Reason 8 - Official

[KarmaShaman]

Why would it be a concern at all? They sold Audiomatic separately for 6.5 users even though it came free with 7. I would be surprised if they didn't sell the new Softube amps separately for 7.0 users...

we are discussing proper devices, not whimsical, first year graduate programmer projects that made it into the general public.

[bluedad]

Anyway, let's have more speculative Reason 8 discussion and less horseshit please, and keep the trash talk where it belongs... at PUF

That's a good suggestion, unless y'all would rather have me lock this thread.

[KarmaShaman]

Dont do that ! But it could do with a quick cleanup. Less personal attacks and more revolt towards the Swedish Mafia is what's in order

[EnochLight]

Why would it be a concern at all? They sold Audiomatic separately for 6.5 users even though it came free with 7. I would be surprised if they didn't sell the new Softube amps separately for 7.0 users...

we are discussing proper devices, not whimsical, first year graduate programmer projects that made it into the general public.

That's adorable.

[KarmaShaman]

You're adorable, big guy. Now come here and give your ol' auntie Sharmey a hug.

[KarmaShaman]

Watching one of the beta-tester's videos, and it's nice that the audio tracks in the sequencer are very clearly indicated as different to devices with a an audio wave image.

Sucks that there's no custom colour pallete. Seriously, how hard can it be to code that ?

I'm also digging the fact that you no longer need to use the pencil tool to draw clips in.

The fonts they use to label devices on the browser, and also the tool window, are horrible. Really B-Grade and amateurish

[memyselfandus]

Link to video?

[KarmaShaman]

Link to video?

Sure. It's embedded into post #5 of this beautiful, love-filled thread

https://www.propellerheads.se/forum/sho ... ost1526318

[stroker_ace]

@neverenoughfunk - while I admire contributors who take the time to contribute in a detailed manner, I respectfully suggest that you're wrong.

The future for Propellerhead is in an RE market, a musical app store with low overheads and maximum profit. Contrary to your hypothesis, it is more important than ever that Props hang on to existing customers as much as they target new users. With the closed loop model of monopolistic plugin distribution, every single user is a potential repeat spender.

Which makes it all the more baffling as to why they have announced such a lackluster upgrade. I'm leaning towards corporate arrogance (a trait always evident under the facade of the 'caring for you' grease they slap on users) and a gross underestimation of their customers in relation to how much they can get away with (or how little, as the case may be).

I am firmly of the mind that there's a plethora of improvements already developed, which will be drip fed to users for many years. Look out for a point release within a year to keep us baited and on the hook, and see how people will start gushing over how great the company is for giving free features. The 8.0 debacle will be forgotten, 8.5 will be the gift from heaven, and RE sales will continue to line their pockets with millions in the double digits.

It's the perfect business model. Up to 50% commission for products they don't invest R&D into, onto a webstore they rarely maintain, using staff solely to market their products via social media. It's a brilliant strategy in my opinion, but my respect for their clever marketing doesn't lessen the reality that existing customers are being hoodwinked.

As a calculated risk, it's going to work for them, and will continue to do so, due to the brand loyal devotees that must have the latest and greatest, and also those who are painfully aware that the RE EULA has them neck deep in the Reason quicksand, and to bail out would be a loss of the products they have been investing in.

I think you're overestimating how well rack extensions are doing. I think there's more evidence to support the idea that they're not doing well.

I don't think they'd be charging full upgrade price for such a paltry (imo) update if rack extensions were doing well. And it looks like they lost a ton of "loyalty points" from users with this upgrade/the Line 6 fiasco, to boot. Reason users have gone around a few mulberry bushes for Propellerheads and their sometimes convoluted way of doing things over the years (Record, anyone?). I think R8 (well, it's price tag) will prove to be the straw that broke the camel's back for more than a few users.

I don't think they would have included MIDI out so soon after launching the rack extension format if rack extensions were doing well. You spend all that time, money, and resources to improve your walled garden, then a year later you blow one of the walls to smithereens? It doesn't make any sense.

And there have been several other indicators that rack extensions aren't doing well, some of them in the form of comments made by actual rack extension developers.

And very few big name devs are rushing to develop rack extensions. More seem to be leaving than climbing aboard. At most, some companies have vague, backest-of-burners plans for some time down the line.

You're not going to keep a user-base happy with that kind of "support"; not when they can go to VST-land and have all these things now.

But, on the other side of the equation, Rob Papen is still supporting the format, as is Softube, and I've heard D16 will be developing a rack extension at some point, and I think a rather major VST synth (I forget which one, and don't want to get anybody's hopes up) will be ported over.

Eventually.

I agree with your point about "drip feeding" features, though. I call them "panic buttons". Props never gives their users what they want until they have to. From the ability to record audio in 2009, to MIDI out in 2013, they, like you said, drip feed out basic features, charging their users every step of the way.

As far as I can see, they only have two panic buttons left: VST support inside Reason, and the ability to transfer rack extension licenses. I think those two things have to happen at some point (although the VST thing might happen in the aforementioned "mulberry bush" way), and given the reaction to the R8 update, I think one of them will happen quite soon.

[KarmaShaman]

I think you're overestimating how well rack extensions are doing. I think there's more evidence to support the idea that they're not doing well.

Firstly, I admire a person who takes the time to offer well thought out dialogue. I shall respond in kind tomorrow, but to address the point quoted above:

We are only in a position to speculate on the success of RE's, and I base my estimation on a couple of factors. There are public records available as to Propellerhead's annual profits, and they reported something like $9M during a financial year that didn't see a major version release. I find it unlikely that they made this much on the back of the phone apps.

