Reason updates (11.3.7 / 11.3.8) and Reason+

[joeyluck]

So by this logic if I'm a musician and I make terrible music, I should get paid anyway, because I have spent 10 years making terrible music and have a family to feed? Let's continue this line of thinking - why not go further and just redistribute all the wealth in the world to everyone equally, regardless of their actual input and output. There's even a word for it.

And talking about those poor Stockholm programmers starving to death - that one really cracked me up.

I don't think he was advocating for socialism

but other than that if they had spent all their time working on improving the program rather than implementing new marketing ploys they would probably be doing better

These are separate teams.

[EdwardKiy]

Hadn't been working on any? Graphics and features for R12 they have been working on.

What features, Joey?

And let me tell you something about a 4k revamp.
There's this game called DOOM 2, of which two dudes made a 4k version. If I remember correctly it had the original 7 campaigns and some additional ones they made themselves. That's a 2-d game made into a 3-d game with every single texture replaced, revamped physics, sounds - the whole gig. Never asked for any money for it - it's a free download. 2 amateurs that had turned a 2-d game into a 3-d game and created a bunch of addition content on the way vs a team of specialist programmers with a goal, a salary and a system of bonuses that had to replace 2-d textures with the same 2-d textures in higher resolution. Should it take more or less time than those guys spent making DOOM 4k?

I'll just be nice by saying RS are VERY LATE with their updates, even if we are to trust that these updates are coming.

[miscend]

No I personally had to move away from Reason after 8 & a half years. Did so 'cause the features missing were just trickling in too slowly.

The devices / stock sounds are great, I'm used to the instruments etc and they provided a plug-in version so it was time to learn another daw. I won't be returning till significant workflow improvements are implemented. Looking like at least 2 full version releases time and that'll be pushing it. First time I booted it up was yesterday to upgrade. Last time I used it (months ago now) I just thought, this is so behind the times workflow-wise. Went back to Reaper.

I dont see Reason going fully in the direction of something like Reaper in workflow. AFAIK Reaper gives you much more granular control of your entire workflow but that sort of thing isnt for everyone and can slow you down when writing. Conceptually they couldn't be further apart. And I think that's by design. Reason is closer to Ableton, Bitwig and FL Studio. These daws are great for jamming and writing electronic music in a kind of self contained environment. But not so great for traditional DAW stuff like recording orchestras, doing surround mixes for films and sequencing external hardware gear. Traditional DAWs like Reaper, Samplitude, Cubase and Logic are a different class of application with different advantages IMO. Personally I think RRP is the way to go, if you need to do things that Reason isn't particularly suited for but still love using the rack to build your own sounds.

Serious question.....was there this much of an uproar when Presonus introduced Sphere? Or was it less of an uproar because S1 tends to implement workflow improvements more often unlike RS.

Not sure about Sphere. But I remember uproar over the cancellation of the Line 6 devices.

[Hazel]

I'm not interested in a subscription model. Too expensive for me in the long run. I'd rather just own the program outright and call it a day I guess. I've got plenty of sounds already and honestly would rather just make my own usually anyway, since I figure Reason is mostly more than anything else, a sound experimentation/sound design application. As far as RE's go I don't buy very many and am very particular about which ones, for 1, I'm a poor starving artist, and two, I don't really need anything new, although I occasionally buy a much needed utility, or an effect, mostly when they go on sale if I happen to need them at the time. There are for sure many great developers with fantastic gadgets in the shop, many of them quite cheap even. I do like to get the updates and generally pick up the new upgrade when it comes out, as like others have stated, I like having new and upgraded features in the program itself more than anything else. If the subscription model is optional and they will always continue to offer the standard normal update/upgrade path that they have always done up till now I suppose it isn't any kind of a bother to me, however, I can't not worry in the back of my mind that this might not in fact be some kind of canary in the coal mine of what may be in the future. If the regular path users are in fact left out later on from updates/upgrades I certainly am not going to sit around using an outdated software and will more than likely move on.

[Heater]

The more I think about it the more I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m done with Reason.

I’m on R11 and will continue to use Reason as a plug in on a more capable DAWs but they are not getting any more money from me.

[chimp_spanner]

That's ridiculous.

Now, of course, there is an intrinsic motivation to make something awesome. But spending a year (or years) developing software full-time also has to come with the expectation of making money, otherwise, those programmers wouldn't be able to afford to buy food or rent, making them homeless and eventually starve to death.

