It's not hard to see the push towards a fully Apple controlled Logic ecosystem, but I'm a bit more reluctant to go with the OS X = iOS theory.Crandall1 wrote:There's a further tinfoil hat conspiracy theory, at least among my fellow developers, that iOS and OS X are headed for a merge. Logic is a fairly small piece of the Apple Ecosystem, at least financially, so if it is a bit caught up in the whirlwind, well, that's just collateral damage that they can probably live with.
I'll remind everybody that they had ZERO problem axing 40% of Logic's userbase when they bought emagic and killed Windows support. And then again, when they killed VST support. Apple's general methodology is "our way or the highway," with the understanding that you have little choice in the matter. Steinberg has caught this disease to a certain degree, having just axed VST2.4 support, and announced that Steinberg products will be VST3 only in the not-too-distant future.
Yes, Apple will have no problems issuing these restrictions to smaller developers and the audio world in general. But this would also mean they would impose these restrictions to other DAW's (mind you, you either go iOS or you don't), which, I presume, would cause a stir but nothing to bother Apple much.
Looking at the broader picture they would also have to apply this model to the likes of Adobe, Microsoft, Autodesk etc. These companies have, for various reasons, a much bigger influence on Apple than, say, Ableton or Yamaha. The involved risk when going to a all restricted iOS model might be too big even for Apple. Because, if one abandons ship, more will surely follow, and there's little doubt that even Apple knows they exist by the grace of other developers/apps on their OS.
Of course, as a longtime Apple user, there is a bit of wishful thinking in all of the above. Time will tell.
