KVR Audio

herodotus · Post by **herodotus** » Fri Mar 06, 2009 12:15 am

afreshcupofjoe wrote: The failure of of blind market fundamentalists is their belief in some sort of pure, unadulterated, ideal free market which does not exist in reality.

I don't know who you are talking about here, but what I am calling a free market, which is the same thing that Adam Smith would call a free market, is perfectly embodied in the example that I gave: The market surrounding the open standard plugin technology that this site is about.

eduardo_b · Post by **eduardo_b** » Fri Mar 06, 2009 12:37 am

A true free market economy would be possible if it wasn't for humans. But greed, gaming the system and dishonest behavior all conspire to require a highly regulated free market economy.

As for the VST standard, is the standard the work of many companies cooperating or just Steinberg? Was this a gift from Steinberg or do they charge for the SDK? Can VSTs be created without the SDK? Is this open standard open to modification by anyone other than Steinberg?

jonnyG · Post by **jonnyG** » Fri Mar 06, 2009 12:55 am

afreshcupofjoe wrote:Just like regular cops go around handing out traffic violations and busting small time drug users instead of going after the real criminals. Yet, I don't think our tax money is wasted on the police. The institution needs a drastic overhaul, but I wouldn't want to see it disappear. I agree with your sentiment though.

Cues up Hendrix playing "Star Spangled Banner", ironically.

<shrugs>

Funny how the Health Service in Britain is subject to "market forces" yet the cops get a blank cheque with which to buy guns, helicopters, tazers and spend 30% of their budget on pensions when the rest of us can go starve...

NAMM looked like a beautiful Utopia. All the journos were so well fed and watered that they all forgot to go to e.g. the CME stand and ask "Hey assholes, where are all the updates you promised?" and "why is all your hardware so shit?" They also forgot to go to the NI stand and ask "why do licence transfers cost so much?" or go to the M-Audio stand and ask "Why are all of your controllers made of recycled yoghurt pots?"

Such is life. Whatever happened to investigative journalism?

mhemnarch · Post by **mhemnarch** » Fri Mar 06, 2009 1:58 am

jonnyG wrote: They also forgot to go to the NI stand and ask "why do licence transfers cost so much?"

How much do license transfers cost?

ew · Post by ew » Fri Mar 06, 2009 3:16 am

mhemnarch wrote:
jonnyG wrote: They also forgot to go to the NI stand and ask "why do licence transfers cost so much?"
How much do license transfers cost?

$0.00 as far as NI goes...

ew

herodotus · Post by **herodotus** » Fri Mar 06, 2009 2:55 pm

eduardo_b wrote:A true free market economy would be possible if it wasn't for humans. But greed, gaming the system and dishonest behavior all conspire to require a highly regulated free market economy.

And yet here is kvr and the whole audio software market, thriving without any regulation at all. (Unless you consider IP law itself to be a form of regulation, which would be quite a bit of a stretch.) How to explain this paradox?

As for the VST standard, is the standard the work of many companies cooperating or just Steinberg? Was this a gift from Steinberg or do they charge for the SDK? Can VSTs be created without the SDK? Is this open standard open to modification by anyone other than Steinberg?

The standard was theirs in the beginning, but what has since happened to it is completely out of their control. One need look no further than the VST3 debacle to see that the market doesn't obey Steinberg's wishes. They got greedy and suddenly hardly anyone was following their lead anymore. Almost like some invisible hand intervened.

And there is no charge for downloading the VST SDK, and no royalties need to be payed for it's use, so yeah, it's a 'gift', though 'smart business move' would be a better way of putting it (until VST3 at least).

But this is all irrelevant. The VST plugin market, and the immense soundware market that it has given birth to, is a free international market by any reasonable definition. And it has done more to benefit poor independent musicians than any number of government programs ever would or could.

jopy · Post by **jopy** » Fri Mar 06, 2009 3:16 pm

herodotus wrote:And yet here is kvr and the whole audio software market, thriving without any regulation at all. (Unless you consider IP law itself to be a form of regulation, which would be quite a bit of a stretch.)