So by this logic if I'm a musician and I make terrible music, I should get paid anyway, because I have spent 10 years making terrible music and have a family to feed? Let's continue this line of thinking - why not go further and just redistribute all the wealth in the world to everyone equally, regardless of their actual input and output. There's even a word for it.

And talking about those poor Stockholm programmers starving to death - that one really cracked me up.

Uhh, nobody's saying they HAVE to be paid a living wage for their efforts based purely on the fact that they spent time on it, regardless of the quality of their results. He's saying that they invest that labour with a reasonable assumption that other people might like what they've made enough to pay for it. That's not at all comparable to just...making a shitty song.

Also without going too far off the rails, equality of opportunity is not the same as equality of outcome. Not sure you can characterise an entire political philosophy as "everyone gets stuff even if they don't do stuff"

But it's late and I think that might be TOO much of a tangent. Don't ban me daddy.

[SuryaDnB]

I feel like once you get on Reason+ there will be no way back. If you decide you don't want to pay the subscription, you have the option to have a whole bunch of unusable project files, or buy the standalone AND any REs that came included in Reason+ but are not part of Reason. Just to be able to keep opening existing projects.

No, I think I'll stick to owning my copy and upgrading to an other copy I can own when they finally decide to put out a new version that contains features worth the upgrade cost. So yeah, still on 10.4 for now.

I just hope they won't increase upgrade costs just to make Reason+ more competitive.
I also think $200 a year is a bit too much, unless they do indeed put out enough content and devices you find useful. But if you don't, then you're paying for new features you don't care about. At least with regular Reason, you can hold off on upgrading until a version comes along that has features you value.

[Creativemind]

Yeah been waiting for an update for months and months seeing what features would be added and they hadn't even been working on any. This and the Hi-Res.

Hadn't been working on any? Graphics and features for R12 they have been working on.

Still doesn't take away the fact it doesn't look like (but hoping) there will be another update before the next major release so muting midi notes and octave shift were 2 of the 8 features deemed worthy of a major update release. Sorry but that's laughable. Then there was expanding the tracks and ok yeah the plug-in, fantastic and curved automation and auto-crossfades great but neither are finished imo. No verticle allignment on the crossfades or different curve types, no multiple curve types or drawable curves in the automation either. I'm just a bit fed up with the dead basic implementations. You couldn't scroll and mute notes in the midi editor with the mute tool either. Woulda been handy to have it work like it does with selected steps on ReDrum.

[exxx]

At least I should have done enough updates to be called DAW and talked about the subscription in the next order. People can't be fooled more. The whole blogging live stream is useless and then we don't plan on updating. Tada, we were focusing on the subscription service. It's a crazy deception

[idliketoremainanon]

I understand why people temper themselves with this logic but we know from trends and historical precedents set by Adobe and other software giants, that eventually they (reasonstudios) will force us at a cross road at R13 or R14. Or make the Hi Res update part of the subscription which I think would melt the world down faster than corona! lol

I give the company 2 years and it'll be gone. Learn another daw now! Time for the life vest?

Wouldn't be surprised if they ended becoming a popular plugin vendor. They'll ditch REs and the DAW completely and convert their synths to VST/AU/AAX.

[avasopht]

Yeah been waiting for an update for months and months seeing what features would be added and they hadn't even been working on any. This and the Hi-Res.

You always have to remember that you will never know what they've been developing and trying out that didn't make it release.

VST support was developed several years before it was introduced.

Internally they might have a few different timeline overhauls being evaluated in-house to see what tradeoffs feel right.

At the same time, the have innovated with their Rack Extensions and made significant enhancements to Reason that are easy to miss:

• Friktion.
• Complex.
• Ensemble.
• Audio Pitch Editor (basically Melodyne).
• Bounce to track.
• REX slicing and editing (which can be switched back and forth between APE).
• Timeline convenience (duplicate and smart grid).
• Players (the SDK and the players they've created).
• Drag with auto-routing (or not).
• VST plugin support (this has been a game-changer for me).
• ... and so on.

That's not to say there's not a lot of room for improvement or that they haven't neglected a few easy wins (feature requests with high impact that require the least amount of development time), but it's easy to miss the progress they are making because they are so seamless.

While sound packs might not appeal to some users, it does seem like an easy win for them. It's low hanging fruit requiring the least amount of effort for a lot of bang per buck.

