New Licensing

[JFreak]

How about hardware plus 1-year support contract? We will see once all the detais are revealed before november sales begin

[TimNielsen]

Congrats Avid, you literally have bungled this as badly as you've bungled anything before. ProTools CC as someone labeled it, what a disaster.

You want us to basically buy a subscription model by dangling free support included with it. Avid support? Anyone who has ever attempted to use such a thing knows what an oxymoron that phrase is. Not to mention the desperate cash crab that is going on at Avid releasing products not even close to ready (um, S6 anyone, and don't even get me started on EuCon), so when you release CC, and it's riddled with crippling bugs, are you going to actually hire any people who have a clue what they're doing, and can tell us slightly more than 'did you repair disk permissions and trash the preferences'?

You're also telling us that you're going to make new major releases of ProTools every year? If not, your model makes zero sense for the vast majority of us who don't use support (because it's just futile every time I've ever tried). You've never been able to do this even on your old pricing model. You haven't even been been able to deliver a stable version of 11 in well over a year of 'attempted' bug fixes (crashing video engine, graphical UI bugs all over the place). It's astonishing the poor quality of your programmers at the moment (well, at least Russian teenagers are cheap I guess). So instead of dangling new features, you dangle 'support', almost admitting that your software so desperately needs support....

Yet again the pricing model you've selected makes no sense, no discount at all, even for the first year, for those of us who shelled out full price to get the 11HD? So the guy sitting on his 9HD license gets to go to 12 for the same price as those of us who went from 9 to 10 to 11, paying all the way?

The worst part about all of this? At SOME point, I'll have to give in and give you more money just to be increasingly frustrated at how terrible your company has become at generating quality products. My job uses ProTools and probably always will. And it pains me that you'll end up getting my money...

[xylie6]

In a past life, I worked on voicemail systems. I saw the same thing happen with one of the major players. They forced the new and existing users to buy a "maintenance" contract. It was nothing more than a new revenue stream for them. It turned out that it was either that or the company was going to fail. To me, this is not a good sign for the future of AVID.

[dccarson]

We all heard the phrase "never out all your eggs in one basket" but this is the basket falling. Pro tools is great at what it does. But I'm not going to pay for an unknown future. I't is the industry standard, but the industry is changing and who knows where it will be 3-5 years from now. One thing I have learned about business is that if the organizational culture is not the greatest and the leadership isn't the best, the company will have issues. Would you invest your life savings in that company? Think about it.

[Carl Kolchak]

Avid really need to make a definitive statement now :

Will the PT10 combo license continue to be bundled with future version of Pro Tools, in perpetuity?

So many of us rely on that PT10 license for legacy hardware / plug-in needs, and with PT10 being the last officially supported software for so much Avid / Digidesign (not to mention former 3rd party partnerships) hardware - with PT11 in many cases either breaking compatibility, or working, but not officially supporting said hardware.

Would anyone in their right mind really want to sign up / pay for software before it's feature set has been officially announced, and also run the risk of loosing the PT10 combo license?


Whilst I have absolutely no doubt that Avid will release a version of Pro Tools that supports Cloud Collaboration, and the Avid Marketplace, within the time frame outlined in this current support plan offer (they've specifically named those features as being included, and an expiry date for support plan cover, so they are legally bound to deliver) I have no reassurance that I will get to keep my PT10 combo license, and no information about the other features that a new version of Pro Tools will include - cloud collaboration, and Avid's market place have no value to me (until at least they are proven in battle), and would certainly not entice me to upgrade under normal circumstances.

Maybe I'm reading too much in to this, but it's perhaps telling that the currently offered period of support expires on the 31st of March 2016...

This years Avid Customer Association event in Las Vegas (where "Avid Everywhere" was officially unveiled) was held in the first week of April.

The 2015 Avid Customer Association event is being held in the second week of April.

My guess is that something big is going to happen at the beginning of April 2016 - about a week or two after support plan renewal is due...

[Righty27]

Originally Posted by xylie6

In a past life, I worked on voicemail systems. I saw the same thing happen with one of the major players. They forced the new and existing users to buy a "maintenance" contract. It was nothing more than a new revenue stream for them. It turned out that it was either that or the company was going to fail. To me, this is not a good sign for the future of AVID.

Could it be that there's little more functionality that can be added to Pro Tools that isn't already in a competitor (albeit, not the 'industry standard') or held back arbitrarily for HD?

So, with 64-bit done, where will Avid's revenue come from to pay for the occasional OS-driven updates and bug fixes? Avid could throw in all the HD features and put Pro Tools in the Mac App store at a price that encourages a perpetual stream of new users (like Logic ... but Apple also make the Macs) ... or try to squeeze what they can out of existing users, basically because it's easier to keep paying than change workflow.

