NI have announced they will no longer activate discontinued products

[revvy]

Both the NI dudes in this thread have made me less likely to buy future NI products. IMO, natch,

Pretty sure it's only me on here so I suppose I'm the one putting you off

Thanks for responding.

I was pissed off by the original NI announcement and found your attitude probably a bit more defensive than necessary. Same with ED who I know is a mod at NI.

Nothing stronger than that and in fact nothing personal at tall against either of you.

Nothing personal either but I'm happy to get constructive feedback especially on the tone.

All good from my end.

[PAK]

I really can't speak on behalf of our legal team here as you can imagine.

That's fine. I didn't ask you to speak on their behalf. I only asked if an enquiry could be made about placing equivalent protections back into the EULA. But I understand EMH likely won't want to hear crazy talk like that, and there is zero justification NI can offer for why they removed these important promises in the first place.

I can understand that you feel this is an important topic but it's not really helping us address what customers are concerned about now which is not being able to re-activate products after May.

Yes, it is. If Native Instruments don't change the EULA, they don't need to provide a way to re-activate ANY products in future. I'd say that's more than directly related. Indeed, it's the exact same issue! We're merely talking about (the expectation) of those other titles being impacted at later dates. Otherwise it's the same problem!

That's why this issue of the EULA matters, and not because of anyone's personal love for legal agreements, which I doubt (hopefully ) anyone on this thread has

We can take on the EULA and involve different stakeholder after we have a better understanding on what is going to happen with the activation process.

But it shouldn't matter. Otherwise, it carries the indirect implication that there will be scenarios where NI will justify why it cannot activate an end users software.

I appreciate that 3rd parties DO complicate things a whole lot. This isn't much justification in terms of NI's own software though. If they're not going to promise to activate a users software, in perpetuity, then what is the point of buying? You are effectively renting, except it's just not being called that.

Whenever NI get around to launching Native Cloud, or whatever they'll end up calling the software rental service, I sure hope there's still some good guys at NI who speak up for the old non-rental users, and we're promised ways to perpetually activate our software which doesn't attempt to force us into renting.

I'd like to think there would be a positive outcome. I know there are good people at NI. But it really seems (from the outside) that all NI does right now is have meetings about meetings about meetings, and use justifications like decisions being "driven by data" for why it's ok to screw over customers, which IMO is exactly what happened this time.


PS I'd ask people in this thread to please remember these issues are about COPY PROTECTION. Not about "this software is x thousand years old, blah blah blah".

[rasmusklump]

It's crystal clear: NI insists that the stupid customers are following the EULA but they themselves don't give a f**k on it...

[TabSel]

that’s my impression, too, after Matt posted.

Shows even more what kind of company NI has become. Totally out of contact with their customers, just interested to maximize profits.

[highkoo]

Actually, that's what I more and more do when I take a look at this whole forum. It's really very tiresome (not just) as of late.

[Matt_NI]

Yes, we can absolutely pick up this conversation after we have addressed the issue of product not being activated first.

We can take on the EULA and involve different stakeholder after we have a better understanding on what is going to happen with the activation process.

But it shouldn't matter. Otherwise, it carries the indirect implication that there will be scenarios where NI will justify why it cannot activate an end users software.

I appreciate that 3rd parties DO complicate things a whole lot. This isn't much justification in terms of NI's own software though. If they're not going to promise to activate a users software, in perpetuity, then what is the point of buying? You are effectively renting, except it's just not being called that.

Whenever NI get around to launching Native Cloud, or whatever they'll end up calling the software rental service, I sure hope there's still some good guys at NI who speak up for the old non-rental users, and we're promised ways to perpetually activate our software which doesn't attempt to force us into renting.

Just so you get where I'm coming from here. I'm working with a group of people to address the technical aspects of this issue and they have no say in whatever we mention in our EULA. This is not what motivates our effort either at all. Should I tell everyone to stop working on this until our legal team has come to an agreement on what we want our EULA to say moving forward? Not really.

I understand you want this to be addressed yesterday but that's not what we are going to focus on at the moment. Once the issue of getting users a suitable solution to what we announce has been addressed, we can go and discuss EULA with the right people.

As for bringing non-perpetual licenses into play at some point, we already addressed most of users concerns on this topic over the past few months so I'd suggest checking our own forum.

[highkoo]

Wouldnt legal at NI have to sign off on a policy decision impacting this many users, this many products, this much overhead?
Wouldnt those legal concerns really be the ultimate dictating factor in this entire scenario, regardless?
How are there dicsussions regarding the posssibility of not following the letter of the law?

Sorry if thats too direct, or in the wrong tone. Im bolstered for a real battering from the NI White Knights.

[chk071]

[AnX]

hand shandy?

[Matt_NI]

Wouldnt legal at NI have to sign off on a policy decision impacting this many users, this many products, this much overhead?
Wouldnt those legal concerns really be the ultimate dictating factor in this entire scenario, regardless?
How are there dicsussions regarding the posssibility of not following the letter of the law?

Sorry if thats too direct, or in the wrong tone. Im bolstered for a real battering from the NI White Knights.

Absolutely and no decision would go through without it. I think I may have mentioned this already but there is no discussion on this not following "the letter of the law".

[PAK]

Should I tell everyone to stop working on this until our legal team has come to an agreement on what we want our EULA to say moving forward? Not really.

Your legal team are its own seperate team. So they should be able to proceed, with such matters, without impacting your work.

You're SERIOUSLY saying that NOBODY at NI can request these promises be put back into the EULA because you're personally working on technical solutions for old and (apparently) badly coded copy protection? What has that got to do with your management and legal team, which is who would deal with these issues in detail?

I understand you want this to be addressed yesterday

What is "this"? That NI legally promise to activate their customers purchased software in perpetuity? My goodness, how unreasonable of me! Also, please don't lower yourself with remarks like "want this yesterday". Implying I'm impatient and that what I'm asking is somehow unreasonable. It isn't. Native Instruments are the one being unreasonable here.

I understand things take time. All I asked was that you start that process at NI. Again, all we want is for NI to legally promise to activate customers purchased software in perpetuity. I'm talking about their OWN software here, not 3rd party libraries. This isn't unreasonable, and YES it's related to the current issue. I also understand you're not on the team that would decide those details. All I asked is if you could forward that request and this is what I get..

[Gamma-UT]

Do you have permission to republish that licensed stock-library image (with a direct link to their content-delivery node to boot)? I know how you like stuff to be legal an' all. So maybe you should check the EULA.

[vurt]

no fisting please.

[Gamma-UT]

no fisting please.

That's what Norman Lamont said.

[Aloysius]

KORE 2.10 OUT NOW

So sorry, I meant MASCHINE 2.10 OUT NOW.