Donation-ware indefinitely?

[mrbarefoot1013]

Hi. Ran across Soundbridge today. I’m considering using it to teach my recording workshops. So all my students can use the same starter platform. It seems to have nearly everything they would need to teach the basics. Before I make that switch, I’m wondering if your plan is to keep it as donation-ware? Or eventually switch to a paid-upfront model? Thanks for making it donation-ware btw. I run a lot of my business on the pay-what-you-want model.

John

[Anonymous]

Official answer from SoundBridge, LLC:

Hi, we have no problem with you using our product in your workshop as long as every student registers as an individual. If you were an institution that charges tuition per student and requesting a multi-computer license to register everyone in the school with one account, we’d charge your institution an annual blanket fee and provide a special account to you. This is stated under the RESTRICTIONS ON USE part of our EULA. As of now, we have no plans to charge for the first computer activation of SoundBridge or RitMix in regards to individual licenses.

FYI: This is an official SoundBridge, LLC forum account. We have just noticed users speaking on behalf of the company in this forum. We’re implementing protocols now to ensure official accounts are more clearly labeled. We are also banning users by IP Address that speak on our behalf without authorization. Please do not use our identity to speak on our behalf to avoid issues. Thank you for understanding.

• This reply was modified 2 years, 2 months ago by asdfas.
• This reply was modified 2 years, 2 months ago by asdfas.
• This reply was modified 2 years, 2 months ago by asdfas.

[mrbarefoot1013]

I’m curious if this is more what you mean…

Thanks your note, John.

We’re glad you found us! And thanks for considering using Soundbridge for your workshops, and we appreciate you spreading the word to your students. We’re relatively new in the DAW space and know we aren’t easily found in Google searches. So new referrals and interest are always appreciated. If you and/or your students have any feedback or product improvement suggestions, feel free to contact us.

And thanks for the shoutout about donation based use. At Soundbridge, our goal is to do things differently, and help make music production accessible to everyone. We like hearing that you run part of your business that way too! And to answer you question:

We plan to indefinitely keep Soundbridge and RitMix donation based in line with our accessibility values. So no worries in referring your students to an accessible product only to have us change our minds and start charging.

FYI: If you are an institution and need a multi-computer license, please contact us for special account and fee info.

If you have any other questions, please let us know.

Regards,
Soundbridge

[mrbarefoot1013]

Thanks for your note, Soundbridge.

I appreciate you speaking to what I wrote and allaying my concern about referring my students. I wouldn’t have wanted to refer them to a pay-what-they-can model only to have it switched to a set-price-based model they can’t afford in the future and have them lose access to their work.

I appreciate your appreciation of my referrals, and I really appreciate working with companies that engage their customers in a relational, mutually beneficial way, as I try to do the same with my business.

Thanks for the feedback invitation. Mainly, I’d say:

I hope you keep it simple! And you don’t add too much more too it!

I think that modern DAWs are overly confusing to teach beginners (and for many casually users needs), and in the few minutes I spent assessing your DAW for teaching purposes, it seems to have just about every feature needed to teach beginners that I already include in my curriculum… without any confusing extra stuff. I like how your default project is using a limiter on the master bus, which I think helps new folks, not looking for the end-all-be-all end product, simplify their workflow to get to some satisfying end results without a separate mastering process.

Two small feedback items:

I couldn’t easily find the shortcut/button (if it exists) a way to set the region to the gird. It seems it maybe defaults to the note value of the time signature? I think easy bar aligned loop setting is critical. Does this exist in Soundbridge?

Also, I couldn’t easily find find the shortcut/button (if it exists) to keep blocks aligned to their start time when drag copying/moving to another track in the project. Also critical. Does this exist in Soundbridge?

And yes, thanks for asking. I do have a followup question:

How often does the donation nag appear? I would expect it would just appear at app launch. Is this the case? I wouldn’t want it to interrupt my students’ workflow or otherwise be overly intrusive, and would want to leave it up to them if they want to donate. I need to factor this into my decision about whether to make using Soundbridge a requirement of my Level 1 workshops.

And lastly, thanks for the institution heads up. I’m not one now, nor will I be one in the future. I teach private students remotely and I like referring them to high quality companies that do good things, and as I said, engage their customers in a relational, mutually beneficial way. I’m glad the referrals are welcome! And I hope that my students and you all form a mutually beneficial relationship!

Sincerely,
John

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