New Licensing

[ronwasserman]

Originally Posted by wmcintyre

I'm a little confused by this...
I have already upgraded from HD10 to HD11,
do I have to buy this again?

Just wait until they do the next version. That's what I'm doing. It'll be $599 if it's a substantial upgrade and you'll get a year of support with it. Pretty simple and you will not have to renew it every year if you want to stay with the new software.

Ignore all the speculation going on. It's straightforward for HDX (HD) users.

[Jay_uk]

Originally Posted by Bill Denton

Ya know, grilled chicken breasts are really good if you brush them with lemon juice before you cook them. Had to fill my car up yesterday, I'm getting really good mileage lately. When you cook the chicken, make sure your grill is not too hot because chicken burns easily. I've got a headlight burned our on my car, guess I better pick up a new bulb.

So, what was I talking about...cooking chicken, or my car?

It would probably be a lot easier to understand had I talked about them separately, right?

That's the problem with threads like this...you got a whole bunch of people talkin' 'bout and speculating 'bout two different things when they don't know anything about what they talkin' 'bout...

"Reductio ad Absurdum"

[Righty27]

Originally Posted by Bill Denton

So let's end this thread...Avid has explained how the Pro Tools Standard Support is going to work, and they will explain how the subscription model works if and when they implement it...there is no need for further speculation...

Bill - with you on subscriptions as this model is slightly different to e.g. Adobe (even if the effect/impact is similar). However, what has been presented so far has been pored over in some detail, and this process has helped the community identify important gaps in Avid's FAQs ... so they haven't fully explained how this will work.

I perceive this thread less about speculation and more as a protest (including, as rainsong reminds us, at the higher price paid by early PT11 adopters for 'beta' software); users expressing their discontent in the hope that we can influence changes. With a few minor amendments (or maybe clarifications if in the missing details e.g. regarding lapsed support plans), current 'owners' may even like the new pricing/plans.

[ronwasserman]

Originally Posted by Righty27

Bill - with you on subscriptions as this model is slightly different to e.g. Adobe (even if the effect/impact is similar). However, what has been presented so far has been pored over in some detail, and this process has helped the community identify important gaps in Avid's FAQs ... so they haven't fully explained how this will work.

I perceive this thread less about speculation and more as a protest (including, as rainsong reminds us, at the higher price paid by early PT11 adopters for 'beta' software); users expressing their discontent in the hope that we can influence changes. With a few minor amendments (or maybe clarifications if in the missing details e.g. regarding lapsed support plans), current 'owners' may even like the new pricing/plans.

It's ridicilous to bitch about having paid a higher price to be an early adopter. This is how it goes some times. Remember how expensive early Mac's were? How about 2" tape? How about all the plugins we've all bought that are unusable or not up to competitors standards.

I wonder if these people get more (or charge more) for their engineering services now than they did two years ago. If so, they should consider a 30-40% price cut.

[Mattiasnyc]

Originally Posted by NipL

I don't agree with this - but who am I, right.

a) Tony made a comment that standard support might work like something close to MediaComposer - but nothing is decided yet, but soon everybody will know.

I don't think that's what he said actually. He was talking about a subscription to the license, not a "subscription support plan".

Thus the support plan includes support and updates/upgrades, and it applies to already purchased infinitely owned licenses.

The subscription plan would be a monthly/annual rate plan where you rent the license for as long as you pay. If you stop paying then the license is revoked/ended.

That's what I read at least.

[Mattiasnyc]

Originally Posted by Bill Denton

So, we're done with subscriptions for now...

Pro Tools Standard Support

I'm going to buy your house. We'll sign the contract today. I will pay you on January 1, 2014. You will come back and put in a swimming pool when the weather warms up.

So, when can you count your money?

That's all this is about...

From Avid's perspective that could be the case. We don't know for sure.

From the user's perspective a more apt analogy would be:

"I'm going to buy your house. We'll sign the contract today. I will pay you on January 1, 2014. At some undefined point in the future you will come back and put in an undefined feature to the property which enhances its value."

(Just as your example I excluded the issue of actual 'support' of course)

[JFreak]

Originally Posted by Mattiasnyc

He was talking about a subscription to the license, not a "subscription support plan".

Until we hear more real information, it doesn't really mean anything if we talk about ABC or QWERTY. Avid needs to spell out all the details and frankly I don't care whether I'm a moderator or a regular user, just plain and clear it has taken too long to do so.

But if a user has a perpetual license, with an expired support plan, what does it mean? If it means that's it and no way coming back except to re-purchase the software, it isn't really that perpetual. How many of you can really think of using PT5 or PT6 today? I don't have any OS9 capable Macs around and I wouldn't want to use Panther either.

