Yes to cloud collaboration!

[JFreak]

10eur/month for 10M/10M optical

[Bob Olhsson]

Originally Posted by xylie6

It's weird how many of the things we use in the music world started out in the telephony side of things...

It's even more that most people realize beginning with the microphone, amplifier and loudspeaker which were developed for public address systems and then adapted to broadcasting, electrical disk recording and talking movies. The mixing console, equalizer, modern tape recorder, stereo, the transistor, digital audio, MP3s and the Unix operating system were all invented at Bell Labs.

The challenge is finding something they didn't invent. A lot of people get credited for inventing things that they were only the first to market as a product or were unaware that Bell Labs had preceded them by a decade.

[JCBigler]

Originally Posted by Bob Olhsson

A lot of people get credited for inventing things that they were only the first to market as a product or were unaware that Bell Labs had preceded them by a decade.

I mean, Avid, Protools, and Media Composer and the whole rest of the recording industry wouldn't be nothin' without Bell Labs.

[Carl Kolchak]

So, is Pro Tools cloud collaboration a software "Feature", or a "Service"?

What I mean is this :

I'm on PT11 (a perpetual license), and I decide to sign up to the annual support plan - which means I get PT12 (perpetual license), and access to cloud collaboration.

At the end of 2016, I decide not to renew my support plan, and remain locked with whatever Pro Tools version was available at the point my support lapsed (lets say Pro Tools 12.3.3).

Does that mean my perpetual license has access to cloud collaboration in perpetuity (and does that extend to Avid's Marketplace)?

If yes, then it's a "Feature". If no, then it's a "Service".

And if it's a "Service" that depends on being signed up to an active support plan, how does one opt back in at a later date, if one has already committed to sticking with a previous perpetual license, and let support lapse?


Avid have also stated several times that collaborators do not even need to be using Pro Tools as their DAW, to utilise the cloud collaboration functionality.


This could mean that there is an Avid SDK, enabling other DAW's to use Avid's cloud collaboration tools - although most likely what Avid means when they have said this (I think it was Tom Graham on the occasions that I remember it being stated), is that whilst the collaboration needs to actually happen in Pro Tools, the collaborators do not need to own a version of Pro Tools...

Which leads on to :

Pro Tools | First

This free version of the software also includes the cloud collaboration functionality, which would allow collaborators to share, without owning Pro Tools.

However, Pro Tools | First cannot open regular PT sessions, and full versions of Pro Tools cannot open PT | First session.

So how is this going to work?

Whilst Pro Tools | First can import & export audio files (but not MIDI), no other session data is transferrable, and no more than 16 tracks, of each variety, are compatible (as opposed to only allowing 16 to be active).

That means, in this particular circumstance, that all collaboration decisions would need to be made, and committed to in one of the 3 available sessions, before they could be exported, and brought in to a regular Pro Tools session.

Otherwise you would loose all of the options for accepting edit changes, version changes, etc. and may well still loose significant metadata in the export process.

[rockridge]

With protools first, you can save the session only in the cloud.
You get three free slots, but if you want more, the service comes in.

Will 12 be the same?

[TOM@METRO]

Originally Posted by rockridge

With protools first, you can save the session only in the cloud.
You get three free slots, but if you want more, the service comes in.

Will 12 be the same?

I doubt it. There are still many studios choosing to keep their rigs offline.

[LDS]

Originally Posted by Carl Kolchak

So, is Pro Tools cloud collaboration a software "Feature", or a "Service"?

Its a service that they are trying to pass off as a feature to get everyone to pay for it.

I can certainly see how the cloud collaboration service would benefit some people and their workflow. For the rest, people like me... its just ridiculous. Avid better have an ace up their sleeves before Dec 31st rolls around otherwise I am out... as are a handful of other people whom I know and deal with. Everything I had seen so far with PT12 is largely in the Apple/App Store/Ecosystem vain... which is pathetic if its the feature that they are banking.

Really, this is one of the few "features" in Protools over the last decade that would have been acceptable as a paid additional extra.

[rockridge]

Avid has nothing left to sell but services.
After freeze track, what's next?

Remember the "Almighty" argument about iLok a few years ago?
I posted that someday we might have to stay connected to the internet just to use Protools.

We're getting closer...

[::F-L-E-X::]

An interesting read in this month's SOS on Avid's Cloud plans :

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/apr1...g-off-0415.htm

[JFreak]

It is clear that NOT EVERYONE needs this, but for the people who actually really need this, it is a godsend. I myself live in Finland and getting me to your studio in LA takes a 12 hour flight at best (usually I need to leave on sunday afternoon to get there on time on tuesday morning), but with cloud collaboration we only need to schedule some time together. Some people really desperately need this.