I don't disagree with your fundamental point about free markets because it is the unregulated and sometimes anarchic nature of software development that has allowed such rapid development in such a short period of time, but there are plenty of regulations on the software market, including laws regarding fraud, the anti-trust issues that are affecting NAMM right now, intellectual property/copyright laws, contract law that requires the makers of software to turn over the goods after they receive their money, the legal framework sometimes forbidding resale of products based on EULA, etc.

All markets are regulated to some extent to "grease the wheels" of free exchange.

kbaccki · Post by **kbaccki** » Fri Mar 06, 2009 3:35 pm

herodotus wrote:And yet here is kvr and the whole audio software market, thriving without any regulation at all. (Unless you consider IP law itself to be a form of regulation, which would be quite a bit of a stretch.) How to explain this paradox?

The explanation is as plain as the nose on your face: there's no money in the audio software market. But don't take my word for it, just ask the developers. Why would you ned to "regulate" a market that barely exists? You're trying to use "audio software market" as a generalization of commerce and a model of socio-economics, and the one giant flaw in that is that it's a niche market and can't be used to generalize anything. Even Microsoft doesn't care about the audio software market, apparently...

As for the VST standard, is the standard the work of many companies cooperating or just Steinberg? Was this a gift from Steinberg or do they charge for the SDK? Can VSTs be created without the SDK? Is this open standard open to modification by anyone other than Steinberg?
The standard was theirs in the beginning, but what has since happened to it is completely out of their control. One need look no further than the VST3 debacle to see that the market doesn't obey Steinberg's wishes. They got greedy and suddenly hardly anyone was following their lead anymore. Almost like some invisible hand intervened.

And there is no charge for downloading the VST SDK, and no royalties need to be payed for it's use, so yeah, it's a 'gift', though 'smart business move' would be a better way of putting it (until VST3 at least).

Steinberg "owns" VST, period. It may be free to download, but anybody who uses the VST API to create plugins and hosts must agree to licensing terms from Steinberg. All those developers are zero-cost licensees of Steinberg's technology.

Now... just because it's free today does not mean it's free tomorrow. Steinberg, at their discretion, can decide that they want to attach a fee to their technology license. They own the technology, developers agreed to their licensing terms, it is totally within Steinberg's rights to do whatever they want with their technology and their licensing terms.

Hello GIF image file format... Hello MP3 audio file format... Google it if you don't know what I'm talking about (yet I suspect you do, but are conveniently ignoring such cases from the real world).

In any case, all this talk about VSTs and audio software is moot... it simply doesn't reflect real world finances and socio-economics in the way that... oh... the price of milk and gas does.

xoxos · Post by **xoxos** » Fri Mar 06, 2009 4:47 pm

i don't know about you, but in my conception is an immediate and apparent relation between the number of people capable of producing media in the contemporary state, and the diversity of ideas then represented in the sum body of media.

the sociopolitical relevance of music technology is that simple, watch who scoffs.

waveriderarts · Post by **waveriderarts** » Fri Mar 06, 2009 4:53 pm

mellotronaut wrote:got a phone-call from fedex once, where the service-lady asked me, whether i wanted to receive a package or not. The duane-fees were a lot higher than before and i said "another rip-off". She said "we have a free market; you can choose the company, you wanna have the goods shipped with and we can choose the company, that does the duane." I broke out in laughter, because the comany, from which i ordered, used exclusively fedex and fedex had a deal just with one duane-company.
"Free market"? What the f**k is this? There is no free market.

yeah fedex runs an incredible scam with customs fees, I have been had before, and again you never have a choice... you learn how it costs when when you have already paid the item plus shipping, and the delivery man is at the door ...then they it you with a 75$ custom brooker fee on a 400$ item

eduardo_b · Post by **eduardo_b** » Fri Mar 06, 2009 5:07 pm

herodotus wrote:
eduardo_b wrote:A true free market economy would be possible if it wasn't for humans. But greed, gaming the system and dishonest behavior all conspire to require a highly regulated free market economy.
And yet here is kvr and the whole audio software market, thriving without any regulation at all. (Unless you consider IP law itself to be a form of regulation, which would be quite a bit of a stretch.) How to explain this paradox?

