Craig Anderton

I sure know what you mean about bureaucracies, but the MIDI Association is somewhat different. There are a lot of small working groups where there aren't enough people in the group to create a viable bureaucracy. Things slow down a bit when trying to integrate what's happening in Japan with what's happening in the US and Europe. But a lot of that is reality checks for hardware keyboards like electric pianos and workstations, because most of those manufacturers are Japanese. As one example of non-bureaucracy at work, once there was a question about how to handle time/date labels. We found out that there's already an international standard, and adopted it. IIRC it took about ten days from start to finish to hammer it out. If it had been General Electric, it probably would have taken a year or two

To be fair, The MIDI Association is an all-volunteer group with representatives from large and small companies. No company can steamroller through a proposal because the power to make changes is distributed uniformly among the members. There is no inter-company "competition" because like MIDI 1.0, the expectation is that the most universal/compatible standard possible will have the greatest benefits for all concerned. There aren't any bureaucrats in the sense of being paper-shufflers. Company representatives are almost all software/hardware engineers, or product designers. Their responsibility is to make sure that any changes or additions to the standard are rock solid. That takes a concerted group effort. There are several reasons why MIDI 2.0 has taken so long to reach fruition. The basics were ratified just before covid hit. Also, the spec accommodates far more complex technology than MIDI 1.0. Just trying to come up with universal profiles for instruments and effects is a challenge, as is making sure the spec will work with new controller technologies that aren't yet in general use - let alone anticipating the functionality of ones that don't exist yet. Finally, because of MIDI's reliance on computers, nothing substantive could be done with DAWs until Apple, Microsoft, and Google incorporated hooks for MIDI 2.0 in their operating systems. Then, there's the lag while companies come to grips with those kind of deep OS changes. It's also important to remember that MIDI 1.0 took multiple decades to reach where it is now. For example, MPE is a fairly recent addition that was not in the original 1.0 spec, as are USB data transports and other aspects we take for granted. Like MIDI 1.0, MIDI 2.0 will roll out a piece at a time. Already, there are keyboard controllers that are MIDI 2.0-compatible. When DAWs start being compatible with MIDI 2.0, these keyboards will be able to communicate. But bear in mind that MIDI 2.0 is backward compatible with MIDI 1.0 gear. MIDI 1.0 is just a language, as is MIDI 2.0. MIDI 2.0 devices can query MIDI devices to find out whether they speak MIDI 2.0 or not. If not, the communication proceeds using MIDI 1.0, and uses MIDI 1.0 features. I expect that people will add MIDI 2.0 gear to existing systems over time, if they need the advantages MIDI 2.0 offers. Otherwise, they'll keep using MIDI 1.0 gear, or a mix of the two. FWIW I was President of the MIDI Association (also a volunteer position) for two years while covid was in full swing, so I'm well aware of all the frustration that companies had as they tried to move the spec forward despite restrictions on being able to meet, trade show cancellations, and economic uncertainty. The process has been back on track for a while, but there was a lot of ground that had to be made up first. I'm still kept up to date on the latest additions to the spec and work of the Technical Standards Board, and there is a lot going on behind the scenes. However, traditionally the MIDI Association doesn't talk about what's coming up until it's actually working.

IMHO the sentiment has already been expressed in no uncertain terms, and wil become a data point as Bandlab continues to make decisions based on their own business models and future plans. I recommend remembering that "always in motion is the future," and leave it at that.

Thanks Noel, that makes sense. I didn't quite understand whether "the software won't activate" meant you could or could not open the program. True, but I suspect that's only for the short term because the programs will diverge more and more over time.

So just to confirm...if your subscription lapses, you can't open your existing projects. However, you can renew at any time in the future, and open those projects. Correct? The context is if I want to collaborate with someone who doesn't use Sonar. They can subscribe for a month, open the Sonar project I send them, and then finish before the subscription ends. However, if they need to do a remix in the future, they can simply subscribe for another month and remix their Sonar project. Correct?

This is something I don't understand. Waves listened to the feedback, respected what their users wanted, and went back to offering perpetual licenses (as well as what's actually a pretty good subscription deal) within less than two weeks after announcing the change. Why would people swear off a company that pays attention to their customers and does what the customers want? As to talking about past history and bringing up Roland/Gibson, I think it's important to point out that BandLab has owned Cakewalk for 6 years. Gibson owned it for 4 years, and Roland bailed 5 years after becoming a majority stockholder. Give BandLab some credit for persevering where others didn't, owning and cultivating the program for longer than the previous two owners, continuing to update the program on a regular basis, offering a free version, and not shutting the door completely on perpetual licenses in the future. Credit where credit is due. This is not Roland/Gibson.

