like a, it's very much a [00:22:00] premium hobby. Um, like obviously people get it to like do work on, but there's a lot of people who just like collect mechanical keyboards. They'll just have a ton of them, which is like an interesting thing for me to sort of like think about as like this tool as a collector's item.
But, um, in some ways, like the more customized, like especially. Split keyboards can be very hard to get into because they require a lot more fiddling. And one specific thing is like, especially with like the early Ergo docs, if you get the, you know, open source version or whatever, you have to customize some firmware to be able to like do custom key mapping and stuff.
Um, and you know, for people who are engineers or used to writing code or fine, you can like figure it out. Um, but for like a lot of people who like want. You know, to just use this product, that would be very unapproachable. And one of the things that I was pretty blown away by with the, uh, ergo docs [00:23:00] easy is just like the Oryx product, which is this like web UI to be able to like write, uh, your own sort of configuration, but it's like very visually, and then it just like generates a file and just like flash it on.
And it's like, Incredibly easy. Uh, and it uses like some pretty novel technology, at least now it's using a web USB to like get a connection to the hardware. So it's like USB connection in the browser, which is all really interesting. Can you talk a little bit more about like how that product came together and like sort of what the experience was?
Erez: Yeah, for sure. It's funny because, again, it's all about people. It's all about meeting and having a good relationship with the right person. So, before Oryx, I wanted a graphical configurator and, uh, and we made one called Fusion. And, uh, Fusion was made, uh, with a development methodology known as a favor driven development.
Uh, [00:24:00] I, I had a friend, I asked for a favor. And he threw something together for me. I also hacked on it a bit because the backend was rails and that was Fusion. That was a start, but I knew, um, we had to take it farther, right? Like for, for a good couple of years, Fusion, the original configurator kind of lingered, or I don't want to say languished, but it, it, it was in a holding pattern, shall we say, while we did other things, uh, and people were understanding because already back then it was the best configurator.
Uh, that was available at the time, so people were fine, but we wanted to improve it. So, I, um, put out an ad, uh, for a developer, and you know, and I said, uh, Dad said, you're not a rock star, you're not a ninja, you're hopefully a nice person who's, you know, pleasant to work with, and da da da da, and I kept going.
And it was, of course, for a remote position. We hire, uh, we're entirely remote. And, um, this guy [00:25:00] reached out, and his name is Florian, and, uh, he was, uh, based in Japan at the time, French, and he is the Rockstar Ninja Unicorn, really. Like he never, he, it, it's funny, it's ironic because he said, yeah, like I, I reached out because I liked how the ad was written and I'm not a rockstar and I just want to work with nice people and all that.
But. In reality, he is the more than the 10 X developer. Like I'm talking about somebody else. He, he, he used to work for Google. He had his own startup. He made an exit, like the whole thing, you know, but he's a extremely, extremely strong developer. Um, you know, one of those people who, uh, who are really comfortable in any.
More or less like any language, right? So he does like, uh, native Swift stuff. He does of course, Rails, React, Rust, uh, assembly. Like he wrote a bootloader for our [00:26:00] keyboards, hand wrote the bootloader himself, and at the same time, this is the same guy who's doing the front end. For Oryx, all the state management and react stuff and everything.
Like it's the same guy. Uh, he wrote. Of course the web, so for example, when it comes to web USP, right? So there's two sides to that because you need the code that's running on the keyboard, the C code QMK, and you need the code that's running in the browser. He wrote both. So just incredible, incredible person.
Incredible. First of all, first of all, just an incredible human being, very pleasant to work with, but also just kind of mind blowing technical prowess. And again, once you have. Somebody like that on your side, on your team, and they want to work with you for, you know, for a long time, you can make a lot happen. So my, and I guess to that, I can add now we have a much bigger team, uh, and, and we have, you know, [00:27:00] Many very talented, uh, people. So what, what I just said is like, you know, that's kind of the technical underpinning and how Oryx got started and what keeps it going on a tech or who rather keeps it going on a technical level. But then in terms of the whole kind of feedback cycle of, okay, people are asking for stuff. Should we say yes? Should we say no? Okay, let's make a feature. What would this feature look like? It's always a balance between ease of use and power. Um, so there's a whole process there that I can, that I can get into.