When I examined Exhale the first observation was that it seemed to have been made from sample sets most people would easily dismiss and discard. But I really enjoyed playing with Exhale, and it seems it mostly consists of basic sample patches and ensembles stacked with effects that could be easily replicated with players (for things like arpeggio and midi echo) and stock effects.

If done right, those sample packs could add a lot of value to even the hardened Reason veteran.

I'll give Reason+ a try sometime before April and see if it's worth subscribing to for a year. It does have to contend with EWQL and Roland's $20/mo subscription (of which the latter includes a pretty strong DAW). The price point also puts it into greater contention with other options, so they are walking a very fine line here. If those sound packs aren't worth $20/mo on their own, by making a case of committing to $20/mo (without the promise of access to Reason when they stop) they might inadvertently be grooming users to adopt offerings they wouldn't have considered before.

Basically, if I'm willing to spend $20/mo to access sound packs and rent Reason (but can't use the files on my old version of Reason when I stop), I may also be willing to instead spend that same amount on something else I consider to be a better value proposition.

I guess we'll see how the market responds.

[Creativemind]

No I personally had to move away from Reason after 8 & a half years. Did so 'cause the features missing were just trickling in too slowly.

The devices / stock sounds are great, I'm used to the instruments etc and they provided a plug-in version so it was time to learn another daw. I won't be returning till significant workflow improvements are implemented. Looking like at least 2 full version releases time and that'll be pushing it. First time I booted it up was yesterday to upgrade. Last time I used it (months ago now) I just thought, this is so behind the times workflow-wise. Went back to Reaper.

I dont see Reason going fully in the direction of something like Reaper in workflow. AFAIK Reaper gives you much more granular control of your entire workflow but that sort of thing isnt for everyone and can slow you down when writing. Conceptually they couldn't be further apart. And I think that's by design. Reason is closer to Ableton, Bitwig and FL Studio. These daws are great for jamming and writing electronic music in a kind of self contained environment. But not so great for traditional DAW stuff like recording orchestras, doing surround mixes for films and sequencing external hardware gear. Traditional DAWs like Reaper, Samplitude, Cubase and Logic are a different class of application with different advantages IMO. Personally I think RRP is the way to go, if you need to do things that Reason isn't particularly suited for but still love using the rack to build your own sounds.

Serious question.....was there this much of an uproar when Presonus introduced Sphere? Or was it less of an uproar because S1 tends to implement workflow improvements more often unlike RS.

Not sure about Sphere. But I remember uproar over the cancellation of the Line 6 devices.

I keep hearing this, Reaper is like a spreadsheet or slows you down. It's so fast once you understand it. It just has a learning curve like everything and agree with people's thoughts that it looks crap but I use the FL Studio theme now and it's well nice. There's a Logic one that's great too.

Everything in it can be customised so once you get a nice theme in it, change some shortcuts and implement some SWS Extensions and Scripts (which takes a bit of getting your head 'round at first) it's great. I've set it up now so that one left mouse click adds a note in the midi editor, F12 brings up the track templates and I've added HeDa's Track Templates so you can add picture thumbnails (a bit like Reasons browser) to them. It's just so customisable and versatile.

[guitfnky]

your marketing since leaving the Propellerhead name behind has been abysmal. I don't say that with anger or because I enjoy being critical, but because I'm genuinely proud of the product you've created, and want to see it succeed.

the gist is that you've been far too narrowly focused on your target audiences in your marketing materials and website, and you don't give any thought to how those things will be perceived by the larger user community. some (none who work at RS, thankfully) have suggested that it's a matter of people here getting bent out of shape unnecessarily, or misunderstanding your intent, but those things only happen under the right conditions--completely avoidable conditions caused by poor marketing decisions.

[Faastwalker]

From 2015;

viewtopic.php?t=7366854

[avasopht]

So by this logic if I'm a musician and I make terrible music, I should get paid anyway, because I have spent 10 years making terrible music and have a family to feed? Let's continue this line of thinking - why not go further and just redistribute all the wealth in the world to everyone equally, regardless of their actual input and output. There's even a word for it.

And talking about those poor Stockholm programmers starving to death - that one really cracked me up.

That doesn't make any sense.

Working FULL TIME developing software for a solid year HAS TO has to be done with the EXPECTATION/OBJECTIVE of making money. I never said that "anyone who does something has to be paid". I was talking about EXPECTATIONS.

