Suddenly I don't feel bad for buying REs anymore :)

[antic604]

I am thinking that they will probably try and develop a parallel standard to VST to entice developers since they would handle marketing, sales, copy protection, etc. It will be easier to entice other DAW developers to support it if it is not tied to a DAW.

Yeah, think so too! Europa VST was testing the waters and making other devs look at the RE ecosystem with interest ("they can port RE to VST easily, so what's in there for me>"). Then there was this talk at Juce about RE being futureproofed for web (incl. mobile) and hardware. And now they're showing REs working alongside VSTs in other DAWs without any effort whatsoever on RE devs part.

I really think Verdane identified RE platform as the biggest asset of Propellerhead when they were buying them in 2016/17. Not the Reason, I'm affraid...

[fieldframe]

2) if they don't release a FREE or close to FREE version of the VST Rack Plugin I strongly believe they will attract nobody. At $99, it is just way too expensive. I assume that the $99 version will include the "stock" devices (like Thor, Redrum, etc...). It would be fine to have a FREE version that is just the empty rack with no stock devices... that way you can't "cheat" and get Reason for free... And you can always buy the stock devices for $99... But the huge difference is that anybody can download it and try it and use many of the free REs that are available or just buy <enter you most favorite RE here> without having to shell <price of you most favorite RE here> + $99...

I'm surprised they didn't do this; it seems like an obvious choice. The only reason I can think of is that the Reason 1-5 devices are so deeply embedded into the rack code that it would be a major undertaking to extract them.

[ShelLuser]

I really think Verdane identified RE platform as the biggest asset of Propellerhead when they were buying them in 2016/17. Not the Reason, I'm affraid...

Why do you think we suddenly have a "rent to own" model?

Every online business that I'm familiar with has strived for this model. Subscription = re-occurring income and if the other end doesn't cancel.. a payment model.

Far fetched theory: healthy organizations don't do this. Not Ableton, not Bitwig (I don't like them myself because I guess I'm a Live fanboy but credit where credit's due). Not NI either last I checked (I am not going to check... before posting ).

[Boombastix]

Far fetched theory: healthy organizations don't do this. Not Ableton, not Bitwig (I don't like them myself because I guess I'm a Live fanboy but credit where credit's due). Not NI either last I checked (I am not going to check... before posting ).

No, it's not. The most healthy corporate software companies have done this for years. The reason is to stay healthy, and be able to keep sw engineers on the payroll to do maintenance and slowly roll out new features. Many sw products are so mature that it would stifle the user if they keep throwing new "features" at them, thus there is less motivation to buy upgrades. (When was the last time you upgraded MS Office?) Music DAWs are still developing and it is a bit of a race still but 5yrs from now the features will probably be so mature you no longer see the need to upgrade and subscriptions will happen as a consequence. This can change the market too during transition where some were a little behind and were not able to get enough paying subscribers. Point is, it is probably too many DAWs to feed a subscription market, so consolidation or fall out will happen. A few niche DAWs can survive as independent by selling upgrades. I keep my thumbs that Reason will position their DAW so strongly that they emerge at the upper echelons.
Cubase is already consolidated into Yamaha, Studio 1 in a way too with Presonus hw unit, NI Maschine as well, Logic obviously. Reason/Ableton/FL Studio/Bitwig/Tracktion etc, AFAIK, rely pretty much on one leg only - DAW sw sales, so they may be more vulnerable.

[antic604]

Far fetched theory: healthy organizations don't do this. Not Ableton, not Bitwig (I don't like them myself because I guess I'm a Live fanboy but credit where credit's due). Not NI either last I checked (I am not going to check... before posting ).

As a "Live fanboy" you seem to be out of the loop - you should complain about Bitwig's 12 months upgrade plan as a disguised subscription scheme

But seriously, it's a pretty clever way of them - as a small, single product company - trying to generate stable cash inflow, without the "stink" of actual subscription. I personally love it and already bough next 12 months, even though my current plan doesn't run off until end of next month.