pwalpwal

Roo Stercogburn

jamesyoyo
Well, I never said Gibson would do the cracking! ;)

Its not open source then, its piracy.

AR HAR!

This Gibson pirate is taking all out booty....  

Shiver me timbres!
 
Baddum-tish
 
Ayyyyye thank you.

Piracy is taking something of value from an entity. If that entity no longer exists, hard to get worked up morally about it.

jamesyoyo
Piracy is taking something of value from an entity. If that entity no longer exists, hard to get worked up morally about it.

Pretty sure there are all kinds of code and rights related to Sonar platinum that are the property of Sonar , You cannot just pirate something because the company no longer operates it.
That's ridiculous

jamesyoyo
If any of you all think that announcing the end of a company comes BEFORE exploring every option to sell it off is how things are done in the business world, I have a large piece of swampland to sell you.

The recent history of the Nik Collection photography software shows that this isn't always the case.  It was around since the 1990s, then bought by Google in 2012 (another big company whose name starts with "G" ).  Google may have just wanted the technology to use for Picasa, but in any case they didn't seem to know what to do with Nik.  First they lowered the price from $500 to $150, then in 2016 they started giving it away for free, and finally in May 2017 they announced there would be no further development of the software.  However, just a few weeks ago there was an announcement that DxO had acquired the software from Google and would be continuing development.
 
If nothing else, it shows that there can be a good outcome in these situations, and that it can come long after the initial announcement.  It would be a long shot for the same to happen with SONAR, but it offers some hope.

Can we all write to Gibson.  On the negative side, I just bought a Les Paul and feel like returning it.  Gibson needs to realize that this affects their company as a whole.
 
On the positive side:  Perhaps a petition and a request that they provide a longer period of time before exercising this decision as well as paying (perhaps with a fee charged for the product) of Noel and company preparing software that converts bundles to other formats that can be done separate outside of the Sonar program (i.e. its own conversion program?)  I have bundles on hard drives from years ago.
 
We should even offer to help Gibson promote it more.  This is a great program and it should get more purchases in the world.
 
Best,
AB

danbottomburp

jamesyoyo
Piracy is taking something of value from an entity. If that entity no longer exists, hard to get worked up morally about it.

Pretty sure there are all kinds of code and rights related to Sonar platinum that are the property of Sonar , You cannot just pirate something because the company no longer operates it.
That's ridiculous

If Gibson goes belly up, who is going to enforce these rights? Or more importantly, who would care?

James
I am afraid you are right.  I would like to organize a group to bid on Cakewalk, but if the talent all leaves, there is not much there except source code.  Ditto on user base, tho that would be slower.  
 
It may be the case that taking a loss (which is probably small vis-a-vis Gibson's debt load) is more tax efficient.  
 
I have tried to guess at the revenues of Cakewalk.  I do not get a huge number.  I am guessing somewhere in the $5-20MM range.  And with a team of software developers, profits could not be huge.  That guess is likely confirmed by the fact that Gibson must have tried to sell it and found no suitors.
 
Then again, everything has its price.  

Couldn’t agree more, of course Gibson has tried and failed to sell off cakewalk. It’s done and dusted, the offices have closed, the employees are looking for employment.....what is left to buy, some unsupported code?

I hate it as much as you but it is what it is, deal with it, export your wavs ready to import into whatever DAW you choose to move to

Gibson is fabulously inept.  I wouldn't be surprised if they barely shopped Cakewalk, or have been forced to hold the assets to pay off creditors for a pending bankruptcy.