But yeah, that's, that's
Oryx.
[00:27:36] Voyager: Low Profile
Andrew: Let's move on to talking a little bit more about the products you guys have come out with. Uh, we've talked mainly about your, I think your like legacy keyboard at this point, you've come out with three or four new ones. So could you, uh, tell us about like the Moonlander and the Voyager keyboards and how they might differ from the ErgoDox Easy and the, the more older models?
Erez: Yeah, for sure. So first of all, I just want to [00:28:00] gently push back on that. The ergodox disease is not legacy. We actually just updated it with the same processor, the same internal processor and all capabilities that are used on our latest keyboards, the Moonlander and the, uh, and the Voyager. So yeah, it's not a legacy product that's fully supported.
We spent an unreasonable amount of Money, time and effort doing it. It's really, it, we had to recertify the product on a, like on an FCC level and on a technical level, it's an all new product. It's like an entirely new keyboard. Uh, but it's got the same shell and the same everything. And we call it the same name just because I don't care.
Love the hype like I don't love just you know We could have hyped it but I chose not to but really it's an all new ergodox easy and it's very much. Uh, You know very much maintained and uh, and we invested it now the moon lander and the voyager Uh the [00:29:00] moon lander Came about when Dima said, you know what?
I think like we, we were, we've been running with the Ergodoxy Z at that point for a few years, and we knew the product quite well and various, uh, pros and cons. And we had ideas. And then Dima said, you know what? I think, I think I can make a keyboard that uses the same keyswitches, the MX style keyswitches, but is super, super thin.
And also, he said, I have an idea about the leg that I want to try. And, and that's the Moonlander was born. Uh, if you have a Moonlander, you flip it, you'll see his name is on the back. I, I wanted to include his name as the designer, uh, on the back because, Uh, his work, obviously he, he does all of the mechanical design for everything, but for the Moonlander specifically, it was very foundational. So what is unique about the Moonlander is one at the time before people started using low profile switches, which we will get to, but for an MX keyboard, it's [00:30:00] extremely slim. It's very, very thin. The other thing, which, uh, is actually patented. is that the thumb cluster tilts and can be used as one of the legs of the board, which has pros and cons.
This is kind of why I tend to recommend the Moonlander to people with bigger hands. I have pretty small hands myself, so I, I was using the Moonlander for many years, but when I do use it, I use it flat. As my daily driver, I don't actually tent it because tenting it moves the thumb cluster and then it wants your thumb to be a little bit farther away.
So if you're like six foot or something, five, five, 10 or whatever, um, that's fine, but if you're like me, I'm like five, seven, that's too much of a stretch. So I like to use it flat. That said, that was a groundbreaking thing. And again, it's patented, uh, uh, the U P U S you know, the patent office agrees. Um, That you can shift the shape of the keyboard [00:31:00] like that and use the thumb cluster as a tenting device.
So that's the Moonlander. ~~Uh, moving on. ~~
Justin: Yeah. I want to, I want to hear about the Voyager. I'm a very, I'm very into low profile like keys these days. So the Voyager is pretty
exciting.
Erez: Yeah. Yeah. So the Voyager again came from Florian in this case, he hit me up one day and said, you know what? What if there was a keyboard? What if we made a keyboard that's really small and you can actually take like a Mac book, you can take a laptop and just tent the keyboards against the size of the laptop so that, you know, half of the keyboard is on the desk and like the, it's kind of like a roof, you know, where, where it sits at an angle against the side of the laptop.
And he even had a name. He said, Oh, let's call it the Voyager. I'm like, Oh, that's a perfect name. Of course. He had the name when he, when he came up with it. And, uh, and then at that time, Kale had just started making the, the chalk switches, or I don't know if just there was, there were not many keyboards using Kale chalk [00:32:00] at that point.
