[Fixed in 4.4] Weird bug: latest "Spectral Suite" update not included in upgrade plan

[ChamomileShark]

Benn Jordan and Venus Theory chatting about it now

Just watched some of this...wow. So two guys who don't pay for Bitwig think paying users shouldn't be upset because:

- there's a war in Ukraine
- Other companies are screwing you too
- Someone went SO FAR as to ask a couple of lawyer friends about the EULA, lol
- And the best one.... You're posting on KVR and WATCHING THIS VIDEO instead of making music.

I've never heard of Benn Jordan before but I just lost a ton of respect for Venus.... At least he confirmed that I should spend whatever small amount of time I spend watching his videos making music instead.

Agree - it was pretty cringeworthy

Well, that didn't take long.... apparently these idiots have pulled the video... it's no longer available.

I guess they're not even going to stand by their own hot takes.

Maybe they are going to edit it down. I was thinking that for them, in particular Benn (much though I love him) saying this was not a big deal and you needed to get on and do some music that they then spent over 90 minutes talking about it. I dipped in and out of it when I was taking a break from, guess what making music in Bitwig.

(for clarity I'm pissed with Bitwig and will hesitate before buying another upgrade plan, but am hoping they will find a way to put this right although I think they've lost alot of trust).

[HBIII]

If a company still has your support after behavior like this then things won’t get better, only worse. I see this a lot in bad relationships where a person stays with someone even after they do something terrible to them. They don’t want to throw it all away right?! Does the relationship ever improve after? No, it only gets worse because the perpetrator knows what they can get away with.

People in an bad relationship should not be accused of whining. They should be encouraged to get out.

[billinder33]

Benn Jordan and Venus Theory chatting about it now

Just watched some of this...wow. So two guys who don't pay for Bitwig think paying users shouldn't be upset because:

- there's a war in Ukraine
- Other companies are screwing you too
- Someone went SO FAR as to ask a couple of lawyer friends about the EULA, lol
- And the best one.... You're posting on KVR and WATCHING THIS VIDEO instead of making music.

I've never heard of Benn Jordan before but I just lost a ton of respect for Venus.... At least he confirmed that I should spend whatever small amount of time I spend watching his videos making music instead.

Agree - it was pretty cringeworthy

Well, that didn't take long.... apparently these idiots have pulled the video... it's no longer available.

I guess they're not even going to stand by their own hot takes.

Maybe they are going to edit it down.

Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.

[Held]

Well, that didn't take long.... apparently these idiots have pulled the video... it's no longer available.

I guess they're not even going to stand by their own hot takes.

Maybe their subscriber count started to drop too quickly.

When Venus Theory kept quiet, I still somewhat respected him because his income depends on his channel and Bitwig, but the video was ridiculous. (I assume. Watching the first few minutes where they make fun of people for asking lawyer friends was enough for me.)

And I don't get why Benn felt the need to comment at all. It's not like he's made a lot of Bitwig content. Way to ruin your reputation without getting anything from it.

[perpetual3]

My “relationship” with Bitwig is nothing like my interpersonal friendships and especially romantic relationships. I am not paying my friends and lovers for their products and services and I’m not using them as tools to create art. I’ll say, brands have really pulled a fast one on people if people indeed view themselves as being in such kinds of relationship with them. A truly bizarre false equivalency.

If a company still has your support after behavior like this then things won’t get better, only worse. I see this a lot in bad relationships where a person stays with someone even after they do something terrible to them. They don’t want to throw it all away right?! Does the relationship ever improve after? No, it only gets worse because the perpetrator knows what they can get away with.

People in an bad relationship should not be accused of whining. They should be encouraged to get out.

[HBIII]

My “relationship” with Bitwig is nothing like my interpersonal friendships and especially romantic relationships. I am not paying my friends and lovers for their products and services and I’m not using them as tools to create art. I’ll say, brands have really pulled a fast one on people if people indeed view themselves as being in such kinds of relationship with them. A truly bizarre false equivalency.

If a company still has your support after behavior like this then things won’t get better, only worse. I see this a lot in bad relationships where a person stays with someone even after they do something terrible to them. They don’t want to throw it all away right?! Does the relationship ever improve after? No, it only gets worse because the perpetrator knows what they can get away with.

People in an bad relationship should not be accused of whining. They should be encouraged to get out.

You’re missing the point here.

[apoclypse]

Out of the box just on content alone Bitwig just can't compare to the likes of Ableton, Cubase, or Logic.

Like I said the easiest way to make revenue without affecting the core application is selling presets and sound packs which imo is pretty acceptable as most companies do it and they make pretty good revenue doing that. Bitwig's current included content is not great and there should be a lot more Grid presets that show how cool it is for those who are not really into synth design but would still like to mess around with it. They should have more presets for their other instruments, and more acoustic drums a hyper sampled Grand Piano. These are easy pickings imo when it comes to making revenue outside of the core DAW and they don't have to break EULA or customer faith to do it.

Does it need to compete on content? Everyone has samples coming out of the wazoo. So many free samples available.

It's is ahead in other areas.

I definitely agree with the better presets/sound packs though. Even with the current content there's scope for 'starter kit' presets that could really show off what it already there.

