The last few years of Splat almost all of us paid about $150-200 for free lifetime updates. So after that it was free.  I think the idea was Cakewalk was going to make their money from the Cakewalk store with FX, soft synths, books, videos, etc. I assume Bandlab will do the same.
 
Free is fine, I see no evidence that CbB is behaving any differently as during the Splat days. With Noel and others on board, we're in great hands. I like the idea of Bandlab owning Cakewalk far more than Gibson or Roland. 
 
During the paid days of Splat there were plenty of bugs that weren't fixed. It has nothing to do with free, it's all about using resources wisely to fix the important bugs first and the smaller ones after that. 
 
Considering everything that's going on I give Bandlab an A for this point in time. I have no doubt they'll keep trying to improve CbB.

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chuckebaby
 
There is a fine line between complaining and constructive criticism.
I'd like to believe we all want a better product and we all want to see Cakewalk succeed and prosper.
So while I agree with you about not complaining because its free, it is nice to hear the voice of users giving their opinions on a way to better the product.

It appears, well for now that Bandlab is not getting any monetary returns on this software and for this reason I like to believe things are strongly priority based when it comes to what features are released.

Personally, I tend to stay away from so called free things because there is a certain lack of accountability and in most cases you are at the mercy of the person giving you stuff.

Yes, you can complain or make simple request but the key is, you are and will always be at the mercy of Bandlab. 

Which is why the whole free thing stinks!

I can agree with most of that.
I do however think (personally anyway) something is going to change in the future.
weather it be a highly upgraded model of Sonar or something totally different like a newly built DAW from scratch, who knows.
 
I just don't see this free DAW thing going on forever. Im happy while it lasts though.
And even though its free, I think its still one of the best tools out there for what im using it for.

chuckebaby
I just don't see this free DAW thing going on forever. Im happy while it lasts though.
And even though its free, I think its still one of the best tools out there for what im using it for.

I am sure most people using CBB will agree with the above statement.
It is too good to be true, which makes me nervous because I hate surprises, and while I appreciate what Meng and crew are doing, the idea that we do not know what lies ahead creates an uncomfortable feeling.

Conceptually, I have moved on from Sonar but about 200 projects are Sonar based and I have no desire to do these projects in another DAW.

Maybe Sonar will be free forever, who knows. 

Unfortunately the reality is that intellectual property has been devalued. Apple of course contributed greatly to this (just ask MOTU), but to be fair, so did the previous Cakewalk management to some degree.
 
So, we have free Windows 10, free Mac OS, free FL Studio, free Grammarly, free Audacity, free LibreOffice, free GIMP, free GarageBand, nearly free Reaper, free apps, etc. Those companies that need to make money do so by selling add-ons. That model that is not likely to go away, so I hope we start seeing Cakewalk sell add-ons soon.

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chuckebaby
I just don't see this free DAW thing going on forever. Im happy while it lasts though.
And even though its free, I think its still one of the best tools out there for what im using it for.

I am sure most people using CBB will agree with the above statement.
It is too good to be true, which makes me nervous because I hate surprises, and while I appreciate what Meng and crew are doing, the idea that we do not know what lies ahead creates an uncomfortable feeling.

Conceptually, I have moved on from Sonar but about 200 projects are Sonar based and I have no desire to do these projects in another DAW.

Maybe Sonar will be free forever, who knows. 

I'd expect them to make new users pay eventually, but I imagine this won't happen until they have enough stuff to bundle it with - FX and softsynths. Right now users who don't have Splat installed have a stripped down version.
 
I wouldn't be surprised if they let the long time users stay free, since that's what was done for the last year or so of Splat after we paid for lifetime updates. And they'll open another Cakewalk store to sell plugins and make money from us that way.