What makes you buy or not buy music software / Plugins?

[CrystalWizard]

... what factors influence you?
For me, need is the biggest factor...

...Superiority includes not only sound (which is absolutely essential, but superior in reliability, function, features, price, etc...

I don't need any instrument or FX but i desire (and only have interest in):
Innovative,
Flexible tools
such as Madrona Labs, Dawesome, U-he, new to me Aqueel Aadam, and some others.
Inexpensive is nice but if i can afford them i don't mind paying.
Reliability is a must for many of my tools because i do live gigs where crashes or freezes are not OK. I don't need everything to be 100% though, just my live rig, most importantly my DAW. I don't use new (to me) synths or FX in the live setup.
Most new (and many old) plugins sound fine for my needs.

Another thing for me, is copy protection. In my eyes, the ideal copy protection, which does indeed exist, and is used by several developers, is the kind that is not vendor dependent...

Watching developers (and corporations) get sold, reorganized, or just fold has made me much more interested in c/p that will not take away anything that i have payed for.

Another thing that determines whether I buy from a developer or not, is their customer service and their interaction with the customer. I would much rather buy from a developer that interacts with me if I have a concern—if he tries to help solve my problem. I want to be able to trust a developer when he says something. I want a developer that is open and honest in his business dealings.

I don't buy or download software when it first released. Small developers can't do extensive QC and compatibility tests, larger organizations don't bother to any more it seems. So, if i need help and contact developer support i would like her to respond within 48hrs (unless it's a DAW, then ASAP) and certainly i would expect to trust what she says.

.... ....

Further, developers that take your rightful upgrades away, and only allow you to download the update for a short limited amount of time won’t win any points with me. ...

Oh, BS to that.
Phoning home? BS to that also.

[razornaut]

As I'm now a hobbyist, I don't strictly need anything. I treat my plugin purchases the same as some do their Steam library. I'm not a gamer, though; my games are audio tools (I'm not as much of a bore at dinner parties as that may imply). My stipulations are:

It must be fun.
It must be clever.
It must have a pleasing and elegant UI.
It must be priced reasonably.

I don't care about copy protection as long as it stays out of my way.

I am undecided about vibe coded products. I'm a software engineer (not DSP) for my day job which means that I'm all too aware of the dangers - of which there are many. However, if it means an interesting and unique concept would otherwise not exist and it meets my stipulations, I'll give it a go.

I will never purchase a subscription plan. Bug fixes -which include OS compatibility updates - must be free, but for major version upgrades, I have no problem with being charged. Brownie points if the developer doesn't, but no ill will if they do.

[cryophonik]

I have a ton of plugins, so I don't buy software very often, but my reasons for many of my recent purchases have varied widely and includes:
- Something that filled a need or substantially improved upon something I frequently use
- a favorite developer released something that I found useful or fun or interesting or whatever and I wanted to support them
- it simply looked interesting, useful, or fun and the price was right
- it was expensive, but offered something that makes tedious or mundane tasks go quicker
- it was a summer sale for a bundle upgrade that has some useful items and I bought them for what worked out to be like $8 each or something

FWIW, I don't care about copy protection - I think I've used every method under the sun over the past 25 years and none have been an issue for me - hell, sometimes I don't even think to look at it before buying.