Licensing for Students - on-going eligibility for student upgrades

[nigelpry]

Full title =
Licensing for Students - on-going eligibility for student upgrades after initial purchase, changes in policy, clarification needed, with Tony Carridi's input please, if possible

I thought this might be best dealt with in a new thread, to avoid it getting caught up in the mass of posts in the main new licensing thread.

Can one of the Mods please alert Tony Carridi to this post/thread, as it relates specifically to a definitive statement he made in relation to on-going eligibility for student upgrades at the time of the Pro Tools 11 announcement.

Currently, there are three different student licence schemes in effect, as follows:

a) People who bought a student licence during the time that Pro Tools 10 was current (plus people who bought a licence towards the end of the time that Pro Tools 9 was current) have a deal in which they get free upgrades for four years from original purchase,
b) People who bought a student licence after the Pro Tools 11 announcement, up until the recent announcement of the new licensing scheme for Pro Tools, have a deal in which they pay $99 per upgrade for four years from original purchase,
c) People who buy a student licence after the new licensing scheme announcement have a deal in which they get the support plan included, and then pay $99 per year to renew the support plan.

The Pro Tools | Software FAQ attempts to clarify the arrangements for the different schemes, but the situation regarding on-going eligibility is a little confusing.

The FAQ section on 'Educational' matters includes these Q&As:
"Q.I have an academic version of Pro Tools with 4 years of paid upgrades for $99. How does this affect me and can I get the upgrades in 2015?
A: You can upgrade for $99.This includes the 12 months of standard Avid Support including all upgrades and cloud collaboration features that will be available in 2015. If you purchase and activate your software by December 31, 2014 you will receive up to 17 months of the upgrade/support plan. Academic users will need to re-verify your EDU status through Identit-e."

and

"Q: I purchased an older Academic version of Pro Tools with 4-years of no cost upgrades, what happens now?
A: If you fall within the 4-year free upgrade window, you will continue to receive upgrades at no cost until your 4-year period is over."

It is not explicitly clear if the 4 years of paid upgrades for $99 refers to the $99 per upgrade scheme (item b above) or the $99 per year scheme (item c above), or both.

Specifically, though, it says that "Academic users will need to re-verify your EDU status through Identit-e." This is a change in policy from what has previously been the case, and, as such, needs to be properly clarified.

At the time of the Pro Tools 11 announcement, there was some ambiguity in the FAQ and webpage information relating to student licences, and this lead to questions being raised, and some speculation about what was intended. One key question related to whether, in order to get the upgrades, you needed to prove at the time of each upgrade that you were still a student, or whether you only had to prove you were a student at the time of the initial purchase.

This thread ...
http://duc.avid.com/showthread.php?t=336961
included, amongst many other student related questions, much discussion on the subject on ongoing eligibility, and the question was picked up on by the Pro Tools Expert Blog and included in its Pro Tools 11 FAQ. Initially, that FAQ included incorrect information regarding on-going eligibility, and Tony Carridi later made a definitive statement on the matter, which was posted into the FAQ as a correction.

The blog item is this one ...
http://www.pro-tools-expert.com/home...ls-11-faq.html
and if you scroll to the bottom you will see Tony's clarification statement.

For ease of reference here it is ...

"Update on Friday, April 26, 2013 at 3:10PM by Pro Tools Expert
Hi Guys,
If you purchased the Academic Student version of Pro Tools then you are entitled to 4 years of software upgrades at no charge starting from the time of purchase. Owners of this version do not need to retain student status to keep their 4-year upgrade entitlement.
Hope this clears things up.
Thanks,
Tony Cariddi
Avid Marketing"

In one of the posts to the DUC thread linked to above, I commented on Tony's correction, and included a link to the Pro Tools Expert blog Pro Tools 11 FAQ, this is my post …
http://duc.avid.com/showpost.php?p=2036736&postcount=85

The key thing is to clarify what the situation is regarding ongoing eligibility requirements for student upgrades for each of the three student licence schemes mentioned at the beginning of this post.

For people with scheme 'a' (the 4 years of free upgrades scheme) Tony's correction post is crystal clear. People only need to prove eligibility at the time they purchase the student licence, they do not need to remain a student subsequently.

But, in light of the change in policy now taking place, plus the fact that Tony's correction was never posted onto the DUC and was never included in the updated Avid Pro Tools 11 FAQ, it would be nice to have this policy re-confirmed for all to see.

For people with scheme 'b' (the 4 years of upgrades paying $99 per upgrade), the new licensing FAQ says that they will need to prove that they are still a student in order to get the upgrade. But this is new information not previously declared by Avid previously. And, having had Tony's clarification note to refer to, such people will have reasonably expected that the same rules would apply to their student licence in the absence of any information to the contrary. It seems unreasonable, up to 18 months after the Pro Tools 11 version of the student licensing scheme came out, for Avid to now change the rules as regards ongoing eligibility. A response on this from Tony/Avid is needed to clarify things one way or the other.