Um, and no split keyboards at all. And we said, okay, we want something that's, that's, Even more portable than the Moonlander. The Moonlander already comes with a carrying case. We, we created the Moonlander as a portable keyboard, but we felt we could do even more. So let's make it even smaller. And let's make it low profile.
And that's how that started. And that's a keyboard that in my opinion, works really well for people with smaller hands. That's the one I use. I've been using it. Um, ever since it was a circuit board, I, the very first prototypes, obviously were just circuit boards with switches. There was no housing yet. So I took the thing, I plugged it in.
I just put the circuit board on my desk and, you know, a little rubber feet. And, and I went to town and I would not use anything else. Like it was so great. Um, and I guess a part of that is also my, my own contribution to the Voyager. This is the first keyboard where the geometry comes entirely from me.
Like [00:33:00] I kind of, uh, decided. Uh, and, and iterated on where exactly would the keys go? How many keys would we have? How far apart would they be? What would be the column stagger? That's what you call it when certain columns are positioned higher than others. By how much exactly, like those are various design decisions.
So there. That was my part there. Um, and yeah, there's a bunch of new stuff with the Voyager. Like it's got a metal back, which means it's magnetic, uh, which opens up a whole bunch of accessories with it. Um, yeah, that's the Voyager and more stuff is coming for the Voyager, but I gotta be quiet about that for now, but it's, it's definitely, uh, it's, uh, it's an evolving keyboard, we can say.
Justin: Yeah. I saw the, uh, tripod advertised on the accessories and I was like, or the tripod mount. And this is like, you can like mount the keyboard to like a tripod or I guess like probably more realistically like to your [00:34:00] chair or like some, you know, something on your desk.~~ But, uh, ~~
Erez: like a C clamp people often just buy third party C clamps and what's the Moonlander also has a tripod kit, which we actually redid recently and didn't tell anyone, like, again, like we're going to be a little bit quiet, but we, it has, uh, I guess this is the announcement, the Moonlander has an entirely redesigned, uh, tripod kit, which, uh, we put, uh, months of work into and, and it's out.
Um, but, uh, the tripod kit for, for the Voyager is magnetic, which is really fun because when you want to take it, you just pull it out. And you don't have to, uh, undo any screws.
[00:34:37] Designing a Keyboard
Andrew: So, how did you go about like iterating on the design of the Voyager? Like it costs a lot to probably create those prototypes. So like, were we just like designing it in CAD and hoping, or were you getting like samples from the factory?
Erez: No, that's, that's a really great question. So, uh, again, I keep talking about the people I love, so here I'm gonna talk about this, uh, [00:35:00] YouTuber. His name is Ben Valek. Uh, he's a friend, and, um, and he talks a lot about keyboards and all that, and one thing I picked up on a, on a video of his, uh, he created his own layout for, uh, For his own keyboard, and he did that by printing out squares, the size of keys, on just a regular sheet of paper, not 3D printed, just print out a paper, and put your fingers on it, and then he actually used, uh, paint, like, like finger paints, to, to put on his fingers and kind of estimate range of motion by, by spreading the paint around and all that, and, and I was like, oh, that's genius.
So I did that the very beginning of the Voyager's geometry was a two dimensional vector file that I just I measured out the size of a key that I wanted I had a fairly clear idea about how many keys I wanted and then I started laying them out okay like for example a very important [00:36:00] subjective decision is the angle of the key.
thumb cluster. So there are, let's see if I can bring this up to the camera here. Hang on. So these are aftermarket, uh, key caps. I can talk about them, but anyways, this thumb cluster, right? This is how many keys should it have? And also like, should it be like here? Should it be much closer? Should these be like more vertical?
These are all really subjective decisions. And much iteration was done on sheets of paper. I put my own hands on the sheets of paper and then I asked other people to put their hands on the sheets of paper and other people to do the paint thing. And like, I shared it around and then I had a clear idea for the first. Version I wanted and then Tebow made a circuit board for me a working PCB It's obviously not cheap. But really when you're talking manufacturing the big money comes when you talk about Tooling for injection molding before the plastic once you're just doing PCBs. That's [00:37:00] okay. That's not super terrible It's not cost prohibitive at all.
