Starting to hate iLOK

[Russell Grand]

So, you're saying it's all down to the benevolence of the developers?

Yes, absolutely.

Even then, do you think it's on a case-by-case basis, or do certain companies always play ball? And on what grounds did the other companies refuse?

Definitely a case-by-case basis with certain companies. With Soundtoys and Eventide, I imagine they're pretty cool about helping customers out in need, though that's merely speculation on my part. I've always had great customer service from them when needed (though admittedly, it hasn't been often that I've even needed any customer service from them as their products generally just work with no issues.)

With UVI, I'm not sure if I'm remembering what the reasoning was, but I think it had something to do with having purchased second-hand. With Sonivox, they treated me like I was a warez kid asking for a handout even though I had receipts that I attached to the conversation. After being treated like a pirate, I asked to speak with someone else and was actually passed on to one of the higher ups at Sonivox who proceeded to double down on treating me like a thief and, after sharing my receipts with him, he proceeded to ignore me from that point on despite numerous follow-up emails from me. (Yeah, I'll never do business with Sonivox again due to their treatment of a paying customer.)

My most important soundware on soft-iLok is some Soundtoys stuff. Even though they gave you a pass, they might not to me etc.

This is very true, they might not help anyone and everyone that asks due to the obvious possibility of customers sharing purchased plugs with friends and whatnot...so I can't speak to whether they would be as helpful with you as they were with me, or even if they'd be as helpful with me in the future as they were last time. It's a crap-shoot really.

[pekbro]

It not really a matter of proving you bought something. Everything should be listed in your account. The issue is whether or not the believe that you’re not trying to pull a fast one for an extra lic.

Just sayin.

[ghettosynth]

With UVI, I'm not sure if I'm remembering what the reasoning was, but I think it had something to do with having purchased second-hand. With Sonivox, they treated me like I was a warez kid asking for a handout even though I had receipts that I attached to the conversation. After being treated like a pirate, I asked to speak with someone else and was actually passed on to one of the higher ups at Sonivox who proceeded to double down on treating me like a thief and, after sharing my receipts with him, he proceeded to ignore me from that point on despite numerous follow-up emails from me. (Yeah, I'll never do business with Sonivox again due to their treatment of a paying customer.)

Observe that this has sweet fuckall to do with the technology. I suspect that the only difference between this and something like C/R is the increased actual cost to the vendor for issuing another license with iLok. This is a reflection of how the vendor views the customer and, most likely, also about the razor thin profit margins that they may be working with.

This is why taking responsibility for your iLok licenses, putting them on a dongle, and obtaining ZDT insurance is better for you. I can imagine that Sonnivox might respond similarly if you ran out of Timewarp authorizations as well.

So, of course, plain serial numbers or numbers that require you to use the same licensed name, e.g. Uhe, are the least risky solution in general. These are followed by non hardware tied license files, e.g. Reaper are also low risk.

I put dongles next on the risk list, preferring Pace to Synchrosoft, and then C/R, and at the very bottom, using soft versions of dongle based solutions.

That is absolutely the worst possible solution because they essentially have all of the downsides of C/R combined with a powerless and disinterested middleman. What is a strength when you use the dongle solution becomes a weakness when you do not.

[Magnut]

It not really a matter of proving you bought something. Everything should be listed in your account. The issue is whether or not the believe that you’re not trying to pull a fast one for an extra lic.

Just sayin.

Absolutely! Customers can't imagine how often vendors get mails about "lost" "broken" or "stolen" keys/dongles, computer crashes/hardware id changes, bought things but they're not listed in my account, bought 2nd hand but doesn't work, don't know why but my license got blacklisted and so on.
This is why everyone is responsible for their own licenses (to a certain degree). In case of a hdd crash you're just out of luck with some copy protection schemes. But you're obviously aware of that and accepted it, else you wouldn't have bought this product or you'd may have chosen another protection method. Anyways, most companies try to help you at least with some temporary licenses until the case is closed in a good or bad way.

[Russell Grand]

It not really a matter of proving you bought something. Everything should be listed in your account. The issue is whether or not the believe that you’re not trying to pull a fast one for an extra lic.

Just sayin.

Sure, you're right...but I was a paying customer who was treated as if I hadn't paid for it - and they were pretty blatant about it. Thankfully I can chose to not support a company that treats their honest customers that way.

[Russell Grand]

It not really a matter of proving you bought something. Everything should be listed in your account. The issue is whether or not the believe that you’re not trying to pull a fast one for an extra lic.

Just sayin.

