Larry Jones
I'm heavily invested in CbB, and I hope for the best with Bandlab, but I'm not seeing the synergy, your experience notwithstanding. Nothing personal, just business.

Look at this months update if you want to see synergy. We have integrated sync with BandLab right from CbB. You can publish stems right from your project to the cloud. Our synergy with Cakewalk is to handle the pro end of the spectrum and leverage the BandLab cloud and deep social ecosystem. This is something other DAW's do not have the luxury of doing. With BandLab we now have solutions for the full content creation spectrum of users, those who want to want the immediacy of mobile music creation as well as the pro end of the spectrum.

Thanks for all of the work you and the team are doing here!
 
I think Cubase has some kind of a cloud thing. I don't believe it's as open ended or feature rich though which limits it. The Bandlab app left a little to be desired for the more  engineer centric folks. The addition of a seamless CbB to Bandlab is something a few here had guessed might happen. Only makes sense if you own Bandlab. Interesting times ahead!
 
As for the forum, I like it but I agree it needs to have a few revamps. I'm guessing that the new forum will tie indirectly into the Bandlab company vision or at least encourage it. Having the ability to sign new users and not occasionally loose posts will be nice. At that same time there's a good chance the whole feel will change. New people, new feel.
 
 
 
 

> If "non revenue-producing" stuff doesn't fit in with any corporate portfolio, do you think Google are going to > start charging for Chrome, MediaHuman are going to start charging for AudioConverter and VideoConverter, > Sun are going to start charging for Java, and Microsoft are going to start charging for Skype?
 
I can guarantee that Sun will *NEVER* start charging for Java -- period!
 
... because Sun Microsystems no longer exists.  They were acquired by Oracle in 2010, and evidently their headquarters was sold to Facebook (sad).

Free software has never gotten the respect it should get. Paid for software is what is reviewed and discussed. However, there are a few very good free software offerings that are quite good and actually lead in some cases. Right now Cakewalk is the very best free DAW on offer. A distinction it owns all by itself. It should be the most downloaded DAW on the internet. I don't believe it is. Why, I don't know, but I suspect it is for the reason in the first sentence. 
 
Then it has only been out a short time as a free DAW. It may be that given time it will reach critical mass and be the number one DAW around. 
 
 

I too left sonar and love what noel and the gang are doing to cbb. i had fl studio and waveform but cant stop using cbb. and the latest updates are pushing this daw to a new level for me. i do believe they will eventually charge for cbb as there is a lot of work going on in this daw and i notice we got 2 new or upgraded plugings. as for the forum us die hard sonarians is keeping it alive and i think it should be merged into the new forum but kept the same as it is now.
cbb is now an exciting colourful daw pound for pound soild and can pretty well match most daws out there at the moment.
i hope they keep and add to the cakewalk university as ive learnt a hell of a lot about sonar keep the good work guys loving it!!

I'm not a naysayer. I explored three other DAWs in the aftermath of the Cakewalk shutdown, and returned with relief and gratitude to SONAR when Bandlab acquired it. I hope for the best and I wish them the best. But whatever "synergy" has been developed so far doesn't do me any good. I'm not going to be collaborating with the folks on the Bandlab site, even if I now have the ability to "publish to Bandlab." I just need a high quality full-featured recording program. Maybe I'm isolated in this, and there are a lot of long-time SONAR users who've been waiting for the chance to have Bandlab "friends" around the world add tracks to their projects. But it's not my interest.

Music in itself is social. Even if you are a soloist, finally you need audience to take notice of your appearance. 
A social music network is indeed way overdue in the digital reality.. To me it's exciting to use this   excellent Software not only for solitary purposes, but have  the possibility to collaborate. Possibly I collaborate with my buddies only? Whatever, nothing to lose, everything to win
 
Cheers :) 

Welcome back. Speaking from someone with years in the software/customer service industry, I trust Bandlab will understand the value of institutional knowledge and keep the present forum around in one form or the other.  
 
The exciting aspect is the synergy between the cloud/social AI of today and the knowledge base of the forum.  We have the potential to create a new landscape - and here is the most intriguing aspect:  Extending functionality in ways we have yet to dream. 

Skyline_UKI also thought that the CW acquisition was intended to help BandLab users make better quality sharing/cooperation tracks and that BandLab itself would be monetised at some point with on-screen ads or similar.

That's been my assumption as well. And I don't think it needs to do much more than that to pay its way. Maybe getting the Cakewalk plug-ins re-branded and up for sale, perhaps selling space on their cloud servers as Cakewalk becomes more and more integrated if people want to use that as backup, selling loop packs. Those would all be nice bonuses, but really, what you say about it just being a complementary thing to the online platform, like Google Docs has its iOS and Android apps. Of course, BandLab already has apps that run on those platforms, too, and they are free. Cakewalk is the (monstrously powerful) Windows app.
 
Once the BandLab site starts getting eyeballs, who knows what it's capable of as far as revenue. Facebook started out ad-free and they wound up doing pretty well. Powerful enough to influence a presidential election? YIKES!
 
There are other modes to be in than "quickest way to increase profits," but when I (veteran of Silicon Valley, both hardware and software) have been at companies that got brand new CEO's, they did tend to have that outlook. Especially the companies that were publicly-traded. :-)

Larry Jones
I'm not a naysayer. I explored three other DAWs in the aftermath of the Cakewalk shutdown, and returned with relief and gratitude to SONAR when Bandlab acquired it. I hope for the best and I wish them the best. But whatever "synergy" has been developed so far doesn't do me any good. I'm not going to be collaborating with the folks on the Bandlab site, even if I now have the ability to "publish to Bandlab." I just need a high quality full-featured recording program. Maybe I'm isolated in this, and there are a lot of long-time SONAR users who've been waiting for the chance to have Bandlab "friends" around the world add tracks to their projects. But it's not my interest.

Its not just about collaboration. I think folks are not seeing all the potential value in a cloud based service like this. The BandLab ecosystem integration serves a multitude of uses. Here are just a few potential use cases...
 

• Expose your music to fans. You can hyperlink any track in BandLab on social media your website or elsewhere. Which musician doesn't need fans? :)
• Easily invite feedback on works in progress from peers or band members. Share a BL revision with select users.
• Push mixes or stems from CbB to the BandLab cloud to easily audition on different devices. i.e. easily check a mix in your car from BandLab using your phone's bluetooth connection. If you upload stems, you can play with mixing the stems in BandLab to see how you can improve the mix. Much faster than going back and forth with the DAW and burning CD mixes or uploading to thumb drives. This is a great use case that you cannot do with other services like Soundcloud etc.
• Backup multiple revisions of your mixes to the cloud to easily audition them quickly. The export integration supports BandLab's revision management. In BandLab (web or mobile app) simply pick the revision that you want to listen to to quickly switch between different mixes.
• Experiment with ideas for a song when you are away from your DAW. With stem mixes you can easily mute a part and experiment with different takes just using your phone. There are some great plug-in mic's that work very well to capture audio with just a phone. BandLab even makes the inexpensive Link Analog and Digital that are useful devices to augment this workflow.
• Publish stems to collaborate with others who may contribute other instrument parts
• Engage with other musicians or fans socially. Comments in your BandLab feed are a much better integrated avenue to get feedback and promote your music than a private songs forum.