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Is the fact that ReNoise users have been part of the development process, an obligation or a privilege?
What do you mean?
If you mean which it is more, it’s a privilege for both devs and users. Stressing the word both. I’m not sure how it could be an obligation, unless you mean the devs have been obligated to listen to the users. They haven’t. Renoise owes alot of itself to it’s users. Maybe not as much as it owes itself to it’s devs, but it wouldn’t be what it is now if either were absent.
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It was really just a philosophical question. I mean, if Emagic, for instance, invited users to have the same level of input as ReNoise users, would you feel that it was a “job” or a “joy?”
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Are you a Renoise user cause you want to participate in the development of a new program, or are you a ReNoise user cause you love the program?
It’s more to do with it being the software I use the most, than with participating in it’s development. But in all likelyhood it wouldn’t be the software I used the most if I, or more to the point, others here who have contributed with their ideas, reports, etc, didn’t have the attention of the devs.
Another philosophical sort of question. What if your favorite artist invited you to be part of the production team. Would you insist they pay you, or would you do it for free?
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Is it amazing privilege to say you played a part in the development of some cool ReNoise feature (that might to be used by Moby or other powerful artists - if you happen to be Moby, you know who you are…) or is it a chore you have to muddle through?
It’s neither. That we can have something appear in Renoise after suggesting it is just plain COOL. It’s not amazing.
That is an opinion. My opinion is that ReNoise is amazing. Your opinion is that ReNoise is cool. How would this discrepancy pan out in a court situation? Does ReNoise: Rock, or kick butt, blow, or Jam?
The worst thing one can do is to step back and expect adoration (i.e. we’re giving you this amazing privilege of parttaking in development).
I did not know what to expect when I downloaded ReNoise, and I found my self adoring the program. I don’t know what the development team expected, but they get my “way wonderful” sequencer vote.
That’s a surefire way for relationships to go sour, and I have the impression that all the devs want to be as close to the users as they can, to prevent any kind of gap from appearing. It’s been a calm conversation (more or less) between devs and users so far, and I hope that never changes.
Nothing passes unless the dev team wants or likes it, or at the very least sees a need for it that they would want or like to still. Most features, atleast to begin with, were introduced after there being a discussion on here that encompassed what seemed to be a high percentage of this boards’ inhabitants.
Not sure what more to say on this one.
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If someone like Moby voluntarily mentioned his excitement about this hot new program called Renoise, should that entitle the developers to sell it for $200 or more?
No. And that’s not to say that they couldn’t be charging whatever they like for it regardless, but Renoise isn’t made to fit just one targetted group of ‘professionals’. If it were, I wouldn’t use it, even if I was part of the demograph.
If you owned a company that produced a cheap product that would sell for big bucks, would you keep the price down or sell it for what people are willing to pay for it? It helps to put yourself in the other shoes.
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Does the Renoise development team owe anything to people who have purchased the program, to use it for their own musical ends, aside from reliability?
I don’t know why you use words like ‘owe’, but yes, IMO they owe it to us to let us know where they are in development, and they’ve been very good at following through with that.
When it comes to reliability, manuals, support and stuff like that, I wouldn’t expect any of it. It’s under a $150-200 price tag, and isn’t bug heaven. The attention given to these things in Renoise seems way over the top for a $45 app.
Do I read you to mean that the team is being more attentive and communicative than is normally expected for a $45 application?
For it that is what you are saying, you would be justifying a higher price due to the attention to detail and over abundance of effort applied to designing ReNoise. Why is a $4000 hand made guitar more expensive than a $120 knock off from China? They both have strings and play like a guitar?
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Should users who have been part of the development process be entitled to special benefits as a result of that?
It depends on their involvement. But sure. A great big stuffed heffalump toy wearing a Renoise t-shirt would probably be in order for people who’ve been of extraordinary help.
Back to the philosophical question of weather it is a privilege or an unpleasant obligation to be part of the development process. Is what you are “getting” more than what you are “giving?” Each person has an opinion on this one, and everyone is right here. Some love to be part of the process, some find it inconvenient. Taste is subjective. Some people pay money to do what other people don’t want to do, for free.
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Are the users entitled to complain about the price or upgrade of a program that can produce amazing music for 45 to maybe 65 dollars?
Sure they are. What better way for them to appreciate the work that goes into developing, than by being ignored, ridiculed and called out when they spew their venom.
Not sure what you mean here…
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How does the amazingly low price play into the sales plan?
It’s not an amazingly low price. And I would hope that they concentrate on development, and not on having an ellaborate sales plan.
I don’t know… How many sequencers are there on the market that can run any VSTi, for less than $45? An ellaborate sales plan could move the price up… Is that why you prefer it not be approached that way? I am trying to approach this from a position independent of my financial means. Cause if i let my means define my views on the topic of price, I would suggest they sell it for $5.
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Aside from the current price of ReNoise, what is it worth to you?
I’m sure you’d have to stop development for most to realise what it was or wasn’t worth to them. What I’m not sure of is what kind of answer you expect with questions like these.
If ReNoise were $200, would you still buy it? Assuming that your bank account to cover it?
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If Renoise were to become your central sequencer, and you devote your life to music, are you a selfish penny pinching bastard even to complain if the program were being sold for $200?
Depends. I’d say that Renoise isn’t worth $200 presently. Why? Because it lacks central features that most associate with sequencers. Second of all, $200 has the potential of being a big deal for most people. Either Renoise will ask for $200+, or it will offer something that others could profit from, for practically nothing. The latter benefits a much larger percentage of mankind, and makes Renoise one of the most noble software projects on the face of the earth.
Does the fact that ReNoise does the same sequencer things, differently, suggest that it does not same things at all? If you build a car that you can purchase with either front or rear drive, does this suggest that 1 or the other is more or less a car than the other? Is it apples and oranges, or green apples and red apples?
I’d like to see Renoise go open-source donationware. I’d drop $100 every year if that was possible, happily knowing that friends could get their very own copy for free. I’m convinced that if this were to happen, this community would all but explode, and the constant demands and complaints would drown in positivity. Yay!
That being said, I understand why it isn’t open-source in the conventional sense, since that might introduce all kinds of clutter.
I am not sure if it is fair to bias the discussion based on your own financial situation. People who don’t have a lot of dough typically would say anything possible to get the price down. Kind of like asking a cocaine addict if coke should be legalized. The coke addict will probably always say it should be legalized, simply because that benefits his personal situation.
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Is 45 to 60 dollars the actual value of Renoise, or simply what people are currently willing to pay for it?
It’s not the actual value of Renoise, because there’s no currency to measure actual value in.
(this crap post moved and deleted from other thread.)
How then do you put a dollar value on a piece of software? Do you compare it to other pieces of software that can accomplish similar goals? Cause if you were to compare what ReNoise can do to all the other sequencers that do the same things, this might suggest that ReNoise should be substantially more expensive than $45.
The point of my post was to delve deeper into these more ambiguous areas, in hopes that we can extract some sort of naturally fair ethic from the discussion. The question of value verses desirability is not a new one. The price of gold rises and falls on a daily basis. I just wanted to get some of the same philosophical dynamics into the ReNoise price debate. I find debate and discussion pleasurable, but this is because i am insane.