Granted, that is an over-exaggeration, but still: if there is no support (or no upgrade path) then the license is not perpetual. Sure, it is not completely as bad as a lease (which would stop working the day you don't have it) but it's not future-proof either.

And neither was a PT8 license, for example. You cannot get it working on a Yosemite that's for sure. But you could upgrade it even if you didn't want to upgrade to PT9/10 before. Now that upgrades are tied to support plan, that support plan policies need to be written down loud and clear without a chance for any confusion.

So...

For me, it has become more and more difficult to just sit tight and wait. Can you believe it how many people ask *me* about what happens next? I cannot recommend anything, because I don't have enough information. So we're all in the same boat.

I might have ranted enough for today, so perhaps I would do everyone a favor by stopping here.

[Righty27]

Originally Posted by ronwasserman

It's ridicilous to bitch about having paid a higher price to be an early adopter. This is how it goes some times. Remember how expensive early Mac's were? How about 2" tape? How about all the plugins we've all bought that are unusable or not up to competitors standards.

I wonder if these people get more (or charge more) for their engineering services now than they did two years ago. If so, they should consider a 30-40% price cut.

Ron - as I reflected in another post earlier today, most technology users have grown accustomed to last year's latest/greatest being sold off cheaper weeks later, usually just before the next big thing. Buyers paid based on the proposition offered at the time - I don't think anyone is complaining about that.

The point with PT11 is that it did not deliver what was promised for most until very recently. I'm in the 'hobbyist' group, paid for my upgrade immediately on release ... and continued to use PT10 until quite recently when I committed to PT11 only because of a much-delayed OSX Mavericks upgrade (which I'd been holding back) and the incompatibilities/uninstall issues with PT10.

I guess we can hope for stable Pro Tools | Software, with all the promised benefits of 64-bit, in the next major release (12?) ... and it's the buyers in November 2014 (only a few months, weeks and days after others have started to benefit from their PT11 purchase) who pay less and will likely get the next version included. That's why this is also an issue for some ... but if Avid put their thinking caps on and accept (*) that PT11 wasn't ready for primetime until recently, I'm sure they could make things good for these people too.

I'm now waiting to upgrade my Pro Tools Mac to Yosemite (happy with it on another Mac without Pro Tools) and it is this dependency on OS/hardware upgarades (moreso for Mac users, I think) that makes the concept of perpetual licences redundant. Avid must know this and, you'd think intended this to eventually force users onto subscriptions.

(* if they don't spend much time on DUC and just look at support tickets, they may not accept this ... how many call support?)

[NipL]

Originally Posted by Mattiasnyc

I don't think that's what he said actually. He was talking about a subscription to the license, not a "subscription support plan".

Thus the support plan includes support and updates/upgrades, and it applies to already purchased infinitely owned licenses.

The subscription plan would be a monthly/annual rate plan where you rent the license for as long as you pay. If you stop paying then the license is revoked/ended.

That's what I read at least.

Maybe I read something else into what he said.

Everybody can make their own interpreation here(from page 41):

"Quote:
Originally Posted by noiseboyuk
And for previous CPTK license-holders, forced to "upgrade" to HD, that means $600 per annum to stay on a current version, regardless of whether or not they release anything new.

We are committed to providing updates and this new model enables us to release updates more frequently, without having to hold completed features from launch until packaged up in a bigger release. We intend on showing this to you through 2015, during which you'll have time to evaluate your decision.
Quote:
Originally Posted by holler
So it's what we feared, and not like WUP. Step off, and you're going to have to buy a new license, like MC.

Not true. With MC, if you decide to not get on a support plan, or if you let it lapse, your original perpetual license will still be available to you. If you then decide you want to get on the latest version, you have the option to subscribe monthly or yearly with no upfront cost.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Carl Kolchak
Reading between the lines, if you subsequently let your support plan lapse, you either need to buy the software outright again, or join an implied Software Rental model (as per Media Composer).

So, pretty much what we thought all along.

That is how MC licensing works, and we will likely mirror that for Pro Tools, however, we're not ready to share the details of that plan yet—but soon. __________________
Tony Cariddi
Avid
Audio Marketing Director
"

[rainsong]

Originally Posted by Righty27

The point with PT11 is that it did not deliver what was promised for most until very recently.

Exactly.

Selling a broken product and then hitting customers with a bill around the time it's finally (somewhat) fixed is poor form and bad customer relations...not just regular upgrade/evolution-of-technology stuff.