>Hendrik Jan Veenstra wrote: >Windows users now >get free bugfixes, while I do not. I have to pay $130 to get those >bugs fixed. Sure I get additional features, but I bought LA5 and >that's what I want to use, and I don't care for new features (uhm, >playing devil's advocate here, mind you :). So... why am I treated >differently than Windows users? After all I paid the same price for >my LA5 the did, right? Hi Hendrik Jan hmmmmm, well that is a very interesting and indeed thought provoking statement, and quite a number of responses spring to mind..... Thinking about all the software running on the various computers I own/am responsible for, IMHO Emagic is quite unique in the sheer amount of improvements/features it has consistently provided as free sub-releases between charging for "major" upgrades. Looking back since version 4, I note the following versions: 4.0.2, 4.0.3, 4.0.4, 4.1.1, 4.1.4, 4.2.0, 4.2.1, 4.2.2, 4.5.0, 4.6.0, 4.6.1, 4.7.0, 4.7.1, 4.7.2, 4.8.0, 4.8.1 and since version 5.0.0: 5.1.2, 5.1.3, 5.2.0, 5.3.0, 5.4.0, 5.5.0, 5.5.1 BTW, I might have missed some LAM-only subreleases, and have included at least one so far for windows only ... By way of comparison, I just looked back at what Adobe have done with Photoshop, Pagemaker, Premiere and Illustrator over the same period of time, there have been at most three or "maintenance" releases of each of these products between paid up versions (FWIW I regard Adobe as a very good professional software company). Same applies to Samplitude, and I am not even going to raise hackles by mentioning Microsoft ;-). You are of course quite right in pointing out that, in an ideal world, bugfixes should not be charged for, and that windows users may have received a benefit here that Mac users haven't. I appreciate that you are playing devils'advocate, but the gut reaction of many windows users to your complaint might be "would you be happier if it was the other way around, the Mac platform was dropped, Windows development continued and Mac users were provided with free bug fixes, but no perspective of seeing the product further developed on their platform of choice?" - anyway, that is me playing devils advocate, I honestly don't care for this type of thinking, it doesn't solve anything :-) It seems to me that it is common practice that software companies incorporate bug fixes into releases which have to be paid for, rightly or wrongly, and it seems that they get away with this. However, I do feel that Emagic has been very conscientious and responsible to its cross splatform customer base in this regard, I know of no other company which comes even close. It would be nice of them to release some more 5.x LAM versions, but going on past experience, once they went from 2.x to 3.x, 3.x to 4.x and 4.x to 5 development stopped on the older version ... cheers Mark Cahill

On a fine day, 02-03-2003, hesse-voormann@... wrote: > >Hendrik Jan Veenstra wrote: > >>Windows users now >>get free bugfixes, while I do not. I have to pay $130 to get those >>bugs fixed. Sure I get additional features, but I bought LA5 and >>that's what I want to use, and I don't care for new features (uhm, >>playing devil's advocate here, mind you :). So... why am I treated >>differently than Windows users? After all I paid the same price for >>my LA5 the did, right? > >Hi Hendrik Jan > >hmmmmm, well that is a very interesting and indeed thought provoking >statement, and quite a number of responses spring to mind..... No, no, don't... :-) I was just playing devil's advocate in response to the idea that Emagic is obliged to treat all customers "the same" (or words to that effect). >IMHO Emagic is quite unique in the sheer amount of >improvements/features it has consistently provided as free >sub-releases between charging for "major" upgrades. Oh yes, I fully agree. You won't hear _me_ complain... >I appreciate that you are playing devils'advocate, but the gut >reaction of many windows users to your complaint might be "would you >be happier if it was the other way around, the Mac platform was >dropped, Windows development continued Well, if anyone takes my above statements _that_ seriously, well... I guess I would just give up then... >anyway, that is me playing devils advocate, I honestly don't care >for this type of thinking, it doesn't solve anything :-) Oka, so that means we can be over and done with this, right? :) >I do feel that Emagic has been very conscientious and responsible to >its cross splatform customer base in this regard, I know of no other >company which comes even close. Yes, and that's all I wanted to point out when I wrote that I thought Emagic was being cool in still releasing Windows versions, even though they have moved on the a Mac-only LA6. I wonder how this whole thread started... I just wrote a one-liner in favour of how Emagic treats Windows customers... >It would be nice of them to release some more 5.x LAM versions, but going on >past experience, once they went from 2.x to 3.x, 3.x to 4.x and 4.x to 5 >development stopped on the older version ... Oh, I don't care for a new LA5 -- I'll just get LA6. -- Hendrik Jan Veenstra <h@...> Omega Art: http://www.omega-art.com