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Dirk Ulrich leaves NI.

Geezus that article was complete clickbait trash and basically just fabricated the 'quote' in the headline. I'm no fan of VC and modern capitalism in general but like 90% of that article was just made up.
 
This is definitely troubling news for sure.
How soon will it be before we start seeing kontakt based libraries as risky investments because we really can't trust "FP" to deem it profitable enough to keep developing the engine that our thousand dollar libraries run on? That's my big concern with this acquisition situation.
 
It does really make me laugh that the VC people totally messed up the purchase then basically ran off the one guy capable of fixing their mess. They love to swoop in and take over and well, they did, and now they gotta own it. Literally. But I agree that Kontakt will live on no matter how bad it gets with NI. I'm guessing some VC heads will probably roll, but the Roman in me will find that quite entertaining, actually.
 
Mike Greene said:
So there's zero chance NI goes under. and Kontakt being abandoned. Zero!
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Its not that it dies, its that what NI represents, what it does will die. When its a team focused on making cool products and innovative ideas its great for composers. As it gets bigger and HAS to make money to cover those overheads it becomes less about whats good for us composers and whats good for the shareholders.

So yes Kontakt and NI might not die completely..... but we already have unsolicited ads popping up in our full-version players... NI doesn't have to die per se for what it used to represent to us as composers dies. Kontakt could get more and more micro transaction heavy or 'watch an ad before you can use this patch' nonsense....never thought id see ads on my movie streaming accounts but now I have to pay another 5 quid just to keep the same service, it would be nieve to not see this greed swallowing up our industry. Money people will rinse every cent out of us then move on. Thats why we are seeing all the sales and repackaging of stuff already done, which will ironically make the fire burn faster. Like if you have SSO at $500 from Spitfire, you are covered. Now they have to convince that person to buy those same instruments again... its been this way for a while now. Its only going to get worse. Company price drops, they sell to money people who repackage, start a sale, make the issue worse, someone buys company, they repackage, start a sale.....so on and so forth. Welcome to capitalism run by short-sighted fools. Its almost like a bacteria that dies because it grows too fast and exhausts its food source before it can replenish it, literally starving itself to death from overly aggressive success.

But yeah anyway thats why I was saying that I hope Kontakt gets into good hands before NI gets too hollowed out. But a situation where the rights to Kontakt cannot be taken from people who are abusing/destroying the platform (unsolicited ads as the example)...in that scenario is it not as good as dead as a professional tool? Again it obviously wont physically go away, Giga studio still technically exists, but without active (useful) support and updates who is going to use it. Kontakt trapped in the wrong would be just as bad.

I mean more that it will die in practical terms.

-DJ
 
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Daniel James said:
So yes Kontakt and NI might not die completely..... but we already have unsolicited ads popping up in our full-version players... NI doesn't have to die per se for what it used to represent to us as composers dies. Kontakt could get more and more micro transaction heavy or 'watch an ad before you can use this patch' nonsense....
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Hey Daniel, been a while - how are you?

I was one of the ones moaning loadly about Kontakt's "instruments for you" section. Less than a month later it was gone (if you wanted it gone).

Of course companies will try shady stuff all the time. It's up to us as users to stop them getting away with it. Waves lasted 4 days of subs-only before the most humiliating climb down I can remember in the world of audio.

Nothing is inevitable. NI knew pretty quickly that they'd over-reached. Similarly they recently rowed back on other smaller changes. They've been pretty good at introdcuing awful unasked-for features, but they've also been pretty good at ditching them again. Power to the people and all that.

NI have produced some excellent composer products in the last few years and I suspect financially they're doing just fine. However infuriating they can be, rumours of their death are frequently exaggerated.
 
Guy Rowland said:
Hey Daniel, been a while - how are you?

I was one of the ones moaning loadly about Kontakt's "instruments for you" section. Less than a month later it was gone (if you wanted it gone).

Of course companies will try shady stuff all the time. It's up to us as users to stop them getting away with it. Waves lasted 4 days of subs-only before the most humiliating climb down I can remember in the world of audio.

