Any chance for a break on Perpetual license renewal

[Tweakhead]

If you get the Perpetual Reinstatement, buy it from a 3rd-party dealer like Sweetwater, Alto, etc etc because you can activate it at any time in the future, whenever it suits you - if there's ever a "must-have" update. If you buy it from Avid directly - it gets activated immediately.

I already have one banked, and I'm not paying for my annual $399 update plan this year. I've decided that I'm not giving Avid another dime until there's a macOS Native M1 code release, and I read reliable reports that it's not bug-ridden. I've had enough of this nonsense, and I'm not rewarding them until they get their act together.

[Dizzi45Z]

On a recent podcast between Avid and Pro Tools Expert, they said they are lowering their reinstatement prices to just a little more than the typical renewal. The $499 someone just stated might (hopefully) be a more permanent price.

Honestly, if they truly dropped the reinstatement price like this, this would be huge. In my opinion I think Avid gets so much negativity around the yearly update plan because it is part of what makes Avid feel so heavy handed. I feel that Avid has made us feel like the yearly update plan is mandatory or we are going to be penalized with a hefty cost (large reinstatement fee or loss of ability to ever upgrade). This ticks off so many users who feel they have not been treated fairly with the upgrades and support that they have been receiving.

If Avid keeps this reinstatement cost low, then I feel like it is finally Avid saying… “if the updates/upgrades, we have provided are not beneficial to you, it is okay for you to let it lapse and jump back in later when it does.” It shows to us that Avid, once again is going to have reason to provide value in the updates and upgrades in order to continue to win our yearly renewals.

In my opinion, this would be one of the strongest moves Avid could do to loosen some of the tension and anger so many people have towards them and their yearly support upgrade plan.

Prior to the “be current or else” days of Avid, I looked forward to paying for the upgraded features and supporting Avid in making the software better. Now that it is required to avoid being penalized, it seems everyone grits their teeth and complains about cost and how horrible it is to have to pay every year.

Avid, please follow through with your discussion from the podcast and keep the reinstatement low. This would benefit you in the long run with better relationships between your customers and hopefully time would eventually heal the damage the current/prior model has caused.

[DontLetMeDrown]

Originally Posted by Dizzi45Z

The $499 someone just stated might (hopefully) be a more permanent price.

Imagine not having a penalty for lapsing and simply having the same price for support plans or reinstatements. It could just be called an "Update" and it wouldn't matter if you were lapsed or not. Having penalties is what makes people hate this company. You're going to charge me more for the same license and provide NO ADDITIONAL VALUE? No other company in pro audio does this, which is why no other company is as universally hated as Avid. I don't think they'll ever figure it out, unless they get a younger visionary or CEO that can put an end to their crusty boomer marketing strategies.

[noiseboyuk]

Originally Posted by Dizzi45Z

Honestly, if they truly dropped the reinstatement price like this, this would be huge. In my opinion I think Avid gets so much negativity around the yearly update plan because it is part of what makes Avid feel so heavy handed. I feel that Avid has made us feel like the yearly update plan is mandatory or we are going to be penalized with a hefty cost (large reinstatement fee or loss of ability to ever upgrade). This ticks off so many users who feel they have not been treated fairly with the upgrades and support that they have been receiving.

Certainly the effect of them reducing reinstatements will be for people to not renew. I guess this is why permanent licenses got all the inner circle rewards, as an additional inducement to stay current. Honestly I don't find them much value, and I never want to rely on plugins I don't actually own. I've just replaced X-Form with elastique aax as it's the only thing I've come to rely on from that whole Inner Circle package, keeping me forking money over every year.

Originally Posted by sw rec

Path of least resistance here is just renew the support plan every year.

I guess this what Avid is banking on - their endless and wildly confusing moving of the goalposts makes people suspicious and wary. I wonder what proportion of their customers will migrate to this new model of using reinstatements as a policy now the cost difference is so low.

[Sardi]

Originally Posted by noiseboyuk

Certainly the effect of them reducing reinstatements will be for people to not renew.

If the software was being updated with new and innovative features, I would think or hope that the majority of users would continually upgrade and stay current.

If you’re not improving your software and penalising customers that don’t stay current, then you’re essentially saying ‘we’re not giving our users any reason to stay with our software, so let’s hold them ransom and make it REALLY expensive for them to update at a later stage and force them to stay.’

Some people will give them the bird. Others will stay on board.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Dizzi45Z]

Originally Posted by Sardi

If the software was being updated with new and innovative features, I would think or hope that the majority of users would continually upgrade and stay current.