For people with scheme 'c' (the $99 to renew your support plan, after getting the initial support plan with the new licence purchase) there are two things to be clarified:

1) it isn't actually clear whether the requirement to prove you are still a student applies to this scheme, as the comment about re-verifying EDU status is in the answer regarding scheme 'b' (the one that gives 4 years of upgrades for $99 per upgrade),

2) with this new scheme, I have not found it said anywhere that it is time limited at all. Is it limited to four years, like the previous schemes, or not?

Maybe people can carry on getting annual $99 support plan renewals for as long as they can carry on proving that they are still a student. This actually makes more sense, and leads me to question whether the requirement to re-verify eligibility each year is actually a new requirement intended to be applied this new student licence scheme.

Maybe it has been incorrectly placed in the FAQ, making it seem that it applies retrospectively to the 'Pro Tools 11 4 years of upgrades for $99 per upgrade' scheme when it is actually meant to apply to the new $99 support plan renewal scheme.

Tony, or other Avid representative, please clarify things for the benefit of all people holding student licences for the various schemes detailed above.

[nigelpry]

An additional question comes to mind that needs clarification too.

The Pro Tools | Software FAQ here

http://avid.force.com/pkb/articles/e...2014-Offer-FAQ

says

"Q: I purchased an older Academic version of Pro Tools with 4-years of no cost upgrades, what happens now?
A: If you fall within the 4-year free upgrade window, you will continue to receive upgrades at no cost until your 4-year period is over."

What the answer does not clarify is how this fits in with the new licensing scheme requirements to join a support plan by the end of 2015.

The four years of free upgrades could last until 24th April 2017 if the student licence was activated on the last day that this particular student licence deal was available.

So the first question is .... the end of 2015 deadline cannot be correct for students still entitled to free upgrades beyond that deadline. In such cases, is the correct deadline for joining the support plan going to be four years from the original date of activation?

Secondly, the FAQ answer does not suggest that students on this deal will be put on the support plan. An alternative to having a different deadline date for joining the support plan would be to automatically place such student licences into the support plan with the fee waived, and the renewal date set for four years after the original activation date.

Either way, the important thing is not just that these student licences benefit from free upgrades for four years, but that, when that time is up, they do not find that their licence is version locked at the latest version received, because they have missed the deadline for joining the support plan.

If they have to join the support before the end of 2015, and have to pay for that, then they would not have received four years of free upgrades.

[nigelpry]

Bump ...

Come on Tony? ... Mods? This is a real issue, affecting all student licences.

[Righty27]

Originally Posted by nigelpry

Bump ...

Come on Tony? ... Mods? This is a real issue, affecting all student licences.

Hi Nigel - FWIW, this just went up on the Avid Blogs site:

http://www.avidblogs.com/pro-tools-a...-and-students/

[nigelpry]

Thanks for the link Righty .... but unfortunately it does not clarify any of the issues I raised in this thread.

We have conflicting information on whether you have to re-verify your student status at the time of every upgrade.

This may be an error, or may be a change of policy. If it is a change of policy, then we need clarification as to whether it only applies to students buying into the new scheme, or does Avid intend it to apply retrospectively to the previous schemes. If so, this directly contradicts Tony's clarification comments at the time of the PT11 launch. If it's only an error, this needs correcting too.

It is also unclear what happens if you are already on Pro Tools 11 under the four years of free upgrades deal. You are not put onto the support plan, but continue to get free upgrades.

You could keep getting free upgrades until April 2017, depending on when you originally bought it, but the new general licensing requirements are that you must be on a support plan by end of 2015.

So at the end of the free upgrades period you could find yourself locked out of getting future upgrades to that license. If, on the other hand you join the support plan to meet the December 2015 deadline, you won't have received four years of free upgrades.

[nigelpry]

Bump ...

No other current or former students want to comment?

Am I the only one seeing uncertainty in Avid's plans for students, whether that be people who bought in at PT9/10 with the four yers of free upgrades deal, or the people who bought in at PT11 with four years of upgrades at only $99 per upgrade, or, indeed, students who buy into this new licensing+Support plan deal?

Avid is changing the terms and conditions, and it will affect some, or possibly all, people having student licences going forward.

Come on Avid, Tony, please, lets have clarification.

[nigelpry]

Bump ...

It feels pretty lonely in here :-(

I'm amazed that no one else is interested, these are genuine, potentially significant issues for anyone with a student licence with a still current upgrade deal.

Also significant for anyone thinking of buying a student licence under the new deal.

[nigelpry]

Bump ...

I always thought most students were pretty apathetic ... it seems I was correct about those that have student PT licences at least.

[nigelpry]

Bump ... sigh ...

[Bill Denton]

Originally Posted by nigelpry

Bump ...

I always thought most students were pretty apathetic ... it seems I was correct about those that have student PT licences at least.

We don't need no stinkin' Pro Tools...we've got Maschine!!!