Nothing is inevitable. NI knew pretty quickly that they'd over-reached. Similarly they recently rowed back on other smaller changes. They've been pretty good at introdcuing awful unasked-for features, but they've also been pretty good at ditching them again. Power to the people and all that.

NI have produced some excellent composer products in the last few years and I suspect financially they're doing just fine. However infuriating they can be, rumours of their death are frequently exaggerated.
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I hear what you say but you are applying an interpersonal level benefit of the doubt to corporate decisions, where there really isn't any emotion other than making money (Its nothing personal just business exists as a phrase for a reason). You can decern usually and quite accurately a lot about a company based on their moves. An easy example is when DJ's become famous then there is a sudden boom in mixdesk releases and the like. Those are so obvious we can all see that for now the company's main focus is trend chasing and it view music and its creation in 'this' little box for now.

The more subtle things however are when you start noticing things like re-releases, or adverts popping up to upsell you stuff where it wasnt before. That usually indicates that right now they need money. They NEED to get that end of year report looking as healthy as possible because now they have a fiduciary duty to shareholders, and that 100% comes before the customers... so you start seeing the firing of staff who maybe command too high a wage (even when they are the reason that company was a success in the first place, thinking creatives are interchangeable), or general layoffs across the board like what is happening in the gaming industry at the moment, as a quick way to balance the books.

So what happened this time is they got caught, not that they had a change of heart. I don't believe even for a second that the driver behind the decision to include ads has gone away. They are most likely going to try to find a more subtle way to either upsell to us or start adding 'taxes' or 'subscriptions' to things. There is no more real hunger for innovation or new product, they dont understand the product most of the time, they are VC's, they know money. Safer to just follow the trends and react.

And so while I do think NI can turn it around like you, I am also a bit more realistic to the nature of how business works in the real world. Too many people spend time trying to shape the world to match how they want to be and so are mad at the things not going right. I have founds its better to just accept the world as it is, including the unfortunate shit stuff, and adapt to it. And right now my gut tells me to start making solid contingencies in the event that these companies we rely on going away. Im not saying its guaranteed but for ME, enough is being indicated that, while the ship aint sinking yet, its taking on water and everyone in charge is pretending to us everything is all good nothing to see here.

Again just my opinions I think it has a solid footing though. And for the record I LOVE NI! I really really hope this all sorts itself out and they get some solid consultants in so they are not flying blind.

-DJ

p.s Also hey Guy! good to see you mate, long time. All good here, hope you are well :D
 
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What the world needs is a good open-source sample player, preferrably one that's Kontakt-compatible, if possible.

If VLC, GIMP, Audacity, Thunderbird, LibreOffice, and even Linux, can thrive and provide reliable, useful software solutions for users, why not an open-source sample player?

Just bypass all the greedy corporate parasites!
 
tc9000 said:
When it comes to Kontakt all I can say is:

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Native Asshat is pulling it in that direction. BTW how many developers spend more time working on their product distribution than the product. How may of these individual installers do you have without the option of a direct download from a site?
 
Daniel James said:
The more subtle things however are when you start noticing things like re-releases, or adverts popping up to upsell you stuff where it wasnt before. That usually indicates that right now they need money.
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We agree on most of it Daniel. But I think this above is the assumption too far for me. They are a company and need to make money - 100%. But to infer they are in financial trouble just because they've marketed in different ways lately - I just don't see that.

And I'm good, ta! :)
 
I'm so confused as to who owns what. I thought that PA, NI and another company merged and that this Dirk guy was the owner of PA and that these guys were going to do some sort of 3 way....developing software for each other. Now they all seem to be sailing in the Bahamas or something.

I honestly love NI but I could live with out it if needed. But I've grown really attached to PA but what's going to happen with it now?
 
NekujaK said:
What the world needs is a good open-source sample player
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There are many, some excellent, but there are good reasons if even who advocates for them ignores their existence (and wants them compatible with Kontakt).

Paolo
 
Nick Batzdorf said:
I know nothing about the situation, but in general it's normal for heads of companies to leave after they get sold. Often they have agreements to stay for a specified amount of time, but even if they don't, their jobs are time-bombed.
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We prefer the drama.

Spme people have the option to retire at a younger age and do so.
 
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