Yes, we will surely make it to 60%, no doubt about that. It's the last 100 that really has to do it. ;) But hey, we still got plenty of time!

Done.

Are yuo sure you can cancel? I thought I read when you signed up you committed to make the purchase ..               

hellogoodbye

HOLD IT HOLD IT!!!

You are mistaken! musicman100 is right!
 
The deal is that you can sign up and wait until the GB is over and buy what you want to buy (which is how BG's usually work) or you can sign up and buy something immediately for the current price and when the price gets lower, the difference will be refunded: this way you can already enjoy KH's stuff without having to wait! Whatever you choose to do, as soon as you've signed up, you HAVE to buy SOMETHING sometime (not later then 2 weeks after the GB has ended, if I am not mistaken).
Maybe you (or someone else) got confused because someone else started a topic on KVR where people who are on the fence can say if they are on the fence or not: that way you can get some sort of idea how many people are thinking about entering the GB. But apart from the fact that it really doesn't work that way with GB, it also is quite confusing...
 
 

I'm sure you're correct, you couldn't very well purchase to pad the numbers then get a refund if it failed to meet a certain %.

bitflipper


If for some reason it never makes it to 75%, and if that's a showstopper for you, then you can cancel the purchase.

That would be a very disingenuous thing to do, to say the least. I'd suggest that anyone who enters the Group Buy have a serious intent to purchase. If someone is iffy about joining the Group Buy and absolutely will not  purchase unless it reaches the 75% discount level, I would strongly recommend that s/he NOT join the Group Buy UNLESS it has already reached the 75% discount. But dishonestly joining with an attitude that you will only honor your commitment if some conditions are met is not desirable. 

Frankly, I've said it before. I designed this Group Buy with Kirk. There is no other high end KONTAKT or VST orchestral sample library developer that has ever sold their libraries anywhere close to the current prices. Kirk Hunter Studios list prices are a good deal in the market as-is, but discounting by 60% is unheard of. This all started with Kirk and I having an extended discussion on the idea of pricing his libraries within reach of hobbyists, students and semi-pro musicians/producers. We both love the idea of making libraries of this quality accessible to a larger audience and, of course, the model works IF you can sell a much higher quantity of product at much lower prices. But, there's no doubt that having such dramatic discounts on your products will impact sales (negatively) following that sale. So, I don't want to get into detail, but doing a sale where you discount this heavily is very much a risky proposition for a high end sample developer who regularly makes a good deal of sales from the pro market. 


I'd urge anyone considering joining this Group Buy to do some research. Check out LASS, EWQL Hollywood Strings (which doesn't use KONTAKT, but is a high end library), VSL (which also doesn't use KONTAKT, but is a high end library), and others. Compare the sound and the features. LASS is largely the one that professionals weigh against Kirk Hunter Studios Concert Strings. They have comparable features, whereas LASS Lite does not have a bunch of those like DIVISI.  LASS lists at $1499 USD and the lowest price I have seen it discounted to is $999 USD. I seriously doubt they would discount much below that, ever. Even LASS Lite, which lacks a lot of important features, imo, goes for $499 USD. Right now, at 60% off, you can get Concert Strings II at $319.60 USD. Kirk Hunter Studios has NEVER had a Group Buy before on it's highest end products like Concert Strings II, only one Group Buy (which I helped design and manage), which started late last year, that was only for Pop / Rock Strings and its highest discount level was reached. It was 50% off, right now, Pop / Rock Strings is 60% off at $99.60 USD. 

I'd also ask people to compare the Concert Brass II library, which I think sounds great and is now selling for $139.60. The cheapest competitor high end concert brass library for KONTAKT that pros compare is Cinebrass at $399 USD. 


So, yes, when Kirk and I were discussing pricing and the idea of making his products accessibly priced for the pro market, I'll be completely candid. I had Garritan in mind and what they never did. Around ten years ago, I purchased GPO. I thought it was fantastic that I could pick up an orchestral library that sounded pretty decent for, what I think was $249 USD. I loved it. But I also realized that it sounded pretty synthy. After a while, I wished that Garritan made a product I could step up to. Over the years, I'm confident that Garritan made a strategic error by never doing so, that there is a market out there whose standards have grown beyond the quality of the sounds in GPO, but there was no step up product that was within reach (price-wise). It was with that mindset that I discussed with Kirk the idea that he could make his libraries more accessible -- and give it a real shot by discounting big on a Group Buy on his pro products, up to 50%.  Then Kirk said that he wanted to do 75%. I said, "That makes me nervous. That could really impact sales and create a mental resistance to your list prices post Group Buy." Kirk still said he wanted to do up to 75%. 