Disclaimer: I don't have any inside information. But I do think Sonar is here to stay. BandLab thought it was worth maintaining Sonar even when it generated no income. They even included a feature that I believe had a licensing fee, yet absorbed that cost. And, they've kept the team behind Sonar together. They did not do the usual "strip and flip" that happens so often when one company acquires a smaller one. I can easily see a program like Sonar fitting into BandLab's long-term plans. I wouldn't count out the possibility of a perpetual version at some point. But if I was BandLab, I'd make the initial foray as part of BandLab, which is the Big Dog of the operation. Remember, customer acquisition is much more expensive than customer retention. Potential "customers" from BandLab don't have to be acquired. If they get excited about Sonar and start talking about/using it, that will make it easier to convince new users who have nothing to do with BandLab to get on board. Non-US companies tend to think more about the long term rather than being concerned only about next quarter's bottom line. In my experience, this seems to be particularly true of Asian corporate culture. YMMV.

+1. When I've had problems with Waves updates, I just follow the instructions on their website on what to do. There are repair and clear functions that work very well. And at least in my experience, and the experience of others I know, Glenn is right about Waves support.

It's just a different paradigm that has its roots in live performance, as opposed to multitrack recording. Think of "loops" as "riffs." Suppose you have a four-piece band. You count off, and point to the drummer who starts playing a drum riff. Then you point to the bass player, who comes in on the drum downbeat and plays a bass riff. Then the rhythm guitarist comes in and plays a riff. That's just like triggering individual loops in Ableton Live. You can also tell individual musicians when to play a different riff. You can also trigger "scenes." This is like pointing to all four members and saying "on 4-3-2-1, start playing the chorus." Then they all switch to riffs that are in the chorus. Another "scene" would be where they all switch to a verse. Congrats! Now you not only know how Ableton Live works, but Sonar's Matrix View.

He's not a software developer writing music software for an hourly wage. As one example, a Senior Audio Software Engineer at Tencent makes $112,000/year. Starting wages are about half to 2/3 that. Bear in mind Tencent's revenue was $86 BILLION dollars in 2023. No DAW manufacturer comes within light years of that kind of revenue to spread around. Based on the usual 50/30/20 budget for a living wage, a family of four would need a household income over $100,000 to get by in Hawaii, Massachusetts, California, New York, Alaska, Maryland, Oregon, Vermont, Washington, New Jersey, Connecticut, and New Hampshire. There aren't a lot of music software development jobs in places with super-low costs of living. Even in Mississippi, with the lowest cost of living, a family of four would need around $75,000 just to get by these days. I assume you're getting your info from the 2022 Experian Automotive study, of which you mentioned only two cars. Here's more detail from that report: "For those with a household income above $250,000, 61% choose to drive non-luxury brands like Toyota, Honda, Ford, Lexus, Subaru, BMW, Acura, Hyundai, Mercedes-Benz, and Chevrolet." Well, I guess it depends on what you define as a "luxury" car. I'm not talking Alfa Romeos. Lexus is the luxury vehicle division of Toyota. Acura is the luxury vehicle division of Honda ("luxury" is the word they both use). For a typical BMW, you're looking at $50K and up. The average price of a Mercedes-Benz starts around $50K and goes up from there. For someone who's owned two cars in my life (66 VW and 2000 VW), an Acura, Lexus, BMW, or Mercedes looks pretty luxurious to me. For anyone who thinks that DAW manufacturers mint money, don't take my word for it. Buy some market research from Music Trades and check out the financials of music industry companies for yourself. I have. I'll shut up now.

Amen. Different DAWs are more like different accents than different languages. Some speak with a heavy accent, but it's still an accent.

I have a somewhat different perspective. I think they may have forgotten that it's no longer a world where people buy Pro Tools and tons of Waves plugins because the ones with Pro Tools are sketchy. It's not a Pro Tools world anymore, and for those who use it, they've probably accumulated all the plugins they want by now. I think a subscription model at the price Waves offered would have been huge, if it had come out 20 years ago. Times change, and these days, they change quickly. I'd place my bets on the companies that acknowledge and act on change, rather than the ones that pretend things haven't changed. I also have more respect for the companies that publicly say "we were wrong" compared to the ones that double down on being wrong.

Hmmm...I'd think a company being so responsive to customer feedback, and pivoting so quickly, is a desirable characteristic.

I have no definitive answer, only comments. Many companies have gone the route of perpetual license for more veteran users, and subscriptions for newer users. Although people cite Waves as proof that "subscription-only doesn't work," neither does perpetual only if you want to address as much of the market as possible. At least UA, iZotope, PreSonus, Avid, etc. seem to think that way. In terms of backend e-commerce, I've been told by others that it's more complicated to have multiple pricing structures for multiple products. $15/month keeps it simple. I think it was very smart to make Next part of the bundle. If people had to start with Sonar, it might be too daunting. Next gives them an on-ramp. Continuing to offer CbB for free is smart as well. At some point, those using it will be aware of the added features in "Nu" Sonar, and may very well bite the bullet and buy the sub. I think the main takeaway is that BandLab wants to assure users Sonar will be around. How they decide to pick up new users for Sonar only, or even whether that's something worth pursuing, is in the future. It may be that enough BandLab people start using Sonar that the idea of putting time and effort into wooing people away from Pro Tools and such just isn't worth it. I interpret saying "not at this time" as Cakewalk signaling they reserve the right to change their minds. So if you really hate subscriptions, you can keep using CbB for free while you wait to see if the company introduces a perpetual sub. For a reality check, don't forget the ultimate expensive "we have you by the gonads" subscription: Analog tape. $180 a year for Sonar is much less than what it cost for one reel of 2" tape that could record 30 minutes of audio. And that's not even considering that Sonar stuffs a quarter-million-dollar studio into your computer. I believe in terms of value received, that's pretty good.

