KVR Audio

ostfront · Post by **ostfront** » Mon Dec 31, 2012 5:41 am

How spoiled can one get?

Please start a new thread about dongles.

Thanks Michael Carnes for being so kind to post here. Anything you choose to say about your past professional experience or plans for the future or these two reverbs that will be out in January will be MUCH APPRECIATED.

Mercado_Negro · Post by **Mercado_Negro** » Mon Dec 31, 2012 5:58 am

An iLok is a necessary evil these days. I don't like them either but unfortunately there are many companies developing excellent plug-ins which are using it as copy protection so there's nothing we can do but purchase one. It's a one-time investment, risky and probably pointless in the long run but necessary.

ariston · Post by **ariston** » Mon Dec 31, 2012 7:04 am

ostfront wrote:How spoiled can one get?

Please start a new thread about dongles.

Thanks Michael Carnes for being so kind to post here. Anything you choose to say about your past professional experience or plans for the future or these two reverbs that will be out in January will be MUCH APPRECIATED.

This is a thread about a product that requires a dongle. It is not possible to divorce a discussion on "will you buy it?" from a reference to this plain fact. Lots of people don't use them, and it's up the the developers to balance out the value of good copy protection with the danger of losing a few (many? a lot of?) sales because of this. Some companies have dropped it already, and are taking a different route.

As a dongle-free-world advocate, I believe it is important to voice my "get thee hence, dongle", and voice it often. If they believe that everyone's just fine and peachy with that USB harassment, then they would never need to change their policies.

I also think the costs of copy protection shouldn't have to be borne by the customers.

And, I also think it's great that Mr. Carnes is posting here. He's dealing very professionally with these queries, so I don't think he needs you to defend him.

ariston · Post by **ariston** » Mon Dec 31, 2012 7:06 am

Mercado_Negro wrote:An iLok is a necessary evil these days. I don't like them either but unfortunately there are many companies developing excellent plug-ins which are using it as copy protection so there's nothing we can do but purchase one. It's a one-time investment, risky and probably pointless in the long run but necessary.

There are many companies developing equally excellent plugins that don't require a dongle, so I wouldn't really say it's a necessity.

OTOH, it helps to cut down on GAS by limiting the field, so maybe you're right.

(edit) I'll stay out of here now, I've said what I wanted to say. No need to force the issue, it'll just get the thread ilocked.

Good luck with the product, Mr. Carnes!

Bronto Scorpio · Post by **Bronto Scorpio** » Mon Dec 31, 2012 7:10 am

ariston wrote:ilocked

el-bo (formerly ebow) · Mon Dec 31, 2012 7:12 am

dayjob · Post by **dayjob** » Mon Dec 31, 2012 7:15 am

too expensive and iLok

no thanks.

A.M. Gold · Post by **A.M. Gold** » Tue Jan 01, 2013 1:55 am

ariston wrote:
Mercado_Negro wrote:An iLok is a necessary evil these days. I don't like them either but unfortunately there are many companies developing excellent plug-ins which are using it as copy protection so there's nothing we can do but purchase one. It's a one-time investment, risky and probably pointless in the long run but necessary.
There are many companies developing equally excellent plugins that don't require a dongle, so I wouldn't really say it's a necessity.

OTOH, it helps to cut down on GAS by limiting the field, so maybe you're right.

(edit) I'll stay out of here now, I've said what I wanted to say. No need to force the issue, it'll just get the thread ilocked.

Good luck with the product, Mr. Carnes!

Yea, I totally disagree that iLok is a "necessary evil". My previous (apparently spoiled

) post mentioned four Steinberg dongles, three of which I have no use for. That's not because products were cracked and the devs gave up on Synchrosoft, it's because they just chose to drop the dongle and go C/R because they thought it was more favorable, I assume.

iLok is only a necessary evil if you know you plan to buy a product that requires one, and that's where the problem with the demo requiring one comes into play.

I'm sorry, but audio demos aren't enough. There are simply too many variables. Will my host crash? Will my host glitch out? Will some mysterious problem arise with my host that the developer didn't encounter? Ditto to all of the above with my OS and my CPU.

I certainly have to have a working plug-in demo before buying a 2-3 hundred dollar product. In this case, as in a few others (like Soundtoys), I will have to buy the dongle first, which may end up being a waste of money.