Jobs like programming in niche fields like video games and DSP tend to have a fair amount of intrinsic motivation, but there's no way any programmer is working full-time for a year or two on something they don't expect/aim to make enough to feed and house them (unless they have enough prior wealth to not need to earn a living).

And there are few, if any, musicians making terrible music on a full-time basis (with no expectation or objective of making a living) at the expense of actually making a salary.

Or course, Propellerhead's programmers aren't shitty programmers. They have the legitimate option of earning $75+k/yr from an average software development role.

Just so we're clear, I'm not saying EVERYONE SHOULD BE PAID FOR WHAT THEY DO REGARDLESS OF THEIR ACTUAL INPUT AND OUTPUT. I was talking about the EXPECTATIONS/OBJECTIVE a programmer would have to have to commit to a year or two of full-time development.

I repeat, I never said anything about them deserving money, I was talking only about the expectations they would have to have to commit to full-time development for a year or two.

There are practically no indie game developers working full-time without the expectation or hope of making money from their investment. If they are not expecting/hoping to make money they will typically do it in their spare time while earning a full-time wage elsewhere.

Likewise, musicians are confronted with the exact same decision - albeit, typically without a viable option to get a full-time job doing what they do at home in their DAW (there's just not that much market demand for full-time musicians and composers). Their decision would typically be between taking the risk of full-time music-making or an occupation that uses their other skills. A programmer has the option of a job using their highly in-demand skills that commands a lower-middle-class salary.

When I spoke to a producer who had produced a track for Sean Paul on his Grammy-nominated album and was at the time in the process of producing many tracks on Chip's debut album (known as Chipmunk at the time), he was still working a full-time job completely unrelated to music. He only committed to full-time music production when it became financially viable.

Skilled programmers have the option of being paid right now to develop software with a pretty generous salary.

[ProfessaKaos]

I think this is great for Reason Studio to further develop Reason, as the company will have a more of a steady income. This should help the company grow and progress into a bigger empire. I think it is great for the future of Reason Studios. This should help Reason features/updates come more often.
The only thing I hope is they continue to also have the option to buy everything outright for people whom prefer to own the products outright.

[avasopht]

I think this is great for Reason Studio to further develop Reason, as the company will have a more of a steady income. This should help the company grow and progress into a bigger empire. I think it is great for the future of Reason Studios. This should help Reason features/updates come more often.
The only thing I hope is they continue to also have the option to buy everything outright for people whom prefer to own the products outright.

And if it doesn't work out, it might result in features being developed that we do like. For instance, being able to trial and buy products and preview samples from within the DAW instead of having to use the store via a browser.

[WOO]

Well now that i've wasted most of the day being pi$$##. I'm going to make some music using what will be the last version of reason i ever own!

[avasopht]

I said it wasn't the first motivator. It was obviously a motivator, but the idea that Reason Studios exists only to make money is really dismissive of the meaning of music.

I never said ONLY TO MAKE MONEY. It would be to make money by developing and marketing software products for music makers.

Every company has to have solvency as a primary goal. Without income to pay staff, you have no company, which means no Reason. No income means no Korg M1, no Ableton Live, no TR-808, and no Moog synthesizer. No guitars, no pianos, and no flutes. Nobody would make your instruments if they couldn't afford to build them.

There will always be the odd hobbyist out there making things for free, and if you want you can go and take your pick of home-made guitars on Etsy that go out of tune when the seasons change, free Open Source DAWs and plugins, and creative commons sample packs.

And yet here we are, all taking the corporate offering from Reason Studios because like it or not, corporations maintaining solvency and seeking profit have afforded us the convenience and affordability that allows us to make music in our bedrooms for $100/yr using a suite of tools that would have cost you more than a 3-5 times your annual salary pre-tax and required veteran engineers, bands and highly skilled session musicians that you can now match with a single NN19 patch and a dusty REX loop.

[QVprod]

Serious question.....was there this much of an uproar when Presonus introduced Sphere? Or was it less of an uproar because S1 tends to implement workflow improvements more often unlike RS.

There was some noise. Everybody fusses about subscriptions. The fact that it came along with the new Version 5 release might’ve softened the blow a little, but they also don’t have the fan base Reason has. Reason fans treat Reason like a significant other and feel cheated on when a new feature isn’t aimed at them.

“How dare you give some other user what they want and not me”

We’re a unique community

[STIM]

Can someone from the US tell me if the $20 a month subscription includes taxes?