Absolutely! Customers can't imagine how often vendors get mails about "lost" "broken" or "stolen" keys/dongles, computer crashes/hardware id changes, bought things but they're not listed in my account, bought 2nd hand but doesn't work, don't know why but my license got blacklisted and so on.
This is why everyone is responsible for their own licenses (to a certain degree). In case of a hdd crash you're just out of luck with some copy protection schemes. But you're obviously aware of that and accepted it, else you wouldn't have bought this product or you'd may have chosen another protection method. Anyways, most companies try to help you at least with some temporary licenses until the case is closed in a good or bad way.

Sure, I get all that. I also get that I'm free to chose to not deal with a company who treats their customers like garbage - and that's exactly what I've chose to do with Sonivox. (And to be fair, I'm not the only one here who has had problems with Sonivox. A quick KVR search will show others stating the same issues with them.)

Anyway, I'm only posting my real-world experiences in response to questions that were asked of me.

[Russell Grand]

With UVI, I'm not sure if I'm remembering what the reasoning was, but I think it had something to do with having purchased second-hand. With Sonivox, they treated me like I was a warez kid asking for a handout even though I had receipts that I attached to the conversation. After being treated like a pirate, I asked to speak with someone else and was actually passed on to one of the higher ups at Sonivox who proceeded to double down on treating me like a thief and, after sharing my receipts with him, he proceeded to ignore me from that point on despite numerous follow-up emails from me. (Yeah, I'll never do business with Sonivox again due to their treatment of a paying customer.)

Observe that this has sweet fuckall to do with the technology. I suspect that the only difference between this and something like C/R is the increased actual cost to the vendor for issuing another license with iLok. This is a reflection of how the vendor views the customer and, most likely, also about the razor thin profit margins that they may be working with.

This is why taking responsibility for your iLok licenses, putting them on a dongle, and obtaining ZDT insurance is better for you. I can imagine that Sonnivox might respond similarly if you ran out of Timewarp authorizations as well.

So, of course, plain serial numbers or numbers that require you to use the same licensed name, e.g. Uhe, are the least risky solution in general. These are followed by non hardware tied license files, e.g. Reaper are also low risk.

I put dongles next on the risk list, preferring Pace to Synchrosoft, and then C/R, and at the very bottom, using soft versions of dongle based solutions.

That is absolutely the worst possible solution because they essentially have all of the downsides of C/R combined with a powerless and disinterested middleman. What is a strength when you use the dongle solution becomes a weakness when you do not.

Excellent points, ghetto, and I agree with 3 caveats: 1.) I'm only answering el-bow's questions honestly 2.) While what I had to say may not have f*ckall to do with the technology perse, it was a response to a question that I was asked so it's relevant; if you disagree, that's fine. 3.) While Sonivox has the right to react the way they did, it doesn't mean they should. If other companies can treat me fairly without being total dicks, so can Sonivox.

At the end of the day, it's really not me that lost out, it was the company. I've moved on and gotten better software that replaces what I'd lost from SV and given other companies my money instead. Had I not been treated the way I had, I'd probably have purchased more from them and also given some positive word-of-mouth to others.

I can own up to my own mistakes. However this a thread about the potential downsides of iLok and I'm merely giving my 2 cents on the subject.

[pekbro]

Sure, you're right...but I was a paying customer who was treated as if I hadn't paid for it - and they were pretty blatant about it. Thankfully I can chose to not support a company that treats their honest customers that way.

I agree, I was just saying. In fact i’ll be very hesitant about them just from reading that. Although, I was already tbh. I’ve not read much that was overly positive about them iirc.

[ghettosynth]

With UVI, I'm not sure if I'm remembering what the reasoning was, but I think it had something to do with having purchased second-hand. With Sonivox, they treated me like I was a warez kid asking for a handout even though I had receipts that I attached to the conversation. After being treated like a pirate, I asked to speak with someone else and was actually passed on to one of the higher ups at Sonivox who proceeded to double down on treating me like a thief and, after sharing my receipts with him, he proceeded to ignore me from that point on despite numerous follow-up emails from me. (Yeah, I'll never do business with Sonivox again due to their treatment of a paying customer.)

Observe that this has sweet fuckall to do with the technology. I suspect that the only difference between this and something like C/R is the increased actual cost to the vendor for issuing another license with iLok. This is a reflection of how the vendor views the customer and, most likely, also about the razor thin profit margins that they may be working with.

This is why taking responsibility for your iLok licenses, putting them on a dongle, and obtaining ZDT insurance is better for you. I can imagine that Sonnivox might respond similarly if you ran out of Timewarp authorizations as well.

So, of course, plain serial numbers or numbers that require you to use the same licensed name, e.g. Uhe, are the least risky solution in general. These are followed by non hardware tied license files, e.g. Reaper are also low risk.

I put dongles next on the risk list, preferring Pace to Synchrosoft, and then C/R, and at the very bottom, using soft versions of dongle based solutions.