So They made me a circuit board and they sent it over and I tried it and it was missing some keys. It didn't have a number row and I couldn't work without a number row. I tried it for 10 minutes and I was so frustrated. How did I not think that, you know, having a number row is essential for me? Let's revise.
I added a number row, you know, kind of finagled the positioning, and then we went back and forth. I don't know. I think there must have been six or seven of these circuit board revisions. Just adjusting the column stagger, for example, because yeah, I can see it on the paper, but what should really be that distance?
What should really be that angle? I can only tell by typing and typing and typing and typing. On a physical keyboard. So that was how the prototyping worked until finally I hit on a geometry that I was really happy with. And I'm still very happy with, uh, more than a year after the keyword, you know, hit, hit the market.
[00:37:54] Wired v Wireless Keyboards
Justin: ~~Andrew, you want to take the next one? ~~
Andrew: doing. Oh, for sure. Um,
~~Uh, ~~so you've done a bit of writing about wired versus wireless keyboards. [00:38:00] So, why is that such an important topic when it comes to keyboards?
Erez: Uh, I want to answer diplomatically, but tell a story. I will, I will not name names. The other day. I saw a new keyboard, a new split keyboard that hit the market. It's not shipping yet. It's a pre order. We'll see when and all that, but, but it's a concept that some people are excited about. Uh, this thing fully configured to the max costs 1, 000 with all of the accessories and everything.
It's ultra premium. Uh, it is, uh, a rubber membrane keyboard. It's not a mechanical keyboard, uh, which is interesting at that price point. But more important, it is, of course, fully wireless. And that looks amazing in the renders, right? It's mostly renders because it's a bit of a concept, but it looks so nice.
You get this clean desk look. And then I go and I start digging through the FAQ and all that. And, uh, a point for them, they actually did include this question, which [00:39:00] was, Is the battery user replaceable and which is nice that they included that in the FAQ and no, it is not, it is not user replaceable and it is rated to last two years.
So that actually brings us, uh, kind of to the beginning of the conversation. Justin, when, when did you buy your
Ergodox
Justin: And it was like 2016 ish. It was like pretty early on.
Erez: 2016. So we're recording this in 2024. Um, and you
Justin: still use it. Yeah, it still works.
Yeah, well it's not exactly my day to day driver right now because I don't have a permanent desk. Uh, I'm in between apartments. But, but yeah, I mean I've been using it for, for years.
Erez: Okay, so if that keyboard was wireless, uh, and had a built in battery, and then the battery would die on you would you still be using it? Like,
Justin: Definitely not. I mean,
yeah.
Erez: yeah. So, so that's, that's really what it boils down to. I, I think it's, I think a lot about the [00:40:00] contrast between what looks great on a web page or in a catalog or whatever, and what living with a product is actually like. Some products are very aspirational and they look awesome in theory, right? And then you buy them and you live with them.
And the actual lived experience is quite different. So I would rather go the other way. I would rather go with a product that on screen you see, Oh my gosh, there's cables and we highlight the cables too. We don't hide them. They're quite visible throughout our renders and our videos and everything. So you see them.
And then you buy the product, you know, like, Oh, wow. It's, you know, I got it at 20 in 2016 and it's 2024 and I can still use it. That's nice. Like that's the lived experience that I want to go
for.
Justin: Yeah, I was trying to look back and see if I had still have the like order email for when that came through. But, um, it might have been a little bit after 2016. I can't remember exactly, but I've had it for a long time. Uh, it's like one of the oldest, like, uh, peripherals that I still have. [00:41:00] Um, I haven't had a mouse that's lasted that long.
Uh, I used to be a big, uh, trackball guy and like, I love trackballs, but none of them last. Uh, they, they just, uh.