Now, my opinion is that this GB is very likely to reach 75% in the next few weeks. Better GBs like this one commonly get a mad rush near the end. But even if this GB only made it to 60%, I would consider this Group Buy a success. I don't think they're going to be seeing KHS' competitors discounting their products at 60% or even 50% anytime soon. 


- Peter 

It's group buy etiquette to buy what you signed up to buy.

Well, the Group Buy is at 233 with the current 60% off discount. The views for the KVR thread are extremely high, around 7 times the next most popular (non-sticky) thread on page 1 in the KVR Market Place forum and the KHS website GB page is getting a ton of views, both of which lead me to believe A LOT of people are checking the GB, but sitting on the fence waiting for this thing to reach 75%. We have more than two weeks left, so I'm still feeling pretty confident that the GB will reach 300, but it's starting to look like it's going to go down to the final week before it does. Of course, I'd love to be proven wrong on that! If anyone wants to join some of us in the Group Buy on Facebook, I created a special Facebook Group yesterday upon request: https://www.facebook.com/groups/197101483701349/ I thought, after the GB, we can always keep it going for people to exchange tips and ideas working with KHS libraries, if desired. - Peter

wst3

I'm going to get the upgrade to TVEC3 for the Diamond collection as well, and I am hoping to join the GB for both Concert Brass II and Concert Strings II 

I'm with you on that bidness... So if it's 60% right now + 10% for previous customers, it's already at 70% for us previous customers? And if another 60 or so join I pay 15%?
 
Diamond TVEC3 upgrade + Brass/StringsII bundle for like $150... gonna ask Kirk to throw the whole kit on a harddrive rather than download Diamond, which I think I might have to do...

Well. come on, people! JOIN! I need that 75% discount!  I entered the GB when it was at 40% and bought Concert Strings II, which is AWESOME and very easy to use and all. (A lot more convenient that Albion which I bought earlier). Since the GB is at 60% I will get a nice refund already, but I'd love to see it be even nicer!  That way I might be able to also get the Brass or maybe Diamond (for all the other instruments apart from the strings).

keith

rather than d/l the 130GB though... ... we'll see. 

The CSII download is something like 25 Gb and it's all divided in zips. Most files are (roughly) around 1,25 Gb, the largest ones being 2,3 Gb. I don't think CB will be a lot larger...? Anyway, you really don't have to download 130 Gb! (Don't know where you got that number?)

hellogoodbye

keith

rather than d/l the 130GB though... ... we'll see. 

The CSII download is something like 25 Gb and it's all divided in zips. Most files are (roughly) around 1,25 Gb, the largest ones being 2,3 Gb. I don't think CB will be a lot larger...? Anyway, you really don't have to download 130 Gb! (Don't know where you got that number?)

CSII+CBII is 45GB compressed (total 68GB), Diamond is 42GB compressed (total 65GB)... assuming 35% compression, which seems to add up to Peter's number. So total download of about 90GB... I guess not that bad. 

I'm only assuming I'd have to download Diamond because I don't know which version I have currently, and the site recommends re-downloading, if necessary, rather than patching. Maybe I have TVEC2 version, can't remember... actually haven't used it in a while.

How does this compare to the EW plat (which is what I currently have) or EW Hollywood strings?

25 away.

I wonder how I can guarantee that I'm Mr. 300?

18 away from 75%. The big question on my mind is how crazy this thing will go once we hit 300. I tried to project numbers for Kirk, but it's tough to say what will happen at 75% off, and I bet we will reach 300 by Wednesday/Thursday. One very good thing is that Amazon.com is handling the downloads, which means that we don't have to worry about slow servers. I've been a customer or advisor on more than one GB where they dev uses a standard small business, cheap web hosting shared server, which is in no way equipped to do this kind of file serving and the server chokes and it becomes a nightmare. I used to manage a major corporate website that got around 10 - 12 million unique visitors in a month and it would spike when we had a new mobile phone coming out, so I know about being prepared for major spikes in traffic. Consequently, one of the first things I do when working with a dev is make sure they are prepared for the traffic spikes. KHS switched to Amazon.com for file serving before last years GB and everything went smoothly. But as I recall, that reached around 260 something people. I would not be surprised if this one hits 400 or more people. I'll be sure to keep everyone posted. - Peter

I just pulled the trigger. I was leaning toward pop rock strings, but at 75% off, the Diamond package will only be twice as much price wise, but 100 times the package, so I am thinking Diamonds are a MM best friend.