Selling sample packs is easy picking when it comes to making revenue. Bitwig doesn't even have to build those themselves, they can contract that stuff out to other houses that specialize in making sample based content. Besides the point isn't to just drop some samples in the sampler or drum machine and call it a day. I'm talking about complex sample based instruments like the included Orchestral Tools library (which was also made with a 3rd party btw). Stuff that showcase the power of racks in Bitwig and the modular tools. Like I said Bitwig can do "mainstream" things in more interesting ways just because of the core tools they have.

As for competing on content a lot of times when a new user is going to buy a DAW they ask which DAW has the most of everything. It doesn't matter if the user will never actually use it, it's a marketing move. Including more brings up the value of the product perceptually. I'm not saying just throw crap into the library (though I'd argue there is a lot of not very good content currently in Bitwig's library already), but they need to be more well rounded and target more audiences with their library. Again doing relatively "easy" things like that can only help not hurt Bitwig.

Here's an example. Bitwig's current Piano offerings are pretty bad imo. They could release a sample library like their orchestral tools with hyper sampling, different models (Yamaha, upright etc). Their bass and guitar libraries are just okay.

[hyperdeath666]

Well, that didn't take long.... apparently these idiots have pulled the video... it's no longer available.

I guess they're not even going to stand by their own hot takes.

It was a strangely condescending video. It felt like they made no effort to think about why users might be legitimately upset by this move, and Jordan appeared unable to fathom the possibility that Bitwig has contractual obligations to users with upgrade plans that this move might breach. There are surely reasonable ways to push back on the community's reaction to all this, but I didn't see any here.

My hot take on their hot take is that since they don't pay for this stuff (and I obviously don't fault them for this), they didn't have expectations about what they were buying, and since they didn't have expectations about the purchase agreement in the first place, they're missing the possibility that Bitwig may have misled users by implying (or explicitly stating in their EULA) that their purchase covered content they are now charging for. In other words, they personally weren't misled, and they can't seem to understand why those of us who made purchases based on certain expectations (expectations which, per the EULA, Bitwig appears to have shared) now feel misled.

[SLiC]

I wonder if a bootleg of this video will be put back up!

[Phil B]

I think it’s clear Bitwig breached their contract. Can’t see any other interpretation there. So, either (1) you are a disgruntled consumer whose contract was breached or (2) you don’t care that your contract was breached and/or think they were justified in breaching it. Both are valid because they are personal subjective opinions. But, that video and most of the online chatter ridiculing disgruntled consumers refuse to acknowledge the breach of contract (eg making fun of someone who asked their lawyer friends to check out the EULA!?!?) and won’t simply admit that they are in bucket (2), which is pretty annoying and pretty weak. I wonder how Benn would feel if this was a service contract for someone to fix his plumbing who didn’t show up and didn’t return the money?

[mostexcellent]

I think it’s clear Bitwig breached their contract. Can’t see any other interpretation there. So, either (1) you are a disgruntled consumer whose contract was breached or (2) you don’t care that your contract was breached and/or think they were justified in breaching it. Both are valid because they are personal subjective opinions. But, that video and most of the online chatter ridiculing disgruntled consumers refuse to acknowledge the breach of contract (eg making fun of someone who asked their lawyer friends to check out the EULA!?!?) and won’t simply admit that they are in bucket (2), which is pretty annoying and pretty weak. I wonder how Benn would feel if this was a service contract for someone to fix his plumbing who didn’t show up and didn’t return the money?

The finger wagging towards those that are upset is bizarre to me. Not only is the EULA clear, but they also retroactively edited the wording on their website/marketing. The idea that add-ons should be included in the plan, isn't just a false assumption that so many customers happened to collectively make. Clearly, Bitwig was operating under that idea until they recently decided to pull the rug. Even if you are fine with paying separate for add-ons, I don't see why we as customers should suffer such bad faith actions silently.

[Digivolt]

I haven't followed this much as I'm not a Bitwig user but I can't help but think this whole mess could have been avoided if they'd just released the Add-on as VST's you can use in any DAW, so that they're not neccessarily part of the Bitwig ecosystem you all pay your yearly subscription fee to have everything included in that price.
Of course the alternative of actually including them in the subscription price rings true as well but if they wanted to go down the route of additional income, releasing as VST's was probably the way to go

[fireapplered]

The Benn Jordan and Venus Theory video is private now. Anyone know which channel it was on?

[pdxindy]

I haven't followed this much as I'm not a Bitwig user but I can't help but think this whole mess could have been avoided if they'd just released the Add-on as VST's you can use in any DAW

I sure hope they don't do that... that leads to lots of development time spent dealing with issues in various DAW's. Plus then they would have to create GUI's which is a big development time suck too.

[dayjob]

i only got bitwig a few months ago. my plan all along was to only buy an update plan when i felt there was some added value that i had to have. i don't see any reason to fork over $169 every year unless there's a meaningful update.

i get why bitwig users are pissed about this situation but leaving a DAW you enjoy using seems unnecessary. just stop giving them their annual update fee and only re-up on that when you absolutely must.

just my 2cents of course. we'll all have our reasons for doing whatever..