Erez: It's, it's funny that you say that because actually my track ball is one of my biggest inspiration. It's kind of embarrassing to show this on video. I don't know how much of the grime is, is, uh, coming through here, but this is a Kensington, a grimy, dirty Kensington expert mouse, which is a very funny name for a track ball.
And, uh, it is wired. It is not wireless. I don't know if they still sell the wired version. I bought this. This specific unit, I think 12 years ago, something like that, 11 to 12 years ago. And it's still my track ball and it's still going strong. Uh, so a product like this, I look at it and I say, yeah, this is what I want to make, like, that's, that's what I want to be making. Longevity.
Justin: Yeah, makes a ton of sense. Also, like, the, there's a lot of really nice designed wires these [00:42:00] days. That, like, some, in the mechanical keyboard community, they get, like, the connectors and they make them really nice looking. So it's like, it gets, it gets to look nice on your desk.
Erez: Oh yeah, totally. There's a big aftermarket there. People, uh, this is a funny one, um, because now you have some context. So Teebo, as I mentioned before, they come from industrial gear. And so it's almost like, uh, not almost, some of their stuff is mil spec, right? Not, not our keyboards, but Teebo's keyboards.
They're used to working very rugged, so their cables are not like those braided fabric cables and all that. Their engineers like hardcore. They're like, no, but what about the interference? What about the EMF? And, uh, and so we ship with very utilitarian looking Vinyl cables, you know, it's just like plastic cables, nothing super fancy.
And these are like the ultra like shielded, intense, rugged cables, but they don't look fancy. Um, and people, uh, do complain about that. And maybe one day, you know, I am looking for, uh, for a cable [00:43:00] vendor. If you happen to know of a great cable vendor that also makes very high quality stuff that, you know, also looks nice, we are looking for them.
But that said, yes, just like she said, there is a big aftermarket of cables and people do really creative stuff.
[00:43:13] Accessories
Justin: Maybe we're while we're on the topic before we sort of transitioning to the our last topic You have a lot of accessories or a lot of different kinds of accessories that you sell across the keyboard products We're talking about the tripod mounts earlier for the Voyager and for the moon lander And you have like a few novelty products too.
You have this like a mechanical key, like fidget toy, which is like called the satellite. And you have like a deck of cards that you make. I'm curious about your product strategy and how you decide like when to make a new product. So we've talked about like keyboards at various points. It's like one of your partners or one of your employees comes and says, Hey, I got this idea for a keyboard.
Like let's do this thing. But what about some of your other products or the accessories for the products? Like how [00:44:00] does that Like come about in your, in your product development life cycle.
Erez: It's usually pretty obvious. I mean, to me, it's, it's when something feels obvious. I'll give you an example of how it doesn't come about. Uh, maybe like a current example. I do not play an instrument. I never got musical education, but I'm fascinated by music. I, I, I want to make music. I want to make sounds and all that.
And obviously it's another type of keyboard. So I've been circling and circling and circling around. Let's make something that's musical and what is out there and I've been checking out products by other companies and like Ableton stuff and all that and all that and You know, I'm still there. Maybe I'll find something, but so far I've been circling and circling and nothing really clicks.
Whereas, you know, where there's, there's a product that you say, Oh, this feels like, this feels like ZSA. This feels like something truly, uh, that really brings something new to the world and also matches kind of our ethos and our values as a company. I'm not there when it comes to the music making [00:45:00] product, uh, or idea, but other stuff, that's, that's really the test, right?
So there's an idea. Um, Am I excited about it? Like we don't, we're very small. We don't do focus groups and stuff like that. We don't do much in the way of market validation and that has pros and cons. Right. So for example, the, um, well, the Moonlander got great traction. We are like at well over 50 or 60, 000 Moonlanders sold so far.
The Voyager is growing even faster than the Moonlander. Like in terms of, from the day of launch, these products get pretty Traction, but for example, during COVID times, um, I really wanted to make something. I felt quite creatively blocked and I said, okay, you know what? Let's make half a moon lander. It was, uh, it was during, uh, there were severe supply chain constraints.