Mercado_Negro · Post by **Mercado_Negro** » Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:51 pm

A.M. Gold wrote:iLok is only a necessary evil if you know you plan to buy a product that requires one, and that's where the problem with the demo requiring one comes into play.

That's what I meant.

djanthonyw · Post by **djanthonyw** » Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:53 pm

Nope, I have all of the reverb I need now, and I also don't have to deal with a dongle. I'll never get another plugin that requires a dongle.

zentatonic · Post by **zentatonic** » Tue Jan 01, 2013 9:57 pm

djanthonyw wrote:Nope, I have all of the reverb I need now, and I also don't have to deal with a dongle. I'll never get another plugin that requires a dongle.

Ditto.

The dev seems like a great guy, and he's obviously a master of the craft. So I wish him the best. Somehow I don't think we anti-dongle musicians on kvr will affect his success either way though.

kimik · Post by **kimik** » Tue Jan 01, 2013 11:28 pm

At that selling price the developer should've hired a graphic designer to make a proper GUI, looks awful, sorry.

AudioGuy720 · Post by **AudioGuy720** » Wed Jan 02, 2013 3:17 am

ariston wrote:This is a thread about a product that requires a dongle. It is not possible to divorce a discussion on "will you buy it?" from a reference to this plain fact. Lots of people don't use them, and it's up the the developers to balance out the value of good copy protection with the danger of losing a few (many? a lot of?) sales because of this. Some companies have dropped it already, and are taking a different route.

As a dongle-free-world advocate, I believe it is important to voice my "get thee hence, dongle", and voice it often. If they believe that everyone's just fine and peachy with that USB harassment, then they would never need to change their policies.

I also think the costs of copy protection shouldn't have to be borne by the customers.

Add me to the "dongles are OK" group. If it weren't for people who get their jollies from stealing other people's intellectual property, which in essence steals the potential fruits of one's labor, dongles wouldn't need to exist.

If you can't afford a $40 USB key then you probably can't afford the $100+ software those things grant you access to. I'm not saying this to be a bastard but it gets under my skin when you have people opening up studios left and right, charging $10/hour all the while using cracked software that I paid good money for to support the developers.

I'm seriously ready to start booking time at one of those studios, seeing first hand if what I've been told by musician friends of mine is true and then calling the cops. If they are going to steal software then they deserve to be treated like the thieves that they are.

I honestly believe that pirated software, music, books and movies has significantly contributed to this whole "everything should be free" mentality that a lot of people under the age of 35 seem to have. If people started getting fined and put in jail for using pirated software that mentality would change REAL quick.

If software couldn't be cracked you'd have studios still charging a living wage. They could maybe pay their interns and assistants more money. Maybe I could record/mix more musicians instead of corporate clients. And maybe the developers who put a lot of blood sweat and tears into making their products THAT MAKE OUR AUDIO ENGINEERING EXPERIENCE GREATER could afford that Mercedes, BMW or [insert cool car here] that they deserve.

Instead they have to worry about little schmucks breaking their copy protection all the while hiding behind their computers like the b**ches that they are! I am so glad those little punks haven't beaten iLok 2 yet. Good for PACE for making the Fort Knox of software...at least for now anyway.

heffus · Post by **heffus** » Wed Jan 02, 2013 4:45 am

el-bo (formerly ebow) wrote:no

+1

ostfront · Post by **ostfront** » Wed Jan 02, 2013 5:49 am

AudioGuy720 wrote:I honestly believe that pirated software, music, books and movies has significantly contributed to this whole "everything should be free" mentality

+1

I don't know what's the point of all the anti-dongle bitching. Do these guys think they could possibly make Michael Carnes - or any other developer, for that matter - change his mind in the last minute? Cause there's probably some benefit for him in the no-dongle route he has failed to see yet? Come on, there are no eye-openers to be had in this!

The only way he could make those fine folk happy would be to scrap the dongle and release his plugins for 50 bucks apiece. And that's ludicrous!

Oh, BTW, back on topic, I'm holding off all my reverb purchases until the release of SKNote's Rev250. So I'm guilty of wanting to have a cheap getaway as well. Well, no one is without sin...

Anyone else holding of all reverb purchases till Exponential release?