If you’re not improving your software and penalising customers that don’t stay current, then you’re essentially saying ‘we’re not giving our users any reason to stay with our software, so let’s hold them ransom and make it REALLY expensive for them to update at a later stage and force them to stay.’

Some people will give them the bird. Others will stay on board.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Exactly my thoughts.

I don’t have a problem with them charging a little bit more for reinstatements. The way I see it, is it is like saying “$499” to renew. If you don’t lapse, we will give you $100 off. It rewards those that are their faithful clients. Seems completely fair to me.

I guarantee, if Avid stuck with the lower reinstatement plans, they will make lots more money in the long run.

Avid severely needs to heal their bad past with the industry. I just barely read a long post of haters on my Facebook all hating on Avid mainly about their “yearly tax” and how horrible Avid is. Many of them claimed to be past Pro Tools users who left because of feeling mistreated my Avid. What do you think posts like this do for their bottom line? I constantly see people feeling this way on forums, social media and conversations with other industry members. This needs to stop and turn around if Avid hopes for a bright future.

Avid may at first appear to make less money as many people will let their plans lapse. But if people stopped feeling mistreated, they may actually feel confident in recommending (instead of hating on) Avid in their social circles which would help bring more new users.. If Avid has really beefed up their development team (as said on a recent podcast) and they are really improving and showing value to their users, they may actually find people happy to pay and stay current with the software.

Goodwill will eventually return bigger profits than continuing to be heavy handed.

[Dizzi45Z]

Originally Posted by DontLetMeDrown

I don't think they'll ever figure it out, unless they get a younger visionary or CEO that can put an end to their crusty boomer marketing strategies.

I got some hope on this from listening to this recent podcast with Francois Quereuil and David Toomey from Avid. David Toomy (prior Adobe member) in particular says he is focusing on “enhancing the product and providing a lot more value and better outcomes for customers and users of those platforms”. Within the podcast they talk about boosting the development team and they are the ones responsible for dropping the cost of the Ultimate Subscription to $599 as well as talk about reinstatements costing just a little more than the yearly subscription. They confirm that there is no plan on getting rid of perpetual licenses.

[ejinbc]

Yo

I have been suffering from FOMO for many years with the perpetual plan yearly fee. Each year I step back and try to rationalize the expense vs. the new and improved features released over the past year. While there have been a few cool things introduced - we each assign different values to the new features - including (almost) functional folder tracks, (almost) stable ARA integration, (almost) useful dark mode, most of the value for PT Studio owners has been the migration of existing Ultimate features down to the Studio version. Cool, but not so innovative.

My plan expires today. Rather than doing the FOMO buy-it-anyway, I am going to buy a renewal plan at Sweetwater (or somewhere) and wait to activate it until there is something worth (to me) spending the cash on.

https://www.sweetwater.com/store/det...ort-for-1-year

I agree that an anytime reinstatement plan makes the most sense for the Pro Tools user base. Indeed, having a penalty to reinstate is the only reason I have updated the past two annual cycles. Fortunately, I am on Windows so I don't have the Mac OS > PT version update cycle to worry about.

Not Buy for now...

ejinbc

[noiseboyuk]

Originally Posted by Dizzi45Z

I got some hope on this from listening to this recent podcast with Francois Quereuil and David Toomey from Avid. David Toomy (prior Adobe member) in particular says he is focusing on “enhancing the product and providing a lot more value and better outcomes for customers and users of those platforms”. Within the podcast they talk about boosting the development team and they are the ones responsible for dropping the cost of the Ultimate Subscription to $599 as well as talk about reinstatements costing just a little more than the yearly subscription. They confirm that there is no plan on getting rid of perpetual licenses.

Except the last sentence is still the contradiction isn’t it? They HAVE got rid of perpetual licenses - for new users. For the old ones, they want to throw their arms round us, shower us with gifts and love us.

This position still makes no sense to me. If they want to be a new broom at Avid, restore permanent licenses to new customers and give everyone the same choice. You never know, it might actually give permanent license-holders a little bit more confidence that the rug isn’t about to be pulled from under their feet the entire time.

[nsureit]

Originally Posted by itsjustmeee123

There’s this from an earlier thread…..

https://www.thomannmusic.com/avid_pr...de_renewal.htm

It's $345USD right now. I got mine for $329 end of October, when Euro was under $1USD. Has since gone up.