Furthermore, if you look at the trend on the Propellerhead forum, a lot of people have dozens of Rack Extensions. As a market of largely 'bedroom producers', people are buying not out of a 'need' but of a desire to 'want'. People are entitled to blow their money as they see fit, but when there's a culture surrounding DAW-Exclusive plugins that promotes such desires in a user base, it's a great recipe for success.

Compulsion plays part in this success also. Take a look at some of the ridiculous RE's that have been released of late, and the ecstasy that people have towards these indescribable products. That Bakelite thing is a perfect example. CrapRE is another. Add to that the device that makes your music sound like an Atari 2600 from 1982, that silly thing that sounds like a Texas Instrument learning toy for kids, three blank spacer plates that do nothing... the list goes on. People rush towards these things with fistfuls of cash, yet they inherently have no logical place in a studio. How many compressors are in the store that people own every instance of? How many delay units does one person really need ? Some people own all of them.

Look at some of the PUF members who have listed their collections. I'm sure Theo has a shitload, there's a guy called PsyTales that must own most of them, Devilfish just listed a heap, and another guy was trying to onsell about $3,000 worth of RE's. I'm not calling these guys out on anything but to use them as examples of the RE success story. As I said, one man's buying habits is their own business. Take a look at those who include RE collections in their signature... it must be an average of 12 per user. Now think about those who don't see the importance of telling the world what they own. Now consider that Mattias recently mentioned that the forum represents a TINY percentage of the Reason user community. Shit, even myself - I don't consider that I'm an 'RE Guy' but come to think of it I probably have about 8 plugins.

It stands to reason that most users will buy RE's from time to time, whether out of genuine usage applications, compulsive buying or simply to feel cool about themselves. And in a closed-loop system where the ONLY options are products from the Props store, this makes for a very lucrative business proposition.

The external developers may not be turned away from the perceived poor sales figures as you have speculated, but rather by the fact that there's no money in it once Props take their pound of flesh (rumour has it that 50% will be the new arrangement for SDK2). One popular dev went so far as to state publicly that Props are making more money per sale than he is. For many, it's going to be a better option to work on VST, especially for established brands.

So, in my speculative opinion, I'm of the mind that RE's are becoming the single biggest recurring income stream for Propellerhead.

[u_f_o]

lol

[ezelkow1]

The only thing about that, I wouldnt use a forum as a representation of an entire userbase. Forums are generally way out of whack with what the actual population uses, does, and wishes. You can just look around here, I know personally I own waaayyy too many vsts of all sorts but I do not believe that I am a good representation of the daw/vst world at all. Most people I know that dont hang around these places only own a couple synths, couple fx, and use their daw ones, thats it.

I can tell you from my day job, there are many public forums dedicated to the industry and company I work at, and the things the people on there request only about .001% of the actual population of users even want or need. We implemented a piece of hardware, mainly because those people are so vocal, and out of a userbase of 14mil, we have a couple THOUSAND (if that) people using it. I believe that is much more representative of what forums represent. They present the utmost extreme of a userbase and are not indicative of normal use.

[trimph1]

Watching one of the beta-tester's videos, and it's nice that the audio tracks in the sequencer are very clearly indicated as different to devices with a an audio wave image.

Sucks that there's no custom colour pallete. Seriously, how hard can it be to code that ?

I'm also digging the fact that you no longer need to use the pencil tool to draw clips in.

The fonts they use to label devices on the browser, and also the tool window, are horrible. Really B-Grade and amateurish

The lack of color customization would be a concern for me. Dark on dark just is not my cup of tea.

[JonSolo]

The only thing about that, I wouldnt use a forum as a representation of an entire userbase. Forums are generally way out of whack with what the actual population uses, does, and wishes. You can just look around here, I know personally I own waaayyy too many vsts of all sorts but I do not believe that I am a good representation of the daw/vst world at all. Most people I know that dont hang around these places only own a couple synths, couple fx, and use their daw ones, thats it.

I can tell you from my day job, there are many public forums dedicated to the industry and company I work at, and the things the people on there request only about .001% of the actual population of users even want or need. We implemented a piece of hardware, mainly because those people are so vocal, and out of a userbase of 14mil, we have a couple THOUSAND (if that) people using it. I believe that is much more representative of what forums represent. They present the utmost extreme of a userbase and are not indicative of normal use.

One of the best and truest posts I have read here. And I agree, ownership does not make for good representation. Even if the product were perfect, so to speak, someone would complain...and would likely do so on a forum.

Still... I love Reason, but have reservations. No upgrade for me, thus far. (And that coming from someone who upgraded from K9U to K10U!)

Jon

[Mr. Fister]

Why would it be a concern at all? They sold Audiomatic separately for 6.5 users even though it came free with 7. I would be surprised if they didn't sell the new Softube amps separately for 7.0 users...

we are discussing proper devices, not whimsical, first year graduate programmer projects that made it into the general public.

You've got to be talking about Audiomatic.

They marketed it at first like it was a great addition to Reason.....and it's the most childish toy of a device/plug that's ever been developed.

It's sad. It's really hard to take Reason seriously as a DAW after seeing Audiomatic, and largely makes all the recent additions look like toys. Guilty by association? Yes.

This isn't the Reason forum and I hope I'm not hurting any feelings. As a consumer and adult producer of music, that is my opinion of Audiomatic.

"It's like Instagram for your audio".......

Wow....