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OK So who is Galbanum ?
Don't trust those with words of weakness, they are the most aggressive

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Galbanum is Andrew's company that sells his content:
https://www.galbanum.com/media/productsaudio/

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Based on what am reading, as a 2C Audio customer: 2C Audio is effectively Dead. :borg:

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Probably not - just in the way.it existed so far.

But the idea of a revived Spinaudio fills me with great excitement, I must say.
"Preamps have literally one job: when you turn up the gain, it gets louder." Jamcat, talking about presmp-emulation plugins.

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So sad this fight is going on between 2 people who I think did brilliant things to the DSP world.
On their homepage it still reads
2CAudio was formed in 2008 as a partnership between Andrew Souter and Denis Malygin to develop audio signal processing software plug-ins focussing on spatialization, advanced creative effects, and other future-forward ideas. Since then it has gone on to win major industry awards, and it's products are heard daily by millions of people around the world.
Please calm down and get this settled. You are both required to bring this to the next level (meant in a good sense).

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***
this is my answer to Mr. Andrew Souter, the man to claims to own all 2CAudio Intellectual Property
and who granted himself a privilege to arrest his business partner IP and money without having a resolution of a court or any other party authorized to make such claims valid.
***
below I present my vision of the situation.
so having two views you, my dear user, you can now make your own independent *third-party* view about the dispute. and decide whether or not you want to further support Andrew Souter by buying from his web site.

The reason this dispute went online is that this is the last resort for me to solve the dispute.
We could not solve it between us.
***

This part is about the history of 2CAUDIO, is the most interesting and will provide
a key insight into understanding of the origins of the dispute.

-------------------------------
Part II: The History of 2CAUDIO
-------------------------------

quote:

[Alan Watts]
"Now the dreaming period is subdivided into four stages.
The first stage is the longest and it's the best.
During that stage, the dream is beautiful.
The second stage is not quite so long and it's a little unsettling.
and there's an element of instability in it. a certain touch of insecurity.
In the third stage which is not, again so long.
the forces of light and the forces of darkness of good and of evil are equally balanced.
and things are beginning to look rather dangerous.
And in the fourth stage, which is the shortest of them all, the negative, dark or evil side triumphs
and the whole thing blows up and so then there's a waking period.
before the whole thing starts again.
We are seeing here, the fundamental principles of drama."

A) Part II :: Prelude
----------------------

I'd recommend reading Part I before proceeding with the info below.

After demise of SpinAudio in 2005 I started to work on new reverb algorithm which I called SpaceVerb. This reverb derived its ER (Early Reflections) engine from SpinAudio RoomVerb M2 though the whole thing went through a major re-design and enhancement.
the most notable changes were:
1) simulation of acoustic spaces with irregular (non-rectangular) geometries
2) simulation of irregular reflection scattering (from say furniture)
3) one could now use two *material* profiles to simulate frequency-dependent absorption of surfaces

SpinAudio's RoomVerb M2 was not able to properly simulate dense and specific decay profile of Halls so I had to come up with completely new LR (Late Reflections) engine. I studied and experimented with the best and the most complex reverb math available at that time and finally after months of RnD I came up with a design that sounded good enough. This design allowed to simulate that specific profile of Halls which no other reverb at that time could do.
(and still many other reverbs on the market cannot do)

Another cool thing that I invented was a specific alg that allowed LR engige to sound what people describe as *alive*. Many people who have used Aether (which is just renamed and little bit tweaked SpaceVerb and you will see later) can confirm.
That was year 2005. Once I had some minimal working prototype I began to email people who I knew from SpinAudio times. I was looking for someone who would be interested in having some joint venture around this product.

Andrew was a beta-tester for SpinAudio so this is how we started communicating.
SpaceVerb has minimal simple GUI enough for prototyping and its DSP engine was not vectorized/optimized (read 'slow'). I was too frightened to use SpinAudio GUI SDK (which was just stellar to date) to make plug-ins so I could not make a market ready product
from SpaceVerb proto easily. As the whole alg of SpaceVerb was pretty complex it required a lot of cpu power to run in its unoptimized/un-vectorized form. As I needed money for my living I had to take some side contract projects.

During next 3 years I had been spending 70% of my time for SpaceVerb/SDK and 30% to do contractual jobs which provided some income to me.

As a result of these 3 years of my work by the end of 2008 I had:
a) new cross-platform plug-in sdk that allowed to do skinnable GUIs
b) the reverb dsp engine re-coded in fast vectorized form, 90% of which was coded IN PURE ASSEMBLER which allowed the reverb to use a relatively (to its complexity) mean amount of cpu resources.
Any plug-in developer will confirm that this is HUGE amount of extremely complex work done.
During this time Andrew provided tweaks to the reverb alg which made it sounding even better.
I do not dispute that. However I consider them as just tweaks, not something that made significant/fundamental change to it's initial amazing sounding (and features) that I initially invented. Andrew might have a different take on this. sure. Anybody has a right to dream and deceive oneself.