Okay, that's different from calling them fools for not being into it for the money, which is how I interpreted what you said. The concept of people expecting to get paid for the work they do goes without saying.

Did anyone notice this from the FAQ: Will Cakewalk Sonar be offered via one-time purchase or perpetual license? At this time, Cakewalk Next and Cakewalk Sonar are available exclusively through BandLab Membership. Is Cakewalk Sonar replacing Cakewalk by BandLab? Cakewalk Sonar builds and improves on Cakewalk by BandLab, offering advanced technology, effortless workflow, and an interface that amplifies inspiration. However, Cakewalk by BandLab will continue to be free without a subscription requirement. While the software will continue receiving essential maintenance updates, no new feature development is planned as we prioritize advancements in Cakewalk Next and Cakewalk Sonar.

My kid is a software designer who turned down a super-lucrative job offer to help make smart bombs that could kill greater numbers of people more efficiently. People who value things other than money aren't fools.

Can you elaborate on what this particular "takes" workflow is? I'm pretty familiar with recent versions of most other DAWs. Maybe some updates have addressed your needs. Or, maybe they should update to a better workflow if that's the case.

I'm not sure about adding an extra overlay of complexity in the pricing. And there's also the matter of age verification. "Sure guys, I'm over 60, here's a photoshopped copy of my neighboer's driver's license."

And...let me add one more thing. Music software is a fickle, difficult, low-paying industry. If you look at the parking lots of DAW companies, you won't see luxury cars - more like 10-year-old Hondas. Everyone I know doing music software (and that's a lot of people!) loves what they do, and are willing to trade off the perqs of sweet corporate jobs in favor of something that fascinates them. They're usually musicians themselves who use their programs. It's a different world compared to making dishwashers for Whirlpool.

But there's also a lot of camaraderie. To me, it's one of the main appeals of this anamolous industry. I won't name names, but when Gibson crashed and took Cakewalk with it (although to be fair, Cakewalk's ongoing losses contributed to the crash), one representative for a very popular software company felt that although software companies have their own target audiences and goals, Sonar was perhaps the deepest of the available programs. In theory he was a "competitor," but the reality was he saw each DAW as very different, and now an important one was gone. I saw his point. Someone who buys Ableton Live will never be swayed to switch to Pro Tools, and vice-versa. Someone who does music for TV will never leave MOTU. Those doing beats will gravitate toward FL Studio, etc. etc. There's indeed competition for new users, but I'd say it's more like offerings for new uses, with the companies hoping they've chosen the right feature set so that when a new user downloads a trial version, it does what they want. That's an area where Sonar's depth is advantageous, but it can also make the program more daunting. There are always tradeoffs.

I just want to set the record straight that at least a few companies genuinely felt Sonar was not going to come back, and Sonar users had been dumped unceremoniously with no recourse (there had been prior unsuccessful attempts to sell Cakewalk). One company considered just giving copies to Sonar users so they could start making a transition, but decided that wouldn't be fair to the existing users who had paid for the program. So, they charged what existing users paid for an upgrade. I'd add this is a tightly knit, small industry, where many people have friends in competing companies. No one that I knew was happy to see Sonar get caught in the crossfire of Gibson's problems. They felt it was bad for the users, bad for the morale of all software companies, and bad for the industry. IMHO they were less like vultures, and more like first responders coming to the scene of an accident to try and keep the patient alive. Of course, they also hoped that over the long run, Sonar users would find their programs a suitable replacement.

Time for the steam punk revival!

I certainly agree that any change is disruptive, and the longer you've used a program, the greater the disruption. However, I think you'll find that you can get used to a new look pretty quickly, and maybe even end up preferring it over time. What's far more disruptive is when UI elements are shuffled, like what Microsoft did with the Start menu in Windows 11. If Sonar's EQ changed to all linear sliders instead of knobs...now THAT would be really disruptive!

Exactly! And also fashion. Computer graphics are a fashion industry, like how the "dark look" became big, pastels made a comeback (e.g., Ableton Live), flat vs. skeuomorphic, rounded corners (e.g., Studio One), etc. Maybe next year it will all be back to gray scale, with splashes of color. Who knows? These trends take hold in advertising, web sites, etc. Software companies that don't "get with the program" may be seen as dated and not "fresh" anymore, which affects market penetration and sales...so it matters to all users of the software. Personally, I prefer the flatter look and find it easier on the eyes. But I've seen some skeuomorphic programs that look gorgeous. Ultimately, I don't really care because usually it's just a question of getting acclimated to any changes.