Survey comment

[sleepcircle]

waves plugins does the "maintenance contract" and i can tolerate that. i wouldn't be happy if u-he did this, but i would be able to tolerate it.

however, the adobe subscription model is eye-gougingly, teeth-pullingly unpleasant to me.

[glokraw]

People use credit cards for gear all the time, and weigh the
eye-gougingly, teeth-pullingly high interest rate against the
use of the gear during the timeframe in which money would
be saved for a paid-in-full purchase.

For example, ones interest inflated credit-card payments over a years time
to finance a Diva purchase, will be in the same currency
as a subscrition would have been, and probably in the same price range,
since there is no free lunch.

Is my inflated-price purchase going to make me money, make me happy,
make me feel like part of the cool people club?
I doubt U-he would implement any lousy alternative to the current
shop regimen. One that is good for some people, while not forced on all,
is fine by me. First do no harm
Cheers

[Urs]

First do no harm

My thoughts exactly.

(I never had a credit card with interest though... that sounds like a bad concept... instead I always add up enough spendings a year to get it for free)

[Urs]

FYI after almost 2000 surveys, 11% are in favour of subscriptions today, 15% in future.

Of course, this is our actual user base. It may not be represenative for our potential user base.

We'll cross reference this with, say, people who don't have any of our products in a month or so.

[Funkybot's Evil Twin]

FYI after almost 2000 surveys, 11% are in favour of subscriptions today, 15% in future.

Right, but there's a large subset of the other 85% that will never shut up about it!

[Benutzername]

I don't think that any of the other 85% will have a problem with an optional subscription model from u-he. Communication is the key here.

[Urs]

I don't think that any of the other 85% will have a problem with an optional subscription model from u-he. Communication is the key here.

Thing is... I'm not sure if - for us - it's an either-or. Or, at least a third kind of option. Serial numbers and subscription don't pair well. We would have to go internet activation and all that shit. Them Horrors.

[Nielzie]

I don't think that any of the other 85% will have a problem with an optional subscription model from u-he. Communication is the key here.

Thing is... I'm not sure if - for us - it's an either-or. Or, at least a third kind of option. Serial numbers and subscription don't pair well. We would have to go internet activation and all that shit. Them Horrors.

Indeed, seems not worth all the trouble, imho. Just imagine the shitstorm when you do change to internet activation

[Funkybot's Evil Twin]

I don't think that any of the other 85% will have a problem with an optional subscription model from u-he. Communication is the key here.

Have you ever read a Slate thread on Gearslutz? Doesn't matter that the subscription is optional. You get posts about how "Slate doesn't care about perpetual owners" and "prices are going up to push subscriptions," or how "Slate abandoned the people who supported his company early on." Doesn't matter that the subscription is optional. The perception (for a vocal minority at least) becomes about how the developer wanting subscriptions to be a success somehow hurts everyone else.

I don't think that any of the other 85% will have a problem with an optional subscription model from u-he. Communication is the key here.

Thing is... I'm not sure if - for us - it's an either-or. Or, at least a third kind of option. Serial numbers and subscription don't pair well. We would have to go internet activation and all that shit. Them Horrors.

Crap! Hadn't even thought of that aspect of it. I love the simple, no hassle serial number approach. I could even deal with iLok as long as there was a way I could use it on my laptop and desktop without unplugging my dongle constantly (I'm thinking two activations and the machine based activation). C/R is definitely my least favorite, but I honestly don't think you guys are going anywhere any time soon. Any change to the C/R (to either iLok or C/R) would almost certainly open up its own floodgate of forum hate.

Note: I'm not implying any decisions should be impacted by how forums might react, but I've gotten a little tired of all the vitriol and energy spent on those types of debates. U-he is very well respected as a company with a lot of goodwill from the customer-base, and as a result, things are generally civil around here. It'd be nice to keep it that way.

[spunkmuffin]

How about an Urs dongle? Flesh coloured of course. Call it 'Urs Breitbeinig'. sorry i'm just no good

[#rob]

Since I just sent out the first batch of coupon codes, I thought I'd also leave a comment here.

First off - the first batch of coupon codes is sent. (Duh.)

Secondly - we received several "mail delivery failed" system notices for several reasons. Overflowing mail boxes, unknown account names, "your email appears to be unsolicited" and many different things more. Please guys, make sure that your mail boxes are in good order and that emails from support at u-he dot com don't get rejected.

Should you have completed the survey and opted to receive a coupon code, but you don't receive an eMail with one in the next couple of hours, then please send an email to support at u-he dot com and we'll figure it out.

Lastly - I noticed that some of you (7 people in total) seem to have submitted the survey several times over, probably hoping to get multiple codes. This behaviour doesn't upset or annoy us, but it would somewhat falsify the outcome of the survey, so we'd like to discourage it.

We made our system smart enough to tell when someone already received a coupon (also when we send out the next batch/es), so you won't be getting two coupon codes. Individual coupon codes can't be combined with other coupons or discounts anyway.

We'd much prefer to gather the opinions of other people directly, rather than have the same bunch of people submit the same bunch of answers to the same bunch of questions to get several coupon codes, and then have them pass on (or sell!) those coupons, since that would distort the outcome of the survey.

And we'd much prefer to not have the same bunch of people submit different answers to the same bunch of questions over and over again just to get more codes, since that would also distort the outcome of the survey.

[clangorous]

Aaaaaaand I bought ACE. Thank you U-he for the coupon code! It really helped me answer the question "Why are you buying ANOTHER U-he synth?"

OK she didn't say the "U-he" part but I still got asked

[glokraw]

Set up a keyboard split and show her how to use the modwheel
and jam out a bassline

[synth_punk]

Now download Kyhon's 2 free Ace soundbanks

Aaaaaaand I bought ACE. Thank you U-he for the coupon code! It really helped me answer the question "Why are you buying ANOTHER U-he synth?"

OK she didn't say the "U-he" part but I still got asked

[clangorous]

Set up a keyboard split and show her how to use the modwheel
and jam out a bassline

Now download Kyhon's 2 free Ace soundbanks

Done, and done!

Oh man, what great value ACE is. Some serious power in this synth, and I'm going to learn a TON just using it. I am not getting to sleep tonight