Pro Tools is going down the 'software as a service' route and this is alien to what most creative types are used to or want, as Adobe have proven. I guess they must know their business better than us and prefer a static base of e.g. 10k users paying $200-$500p.a. to 40k new users p.a. @ $100 (I have no idea of actual numbers!)

My view is that the industry leader should be tracking the industry better and making their products relevant in increasingly smaller facilities and home studios (not at the expense of pro facilities), including their hardware. Two versions of Pro Tools: 'Express' to hook new/young users and a 'proper' Pro Tools, as good as it can be, with no upgrades + compatible with more affordable Eucon hardware (cheaper Artist Series, new S3 control surface, etc.)! They can still sell support plans if they have confidence that this is really a service that lots of users will pay for ... without it feeling like some sort of 'money up front' scam.

Get 'everywhere' first and develop a captive market for 'Everywhere' and the 'Marketplace', which would in turn become more relevant. Avid need scale to really leverage the potential of Everywhere ... kids in their bedrooms, schools, collaborating across the world, etc. able to monetise their creativity!

... or just get Logic, Dropbox/Gobbler and save some cash wondering why the older guys still use Pro Tools?! I know it's not the same thing but DUC represents some of the people who should 'get it' and I don't see quickly growing threads raving about any of Avid's recent announcements.

[noiseboyuk]

Originally Posted by nigelpry

noiseboy ... you don't allow PMs via DUC ...I tried to send you one. Can you please switch on PM via your profile or PM me some other way of contacting you privately?

Ah yes, apologies Nigel. Switched on now (don't all rush at once), and I even have a real name in the sig.

[Logichead]

Wow. What a mess.

I'm on PT10HD6Accel with a D-Command. It's a great rig - stable and it sounds great. I have been watching the forum for posts about PT11, and it has been a long sad story, similar to the issues of PT8. When I bought PT8, it was almost a year before there was a stable version.

I may go ahead and buy the PT11 upgrade / subscription, especially if it is the last permanent license of ProTools.

But I don't need it…

Best…H

[Shifted Music]

As everyone has said, our collective confidence in the company, the software and the resulting future in our investment is seriously in doubt.

Playing catch up feature wise but mainly its the sacrificing stability to generate cash flow that has shaken this community to the core.

How is this so hard to see from the top and the middle even...

I know some of you are beta testers, but can we all agree that there were serious issues with PT 11 that took a year or so to fix and several were not really deeply hidden... Investing in stability and resulting consumer confidence is always a sound investment. Its the board room that doesn't seem to understand this, if they used the product daily they would, but they don't, we do.

I have the ever increasing thoughts of "switching" packages and after using Logic for 8 solid years daily, it might be time to re learn.

But maybe reaper or ableton.

I'm not in a position to stay much longer since there are options. Of course other packages have drawbacks and software glitches and bugs but up until now I have not taking this serious enough to really investigate the other product strengths and weaknesses. What I will tell you is that when I do I will also try and take a peek into the company itself as I hate to think I might have to switch software again in this lifetime.

When I made the jump to pro tools (during a time of logic instability in the TDM world - early 2005) I was so craving stability that I dealt with the learning curve and have loved the workflow.

In the last 3 years though Ive slowly started joking with my Still using Logic friends that I may join them once again. More and more each year.

Og course to Avid, one user like me bailing downs' mean a thing.

The point is the collective thinking on this is the same all the way up to the switching part... Many situations are too deeply rooted in PT to jump (Post, Film and other big facilities).

Every single one of us using Pro Tools for more than 5 years can say 100% that we are less confident in the company and the software.

That is the key thing that will erode from the bottom up. And Unless some serious strides are made to once again release tested and solid products it maybe too late for the company when those at the top finally get it.

I'm already stressed out about hitting the PT key commands in Logic I remember how frustrating that was in 2005 the other way around, but Hey I dealt with it, learned and adapted a new workflow. Im also secretly excited to have EXS24 back again, and a audio bin that makes way more sense when it comes to dealing with Files and Regions, oops - sorry "Clips"...

[noiseboyuk]

I must admit I don't get any sense that PT11 will be the last full release. Avid mention several times how we'll still have permanent licenses - I just see no evidence for that pessimism.

The three main questions to me are

1 - What happens after a break in support? Can you rejoin any time like WUP without penalty?

2 - For those who have nursed PT11 through a very painful birth, will there be any show of good faith from Avid going forward?

3 - for how long will PT10 remain bundled with the new version?

On 3) Avid explicitly state that PT10 is still bundled come November, so its not a short term concern. Personally I'd like to see them move to the same system as most other devs, where old versions are all just covered, you can have as many legacy versions on your system as is useful. But right now that's just wishful thinking on my part.