30 Mar 2024
I also haven't read too far into the thread. But I'm going to guess that Steinberg is addressing the VST developers, -no further authority to release plugins in VST2 format. It's what the original KVR post (from Audiority) is talking about. Existing VST2 plugins will continue to work, and DAWS, etc. won't be prevented from hosting VST2, but no further release of VST2-format plugins or updates. That's my take.
Whether or not the legal jargon insinuates DAW's can't host VST2, it's hard to imagine Steinberg would enforce this, for reasons mentioned by other posters. For Steinberg's own self-interest, It would not be good PR for them to paralyze all of our old projects that utilize VST2 plugins, etc. It would also create paranoia that they could do the same to VST3, putting every major plugin-maker out of business, since CLAP is not so universal yet.
So I say, relax. Our old VST2's will continue to work, Reason 13 will still support them, and in the mean-time we have all been migrating to VST3 anyway, have we not?