I should have qualified my remarks by noting that the structure and specifics of each segment of a free market will determine to varying degrees how well it works for both producer and customer. I certainly appreciate your point regarding how well the free market has worked on KVR, but I don't think I would extend that to the distribution channels if the prices can be fixed by secret agreement. That, to me, removes the freeness of the market because now the market is not competitive but being manipulated. The presence of free plug-ins seems benign as long as the free ones are not being used to undermine competitors who are charging for theirs. This is why anti-dumping laws exist, to prevent selling below cost to undermine and drive competitors out of the business. Which is why free markets simply must be regulated. There's no such thing as an unregulated free market.

kritikon · Post by **kritikon** » Mon Mar 09, 2009 7:38 am

Since 1999, a completely free global market

In what way do we have a free market?
KvR is owned by a private commercial company, with it's own agendas and profit margins. You can state categorically that KvR advertising etc is pure, free and unbiased in every instance can you? (I'm not saying that it isn't, but there's also no way you can say it is...neither of us know because it isn't owned by us - which is my point entirely)

World markets have never been and likely never will be free. There are tariffs, protectionist policies, access inequalities, power and financial imbalances and extremely powerful and self-interested parties who do much to control a so-called "free market". In what ways are either the US or European markets "free"? They both avidly try to protect their own interests, often in ways to camouflage the issue.

I'm not entirely sure I even want a free market. Free market implies no controls/ boundaries. Basically the most powerful wins, because power is right and always will be. Individual companies mostly would love to gain a monopoly - it's what the big players manoeuvre for. You undercut, overadvertise the competition out of the way and gain a monopoly - the ultimate destination of a complete free market could be argued to be complete monopoly. Microsoft anyone? proctor and Gamble? Any of the very small number of drug companies that have squeezed the small fry out? Ensanto? They sure love a free market - it would enable them to absolutely kill all opposition.

It's the silly attempts to have a free market that partially causes financial states like the present one. No controls, no checks/balances on share markets, no hint of ethical trading enforced externally leads to absolute greed. Personally, I think the "free market" needs a shedload more control on it to enable fairer trade.

eduardo_b · Post by **eduardo_b** » Mon Mar 09, 2009 1:49 pm

kritikon wrote:
Since 1999, a completely free global market
In what way do we have a free market?
KvR is owned by a private commercial company...

I meant free in the sense of a level playing field -- unless, I suppose, you include the greater financial resources of some companies to advertise on the site. And, really, I don't see the owners of KVR giving their own products any particular advantage here, but that's perhaps because software, not hardware, dominates the site's forums, database and news.

As for the larger sense of free market, you are quite correct that there are no truly free markets. More importantly, no one who believes in free markets would actually want to live in a country in which truly free markets were allowed to do as they please. Greed would overcome any so-called self-regulation in very short order.

jopy · Post by **jopy** » Mon Mar 09, 2009 2:16 pm

kritikon wrote:
Since 1999, a completely free global market
In what way do we have a free market?
KvR is owned by a private commercial company, with it's own agendas and profit margins.

There's a great book by the historian Alfred Chandler on the idea that "free" markets are never really in existence once corporations and their management agendas come into play. It's called The Visible Hand and although it's relatively thick reading, it's a fascinating perspective.

http://www.amazon.com/Visible-Hand-Mana ... 0674940520

herodotus · Post by **herodotus** » Mon Mar 09, 2009 8:16 pm

The 'freedom' of markets is relative. Even in the most free of countries, there are limitations on people's freedom. 'Your right to swing your fist ends at the tip of my nose' is the standard cliche. Markets are the same.

It just never ceases to amaze me how much animosity people have for 'greedy corporations' and how much trust they seem to have in regulators, as if the regulators never do stupid, wrong-headed things out of ignorance and just-do-something-itis; as if the greediest and largest companies don't have lawyers working full time to game the system in their favor. Funny, isn't it, how the anti-tobacco legislation that was supposed to bring down 'big tobacco' actually allowed the behemoths like Phillip Morris to increase their market share at the expense of smaller companies, who just couldn't afford the costs of compliance.

But I am out of here. I know I will convince no one of anything that they don't already believe, I will just convince them that I am either naive or evil.

I just get this foolish urge to state my opinion on these matters from time to time.

Sorry.

so maybe NAMM isn't so benevolent after all...