That is absolutely the worst possible solution because they essentially have all of the downsides of C/R combined with a powerless and disinterested middleman. What is a strength when you use the dongle solution becomes a weakness when you do not.

Excellent points, ghetto, and I agree with 3 caveats: 1.) I'm only answering el-bow's questions honestly 2.) While what I had to say may not have f*ckall to do with the technology perse, it was a response to a question that I was asked so it's relevant; if you disagree, that's fine. 3.) While Sonivox has the right to react the way they did, it doesn't mean they should. If other companies can treat me fairly without being total dicks, so can Sonivox.

At the end of the day, it's really not me that lost out, it was the company. I've moved on and gotten better software that replaces what I'd lost from SV and given other companies my money instead. Had I not been treated the way I had, I'd probably have purchased more from them and also given some positive word-of-mouth to others.

I can own up to my own mistakes. However this a thread about the potential downsides of iLok and I'm merely giving my 2 cents on the subject.

Yes, to be clear, I wasn't trying to disagree with you. Sonivox is best approached from a good distance. I have three or four of their products and I'm satisfied with them but only because I paid virtually nothing for them. I wouldn't care much if I lost them. I specifically didn't buy their bundle at a super discount, in part, because Timewarp isn't on iLok and when a company is as flaky as they are with respect to software development, then you can probably expect them to be flaky with other things as well.

The main point that I was trying to make is that there is a world of difference between both the risks and the value to the consumer of dongle based schemes when used with and without a dongle. Choosing to use iLok or eLicenser without the dongle is taking a huge risk that is considerately mitigated with the use of a dongle. I have a few unused licenses in the cloud. I could put them on one of my dongleless machines, but nope, they just stay in the cloud. I've had enough hard drive failures to know better.

[el-bo (formerly ebow)]

So, you're saying it's all down to the benevolence of the developers?

Yes, absolutely.

Even then, do you think it's on a case-by-case basis, or do certain companies always play ball? And on what grounds did the other companies refuse?

Definitely a case-by-case basis with certain companies. With Soundtoys and Eventide, I imagine they're pretty cool about helping customers out in need, though that's merely speculation on my part. I've always had great customer service from them when needed (though admittedly, it hasn't been often that I've even needed any customer service from them as their products generally just work with no issues.)

With UVI, I'm not sure if I'm remembering what the reasoning was, but I think it had something to do with having purchased second-hand. With Sonivox, they treated me like I was a warez kid asking for a handout even though I had receipts that I attached to the conversation. After being treated like a pirate, I asked to speak with someone else and was actually passed on to one of the higher ups at Sonivox who proceeded to double down on treating me like a thief and, after sharing my receipts with him, he proceeded to ignore me from that point on despite numerous follow-up emails from me. (Yeah, I'll never do business with Sonivox again due to their treatment of a paying customer.)

My most important soundware on soft-iLok is some Soundtoys stuff. Even though they gave you a pass, they might not to me etc.

This is very true, they might not help anyone and everyone that asks due to the obvious possibility of customers sharing purchased plugs with friends and whatnot...so I can't speak to whether they would be as helpful with you as they were with me, or even if they'd be as helpful with me in the future as they were last time. It's a crap-shoot really.

Thank you for your response.

I got caught caught up in a few things, yesterday, and so completely forgot to email Soundtoys. Will get around to it, today.

Hopefully this thread will stay open long enough for me to share the results. If not, and if anyone is really interested, you are welcome to pm me.

Thanks, again

[himalaya]

At the end of the day, it's really not me that lost out, it was the company. I've moved on and gotten better software that replaces what I'd lost from SV and given other companies my money instead. Had I not been treated the way I had, I'd probably have purchased more from them and also given some positive word-of-mouth to others.

This is all that counts in the end! It's a point I made several times in this thread.

[Nielzie]

I won't touch i-Lok/E-Licenser protected products either and think a lot of potential customers think the same.. But apparently those companies still earn enough money to justify paying for and using such a draconian license protection system. They probably think they loose even more money if their products will be available in the cracking scene. Doubtful, but still.. their rightful decision.

[el-bo (formerly ebow)]

So, I have a reply from Soundtoys - Regarding renewal of license after computer theft, or failure:

...We don't have an official policy, but this is something that happens fairly regularly and we almost always accommodate the license reset requests of our users. Feel free to pass this info on to others. Let me know if you have any other questions...

I get the feeling that the "almost always" is reserved for situations where things seem really suspect, rather than some arbitrary thing. Either way, I find this very encouraging (I don't tend to buy new computers till the previous one's die, so...).

So glad to be able to keep me a perfeshonal plugin, in with all the unworthy shit