The UK subscription price is £20 a month which is $27.35, that can't be right surely?

[QVprod]

That's ridiculous.

Now, of course, there is an intrinsic motivation to make something awesome. But spending a year (or years) developing software full-time also has to come with the expectation of making money, otherwise, those programmers wouldn't be able to afford to buy food or rent, making them homeless and eventually starve to death.

So by this logic if I'm a musician and I make terrible music, I should get paid anyway, because I have spent 10 years making terrible music and have a family to feed? Let's continue this line of thinking - why not go further and just redistribute all the wealth in the world to everyone equally, regardless of their actual input and output. There's even a word for it.

To be fair, a terrible musician likely isn’t making music full time. Regardless, same logic applies. Any music maker, who’s not intentionally a hobbyist, makes music with the intention of it being sold/streamed. Whether it happens or not is a different matter.

[QVprod]

With all the time people are spending here on the forum, nobody can tell me it's a waste of time to try Reason+ and Companion for free and check out some packs. Or on that note, maybe we should reevaluate the value of a ReasonTalk membership

[EdwardKiy]

Uhh, nobody's saying they HAVE to be paid a living wage for their efforts based purely on the fact that they spent time on it, regardless of the quality of their results. He's saying that they invest that labour with a reasonable assumption that other people might like what they've made enough to pay for it. That's not at all comparable to just...making a shitty song.

Why is that not comparable? I've put work into that song and I also like it very much so I make a reasonable assumption that other people might like it too. Plus my mama said it's good.

But maybe this is a better example: If I keep telling a doctor I need surgery done on my arm because it's not the same, but he keeps telling me to wait, makes me wait 3 years and then performs a surgery on my foot instead, you think it's going to matter what the doctor assumed? Does it matter how much skill and effort it took him to do the foot surgery? Or his assumptions and aspirations? You can just dump all of that into a cauldron, along with his stupid wife and kids - nobody cares. He'll be lucky if he's not taken out into the woods for a little ride by the patients' friends or relatives who have positions in higher/lower places.

My point is this - anyone can expect whatever the hell they want to expect, it doesn't mean their expectations should have any bearing on reality whatsoever and it doesn't matter if they work full time or tripple time - they can take all their working hours and all their expectations to the grave, as far as I'm concerned. It's the actual result of effort that matters. We all commit blindly to what we feel is right. There's a bit of heroism in that, but it shouldn't be acknowledged and definitely not celebrated, because WE ALL DO IT. It's just NORMAL. Biologically, we have a limited capacity for empathy. This can be (and is often) used against us, so we have to be very careful with how we spend it. We simply can't afford spending it on something as mundane as someone's expectations. They have 0 value.

[avasopht]

Why is that not comparable? I've put work into that song and I also like it very much so I make a reasonable assumption that other people might like it too. Plus my mama said it's good.

But maybe this is a better example: If I keep telling a doctor I need surgery done on my arm because it's not the same, but he keeps telling me to wait, makes me wait 3 years and then performs a surgery on my foot instead, you think it's going to matter what the doctor assumed? Does it matter how much skill and effort it took him to do the foot surgery? Or his assumptions and aspirations? You can just dump all of that into a cauldron, along with his stupid wife and kids - nobody cares. He'll be lucky if he's not taken out into the woods for a little ride by the patients' friends or relatives who have positions in higher/lower places.

My point is this - anyone can expect whatever the hell they want to expect, it doesn't mean their expectations should have any bearing on reality whatsoever and it doesn't matter if they work full time or tripple time - they can take all their working hours and all their expectations to the grave, as far as I'm concerned. It's the actual result of effort that matters. We all commit blindly to what we feel is right. There's a bit of heroism in that, but it shouldn't be acknowledged and definitely not celebrated, because WE ALL DO IT. It's just NORMAL. Biologically, we have a limited capacity for empathy. This can be (and is often) used against us, so we have to be very careful with how we spend it. We simply can't afford spending it on something as mundane as someone's expectations. They have 0 value.

Again, you've completely misunderstood what I was saying.

I never said anything about them deserving or being owed an income.

I was saying that there's no way they spent 1-2 years working full-time on Reason and Rebirth without the OBJECTIVE of making money.

I never said they should get the desired result.

I never said that because they expect/seek to make a living from developing software that YOU or anyone else is obligated to pay.

I was only saying that there's no way they spent that time without the objective of it making money.

I'm really struggling to see how what I've said could be so terribly misunderstood.