It was hard to make anything. And I really wanted to make something. And I said, okay, what if this idea actually came from another person on the team as well. I really enjoy getting ideas from people and bouncing them back and forth. And, and they [00:46:00] said, uh, this, this was Steve. And Steve said. What if there was half a moon lander just for as a control surface for like, uh, blender and things like that?
And I said, sure. Yeah, let's make it. And I got really excited about the idea. Uh, and because it sounds also so simple, it's like, well, we already make a full moon lander. Let's just sell half, uh, shows what I know. It is not at all that simple. Uh, it's, it was actually a really long process, uh, From packaging and everything down to like actually, uh, changing tooling, because not, not injection molding tooling, but PCB tooling, because, uh, well, for boring reasons, I won't get into, but anyways, it was much bigger than I thought it would be. And it's not selling. Nobody cares that that product is, I don't want to say, A fail, but, uh, but it's a fail, like, uh, not to put too fine upon it. Maybe some people will still like it and all that, but really, and, and, and then when I approach it more methodically or, [00:47:00] or as kind of a retro type of thing, I can understand why it's a fail because I don't know that it's the best control surface out there.
There are other solutions and it's not the right price point and all that. And that's one fun story. Actually, Pixar, uh, got in touch with me. Uh, the people in Pixar who, uh, who outfit their workstations and they wanted to talk about this half moon product and they loved it. They were really excited about it.
Uh, but it costs 200 and something dollars and their current solution, which is much less capable costs a hundred dollars. So we're not in Pixar. Um, all of that is to say that I typically make products that I would like to use myself and that I am excited about that seem interesting, seem like something that should exist and I can't get, so why not make it?
Justin: Yeah, that, that sounds really good. I mean, I think so something that we really haven't touched on a ton, but you're a bootstrap [00:48:00] business, um, and you kind of like control your own destiny in a way, in a real, real sense. And I feel like that this sort of like intuitive, uh, way of developing products, like gives you like a good, like, Consistent, like taste and aesthetic.
And like, you know, I feel like the products feel pretty consistent. You know, just like in how they're created and branded and, you know, documented and quality like everything sort of like ties together. And, um, I feel like if you're just trying to make a bunch of money, if that's like your core prerogative, because, like, say, you've taken a bunch of venture capital and you just like have to turn out products, then you start Yeah.
sacrificing a lot of those like, uh, design qualities sort of somewhat out of necessity of like scale. Um, so it's nice to see like what you've built and the fact that you can maintain, um, you know, this, this sort of like design approaches is pretty unique and, and nice.
Erez: Yeah. Uh, thank you very [00:49:00] much. I think a lot of that consistency comes from the fact that we are a small team and that people really stay. It's that I say, we don't have many openings. We hardly ever have any, but when we do hire someone, that person tends to stay for years and years and years.
For example, the consistency, uh, you know, in, in our websites and all that, we had one designer Mario for many, many years, and then he moved on. And then Joe, Joanne, a designer from South Africa came on and she's been with us for years and years and years and does so much and carries everything. And like.
So a lot of that consistency in design and UX in customer service comes from having great people who really want to work with you, want to do the work and want to stay for a long time. And then, and then it starts feeling like something special.
Andrew: ~~Cool. Justin, do you want to ask one more question or just wrap up now? ~~
Justin: ~~Um, you can do the, for the future facing question and then we can wrap up. ~~
Andrew: Uh, how, since we don't have it on the doc, how do you think I should phrase it?
Justin: ~~Uh, just what's next? Like, what's next for ZSA? Zeta saying ~~
[00:49:57] Looking to the Future
Andrew: So, uh, on the podcast, we love to ask some [00:50:00] future facing questions. So, uh, from what you can tell us, what's planned next for Zed USA? And what do you think the future of keyboards is?
Erez: Uh, for ZSA, that's a complicated question. So first of all, what's next for us? Uh, in, in the immediate term, we're working on some really exciting stuff around the Voyager that I hope to share sometime in 2025, uh, around the Voyager. But it will also help other keyboards and it will even help keyboards that are not made by ZSA.
