Proactive?

[Raveshaper]

I have an idea, although I am completely ignorant of any legal issues that may stem from doing this. Since our ability to request features was taken away at the PUF, we may find it even harder to have our voices heard here. It's practically a given at this point.

Why not take the DIY homebrew mentality that Reason is steeped in and turn this into a developer section for MIDI programs and the like that essentially run along side Reason and "patch" the missing features we want? Is this possible? Legal?

I think that would be the only realistic way to see results from our requests. But better that than nothing, right?

[-008']

Well, we already have at least two propellerhead staff joined here... And I am certain that feat.sugg here can be collected and forwarded. i think the props would be crazy not to read that stuff!

And I even saw a user named "ernst" register too. Not so sure about that one tho. lol

And about the patching stuff I don't think there is very much people can actually do along those lines, but I could be wrong.

[joeyluck]

I think the idea of having the features suggestion here (at least from the standpoint that I suggested) is to have a platform to bounce ideas around with other users before appropriately sending them off to the Propellerhead Santa Claus here:

https://propellerheads.se/company/conta ... n_feedback

Can we update this forum to include a note about this with a link to the Reason feedback form?

Thanks!

[joeyluck]

And of course, when you submit via the form, it's nice to have a thread to reference and say, "See, other people think it's a good idea as well."

[Namahs Amrak]

I think that would be the only realistic way to see results from our requests. But better that than nothing, right?

What makes you think Propellerheads will take any user requests on board for review? They never have in the past. Reason only has new features when they consider it prudent to do so in order to say relevant in the market. Sure some of those feature changes may happen to coincide with what users have been asking for, but it's simply that - a coincidence. That company marches to the beat of their own drum, always have and always will.

Look at the whole Discover gimmick. The single publicly recognisable change to 8.1. There was no major community push for such a service. Overwhelmingly the critiques of 8.0 (bright sequencer, locked browser, odd patch browse behaviour) where ignored, in favour of what they believed would be a commercial carrot to dangle.

[Gaja]

I think that would be the only realistic way to see results from our requests. But better that than nothing, right?

What makes you think Propellerheads will take any user requests on board for review? They never have in the past. Reason only has new features when they consider it prudent to do so in order to say relevant in the market. Sure some of those feature changes may happen to coincide with what users have been asking for, but it's simply that - a coincidence. That company marches to the beat of their own drum, always have and always will.

Look at the whole Discover gimmick. The single publicly recognisable change to 8.1. There was no major community push for such a service. Overwhelmingly the critiques of 8.0 (bright sequencer, locked browser, odd patch browse behaviour) where ignored, in favour of what they believed would be a commercial carrot to dangle.

That is an infamous insinuation.
They have been adding stuff users requested for ages. But they don't implement every scrap of thought thrown at them. I think you're being too quick with judging like that (unless of course you have seen Propellerhead hq from the inside as an active developer). They have stated in the past that they have an enormous list of feature suggestions, both from the forums and from the developing teams. They have to carefully select the ones that will make it into the next release, because they have limited staff to deal with unlimited feature requests.
The "but everyone wanted vst which they didn't deliver" arguement is imo not valid, as props have quasi developed all the basics for that format and have been ripped off by steinberg, of course they're not going to shove money up their arses.
anyway sorry for the rant...

[Namahs Amrak]

Let's toy with an analogy here then, Gaja. You own a garment company with 10,000 loyal customers. Over the years they request that you make a T-shirt in a particular colour. When you decide that yourcompany is going to release a blue T-Shirt, all the people who requested a blue t-shirt will think you're listening to them, even if you hadn't read a single email request.

It's the same with feature requests. In what was arguably two of the biggest feature implementations in recent years with audio integration and MIDI out, it's a given that Propellerheads would introduce them. Not to satiate their users, but to stay relevant against the competition. They need to make decisions to attract new users, and with no audio recording, many people would be likely to adopt another DAW. And a lack of new users does not support the Rack Extension business model, because if they cling to existing customers, soon enough there will be an exhaustion point for future sales.

And if we compare how long people have been asking for these features, it seems clear that they weren't in any rush to deliver what their existing customers wanted. And how high on the list was a request for collaborative sharing? This didn't seem to pop up often, yet they based a whole point release on this novelty. Sure there were bug fixes, but they are back end issues, not selling points. Propellerheads release features as they see fit, always have done, and always will do.

Is this an issue? Not really - if we don't like the software we don't need to upgrade. But to hold onto this belief that they are actively listening to users and basing their developments primarily on user requests is quite incorrect. We're talking about a business that's about to pull the plug on a 10+ year online community, let's not forget that.

[Gaja]

I am actually surprised they didn't pull the plug earlier
You're saying they are blindly dabbling along for years, randomly implementing features in the hopes somebody will like it?
We know that props have said early on in the Reason development that tey wouldn't implement audio, unless they find a way to do it properly.
Some migt find the implementation of audio ito be improperly done, but I personally like it a lot. It has improved my workflow massively and added an entirely new level of fun to the Reason environment.
It took some time for them to figure out how to do it, I agree on that. Same with midi out and the implementation of third party devices, but they have certainly done so.

Let's say you are a company based on music production. You record local flute players and people who like to record a cd for their parents as a christmas present, local rappers and do some remix/remake work. Then you did music for one commercial and now a customer comes with a request for music for an entire 90minutes feature film. It is necessary to write songs, score and on screen music, partly containing sound design elements, and the entire thing has to be mixed in 7.1 and according to Dolby standards. How quickly will you be able to deliver these things, if your knowledge of orchestral composition, as well as arranging for orchestra, and orchestration and notation is zero? Based on your situation your studio is not licensed for dolby standards, nor has a dolby licensed 7.1 mixing environment.
So first you'd have to get your studio up and running, order a dolby technician to do all sorts of measurements and get your mixing environment to dolby standard. You'd have to learn about orchestral composition. What can an instrument play based on the inherent limitations, which instruments can be easily combined to deliver a satisfying result. How does an instrument sound in what range etc. etc.
Then you'd need to learn how to score to picture. What techniques are available, how can they be implemented in order to support the dramaturgy of the movie. How does which selection of instruments influence the recipients perception of the picture.
Then you'd need to know how to notate for orchestra. Which instruments are transposed, and to what keys, what notational sign do I need to express how the piece is to be played. I could go on and on about differences in TV and cinema productions, composing and mixing wise, and about difficulties in correlating sound design and foleys and whatnot, but I guess you get what I'm saying.
Reason used to be a virtual studio. Couple of synths, samplers and effect units, and a sequencer. That was it. It was imparative to learn all sorts of things about coding an audio production environment in order to find a way to implement it in a way that is coherent with their vision of the software. I am certain that along their way they found many problems to be solved which I know nothing of because I am no programmer.
Of course I have no insight in how they work over there, so I have to speculate just like the next guy, but I think saying that because it took time to get features implemented, the company is greedy and doesn't ever listen to anything their customers have to say is not exactly logically forcing.