In 2008 we decided to join our forces. At that time Andrew was making sample libs and had his own company called Galbanum (I've never been its shareholder) and had an online shop so we could sell through it. Andrew came up with the name Aether which we agreed to use instead of SpaceVerb.

I came up with the company brand name "2CAUDIO". I've read a book about how to make proper brand/company names and invested a lot of my time/thinking into this. As a result the company/brand name turned to be:
a) well-thought-out
b) utterly compact
c) easy to remember
d) makes it atop of any lexicographically sorted list
e) and the most essential: it packs a lot of meaning

TAKEAWAY: COMPANY NAME WAS INVENTED BY ME.

--------------------
B) Part II :: Intro
--------------------

In january 2009 the sales started. Andrew was collecting money via Galbanum.
We agreed to reserve some % of sales revenue for company related expenses (hosting, advertising etc) and split the rest 50/50. Every month Andrew made a sales report that included all accounting related to sales (but not to company expenses, which he has never ever provided to me so far and still refuses to do so) These reports included user names (but provisionally NO USER EMAILS, access to which Andrew still refuses to provide to me to)

I HAVE ALL SUCH REPORTS from 2013 until nov-2021 and I might be able to find some of pre-2013 ones or retrieve some data from emails.
I CAN DISCLOSE THESE FILES TO A COURT OR OTHER AUTHORIZED PARTY IF NECESSARY.
All payments to me until the last one in nov 2021 (for sales in october 2021) were made on the basic of these reports and nothing else. I can prove that. In the absence of a written agreement between us I consider these reports as a confirmation basis of our actual, albeit informal, business relationships regarding this joint venture. These reports unequivocally read that I have a certain profit share.
2CAUDIO LLC as a legal entity was registered in march 2020 and we then signed
our first formal, written agreement (more on this in later posts). not having a formal agreement for so many years is a major mistake that finally lead to this dispute.
At the start and the following years things just worked for both of us and until 2017
we had no major disagreements. All that means that we had no agreement that would specify who owned what code.
Some of the source code files were marked "Copyright 2CAUDIO, [year this/that]", some "Copyright Denis", some "Copyright Andrew" and some had no "Copyright..." at all. Nobody cared.

At the moment of Aether (and 2CAUDIO brand) launch in january 2009 the parties made the following contributions:

Denis:
A) 3 Years of RnD resulted in Production-ready:
A1. Reverb alg ,which later won awards that no other 2CAudio product could accomplish thereafter
A2. Optimized/vectorized (written in manual asm) Aether reverb DSP engine (which then was a basis for Breeze 1.x)
A3. Optimized/vectorized (written in manual asm) DSP code library/infrastructure that can be used to make other audio plug-ins (B2, Kaleidoscope)
A4. Plug-In Code Infrastructure (engine, copy-protection, VST, AU etc etc). used for all products
A5. Cross-platform (Win, OSX) skinnable GUI Engine. 50% of which is still used
B) 5 years of experience running SpinAudio and thus 5 years of expertise in Audio Plug-In Research, Development, Sales, Marketing and User Support
C) 2CAUDIO brand name

Andrew:
A) reverb alg *tweaks*
B) presets for Aether (pretty good indeed)
C) ugly/unprofessional-looking GUI design (design = layout description + pictures).
Those who tried the first version of Aether could confirm that. I did not like that (as after SpinAudio that looked inferior) but Andrew wanted to train his gfx design skills and I finally accepted that. Due to many user complains the design was reworked later following advice from one cool designer who worked for Apple
D) simple online shop. which is nothing extraordinary. we could have used share-it or similar service no problem
E) some initial small user base
F) manual (released later)
G) Aether name
H) support in forums

---

Now, my dear reader, could you see a huge disproportion in initial contribution of the parties that we had at the start, having agreed to have 50/50 profit split? I hope you can see that and won't dispute much, would you?

This is why I call myself "An Initiator" of 2CAUDIO. I think it's fair for me to claim that.

How come that Mr. Souter can now claim that he is the major inventor of Aether and the sole owner of it that gives him a right to sell this product online and not share profits with me.
And what about owning of the whole brand name he claims to have?

Andrew calls me a *contractor*. I call myself a major initial contributor to 2CAUDIO.
I provided enough info above for anyone to see that my claim is substential. If anyone has questions they are free to ask me and request clarifications.

So how we can reconsile such disagreement? Somebody must be wrong. Who might that be?
Who got caught up in a self-delusion?

I understood this disproportion at that time but my idea was that sooner or later Andrew will catch up and indeed, I agree, that by 2020 that initial disproportion was finally fully evened out and it's fair to say now that each of party contributed equally to the brand. 50/50. No exceptions.
I do not claim that I own more that 50% of the joint venture whereas Andrew claims (and behaves accordingly) that he's got the whole 100%. How is it possible? There must be some trickery involved you might guess. And indeed, there is, we'll talk about that in later posts.