Uh, so I'm very excited about that. Um, I also have many thoughts around writing and the, the craft of writing, the act and the art of writing. And we're going to do something about that, but that is all I can say. We've been working on this for several years now, and we're still working on it. And eventually when it's ready, it will come out. Um, Yeah, so that's for us. [00:51:00] As for the future of keyboards, um, I think as a product keyboards, you know, we'll keep seeing them. I mean, they will be around and they will be around in, in various forms, but I do think speech, uh, has a growing, you know, kind of, um, it's becoming easier and easier to talk to your computer.
Um, and for certain kinds of writing, it used to be just prose. Uh with good dictation and I can I also sometimes dictate and I have tips and tricks that I can share later I think there's like a recommendation section Uh, but now it's becoming possible to code by dictating And I don't mean like, you know There have been solutions where people actually literally dictate the code But now with llms you can actually dictate prompts and there is um, There's the cursor that, uh, AI [00:52:00] powered via code fork, uh, and they have an unofficial plugin that lets you talk to the thing transcribed locally with whisper, and then that acts as a prompt.
So suddenly you're coding with speech and you're typing much, much less. So I am generally optimistic about the future of keyboards, but I think the nature of typing we do. Will be changing. It's like, it's a little bit like the paradigm at the core of Vim, right? Like why is Vim, Vim, right? Vim is Vim because you mostly read code and only now and then you edit like this insight that you mostly read.
I think keyboards are headed in a similar direction where I suspect we will mostly be editing. At some point, whether it's editing transcribed speech, whether it's editing LLM output, things like that, whether it's editing media too, like using it as control surfaces, like for tweaking the appearance of photos and whatnot.
But I think [00:53:00] increasingly keyboards will become more about editing rather than composing something entirely fresh. Uh, no, not a
Justin: Yeah, no, I, uh, I do wonder about what the future of like inputs is like speech is, is really powerful and definitely is coming a long way. And I wonder like. What's next after that, but, um, we didn't really get to cover, uh, writing, which is like a, a topic that I really would like to talk about, but, um, just for time's sake, uh, we'll put in the show notes, a lot of the resources that you have and like any, any recommendations you want to share with people, uh, y'all do a ton of really good writing.
So you have a blog that's just like, yeah. Really excellent. Um, you also do user interviews on people. Zsa. io, which is like great to check out, just like see people's workflows and like how they do their work, which is really fascinating. Uh, and then you also, uh, have like a once a month podcast that that y'all do.~~ Um,~~
Erez: podcast, a
newsletter. It's once a month email.
And uh,
yeah,
Justin: Gotcha. Gotcha. What is the, uh, the [00:54:00] Tisha talks switches.~~ Oh, ~~
Erez: Tisha Talks Switches. So Tisha, uh, is our most veteran support person, and, uh, she knows a lot about, uh, switches, obviously very passionate about it, has, uh, she's just as a fun trivia, like she types QWERTY, uh, like standard QWERTY, at like, I don't know, 140 words per minute or something, that's just like, with extreme accuracy, it's really something.
So, she knows a lot about switches, and, uh, she has a wonderful voice. So I really enjoy talking to her and I said, why don't we make a series? We call it our not a podcast because it was a one time thing, right? Key switches, mechanical key switches come in colors. You got your blues and your reds and your browns.
So it's okay. Why don't we make an episode per color and kind of talk about them? So it's mainly Tisha explaining to me all about switches and uh, You know, different color, every, uh, every
episode.
Justin: awesome. Yeah, definitely check that out. It's a treat.
Erez: Thank you.
Andrew: Well, that's it for the questions [00:55:00] that we have. Thanks for coming on. This was a very interesting delve into all things keyboard and manufacturing and running a business. So thanks for coming on.
Erez: Awesome. Thank you
guys. It was
fun.
Justin: Yeah, it was an absolute pleasure. Still loving my EZ. I'll probably use it forever. So thanks for,
thanks for building it. And I hope people like continue to buy a ton of Yaas keyboards cause they're fantastic.
Erez: Thank you.