Note that without my initial start-up contribution/impulse that provided revenue stream for years 2CAUDIO as we know it today would not exist. Without good revenue no professional audio RnD is possible. Without it Andrew would not be able to become top reverb/spatial math/dsp guru and make brilliant Breeze 2.x + Precedence combo later. It was me who sponsored his research. Taking over all 2CAUDIO intellectual property, claiming ownership of Aether reverb and arresting for no reason my personal money was his way to thank me for that contribution. what a turn!

this is not the end of the story. it's just a beggining. it's going to get more and more interesing and tricky with every new post to come. stay safe, stay cool, stay tuned. see you later.

[to be continued...]

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2ca wrote: Thu Mar 10, 2022 10:04 am ***

[to be continued...]
The problem here Dennis is none of us - or overwhelmingly most of us dont know you or Andrew at all. We have no way of reasonably interpreting anything you or Andrew say about your conflict or history. My advice is to seek some form of mediation and stop posting online. Remember the old cop line - anything you say can and will be used in evidence against you. Which basically means nothing you say here can be of any benefit to you, it can only get you in trouble. Mediation services are the go. That's a great big industry that has arisen precisely for cases like yours. Use their experience

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Personally, I have no problem with either of you, I've no idea who i've spoken to over the years, but i've always had a good experience with 2CAudio .

I still use and love Aether and Breeze V1 , but I doubt VST3 support will arrive so they will be gone eventually.

I wish you two would come to some amicable arrangement, and stop the public showing of your underpants, because this is not the place for internal beef.

If 2CAudio disappear, thank you for the wonderful verbs you brought to me.
Don't trust those with words of weakness, they are the most aggressive

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LeVzi wrote: Thu Mar 10, 2022 11:02 am I still use and love Aether and Breeze V1 , but I doubt VST3 support will arrive so they will be gone eventually.
i hope this doesnt happen, when do you expect vst2 support to end? just seen cubase will stop supporting it in the next few years but would it depend on each daw? even apart from plugins that arent vst3, some plugins are more buggy in vst3

hopefully they both realise that even if they don't make any new products together they could still both continue to make a fortune from keeping these old products supported as they are the best algorithmic reverbs around imo

agree that they need to get some sort of mediation, none of us can do anything, if they had a formal agreement then just get legal help

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fairlyclose wrote: Thu Mar 10, 2022 10:16 am
2ca wrote: Thu Mar 10, 2022 10:04 am ***

[to be continued...]
The problem here Dennis is none of us - or overwhelmingly most of us dont know you or Andrew at all. We have no way of reasonably interpreting anything you or Andrew say about your conflict or history. My advice is to seek some form of mediation and stop posting online. Remember the old cop line - anything you say can and will be used in evidence against you. Which basically means nothing you say here can be of any benefit to you, it can only get you in trouble. Mediation services are the go. That's a great big industry that has arisen precisely for cases like yours. Use their experience
1. I appreciate your feedback

2. Could you point to me to a mediation service that would:
a) be neutral to US and RU
b) accept crypto as a payment method since SWIFT is blocked and my MC/VISA are blocked as of today

3. Mr. Souter already threatened me a year ago with a defamation lawsuit if I start posting online a true information about his actions. If there is anybody who feel afraid here it must be Mr. Souter who does not want that this info to leak into public so he can continue what he does, ie selling products with my IP and grab all the money into his pockets. In the current situation what should I be afraid of? Arresting of all my property in US? already done by Mr. Souter. I dont have any other. Block payments to me by SWIFT. already done. Block my MC/VISA cards. Already Done. Maybe No Visa to US? I dont need one. What else should I be really afraid of? let me know.

4. Since I have invested 17 years of my life into 2CAudio I feel obliged to users who paid to me over these years to inform them about the situation and warn any potential new users. I must present an explanation to customers why I cannot support them anymore and why I have no access to the company emails. Users are all waiting for the updates which already are long overdue due to actions of Mr. Souter. It's my right to speak out the truth here. I did not email users yet. I did not post to other forums, and I even did not make a new thread with a bold mind-catching caption. My expression is limited to this small casually-looking thread. I would kindly ask everyone to withdraw from any attempts to stop me speaking out. That would only make things worse.
Last edited by 2ca on Thu Mar 10, 2022 1:31 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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LeVzi wrote: Thu Mar 10, 2022 11:02 am but I doubt VST3 support will arrive so they will be gone eventually.
I've been working on VST3 support. It was expected to be ready later this spring.
Note that I've been working on this and M1 support having NO MONEY from sales since november.
I was hoping Mr. Souter would withdraw from this malicious behavour but unfortunately it did not happen and I could not stand that any longer. Thanks for understanding.

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Well, I for one don't think this is the place to be airing these issues. All I can say thus far being a very new customer to 2Caudio and dealing with Andrew via customer support.. is that he is being very helpful trying to work with me and has offered me a full refund if we cannot get to the root of the issues I'm having and get them fixed.

Dennis, with all due respect.. you are not achieving anything posting here and in all honesty, your constant posts are causing you to come across as somewhat unhinged. rather than making excuses about why you cant seek legal help.. go a seek legal help.

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The disagreement between Andrew and Denis needs to be resolved in private away from KVR. The direction this topic has taken is helping no one so I'm locking it.

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