NI have announced they will no longer activate discontinued products

[whyterabbyt]

Those products are very old though, 2003, 2004... I think they should give away those for free.

So, NI are saying they cant maintain these legacy products for actual owners, but you think they can somehow manage to maintain them for everyone else, for nothing?

That sure is optimism.

[Teksonik]

I can see not providing updates or support for old plugins. I don't think any reasonable person expects that but to just break the ability to install them even with us accepting and knowing full well they are no longer supported is a repugnant move in my opinion.

It's basically extending a giant middle finger to the people who supported them for all these years and put N.I. in the market position they are in today.

It's probably not an illegal move but in my opinion it's certainly an immoral move.

[rasmusklump]

Now you know how honest this company is and why I strictly don't buy challenge response software anymore.
I am super happy since I moved to UVI. Very robust engine and superb libraries.

You're aware iLok is fundamentally challenge-response? I use and love iLok but Pace's servers are required for authorization. Personally, I believe Pace will exist longer than some of the developers that use iLok so I'm not particularly worried about that aspect. And yes, defunct developer products will still get authorized even if the plugin itself can't be installed.

A lot of software is challenge-response under the hood. Anything that has you log in to an account in the plugin. Some will auto-reauth if the auth is on an expiration period. Some that ask only for a serial still validate it against the cloud. If you firewall your DAW or isolate your workstation from as network it becomes apparent very quickly.

Very few are locally authorized. There's a thread about it somewhere on here. u-He, Plogue, 2C Audio, off the top of my head, will auth locally.

Everything I have on ilok is on at least two sticks, no challenge response in sight.
My studio PC doesn't even have a network card activated and everything works without calling home.

[rasmusklump]

I have about 120 licenses on my iloks.
And everything I had to do two years ago when I bought a new pc was to run the installers and stick the ilok into the port....

[pandashake]

I can see not providing updates or support for old plugins. I don't think any reasonable person expects that but to just break the ability to install them even with us accepting and knowing full well they are no longer supported is a repugnant move in my opinion.

It's basically extending a giant middle finger to the people who supported them for all these years and put N.I. in the market position they are in today.

It's probably not an illegal move but in my opinion it's certainly an immoral move.

Pretty much sums up my feelings about the whole ordeal. I also believe that at the very least Windows users should still be able to activate all products since there is NOTHING hardware-wise (paying customer side) preventing that from happening. In fact, they created a way to authorize Kontakt libraries through NA, so there is no reason why they couldn't create something similar for their synths as well. Both were using the same system for authorization.

Also the support person who answered my inquiry closed out the case without even giving me a chance to respond, which is a pretty dick move from a customer support standpoint. Unless there's some serious changes happening at HQ, I think I'm done with NI.

[mi-os]

It's probably not an illegal move but in my opinion it's certainly an immoral move.

Agreed on the latter. I fear the former has to be decided by a court. Even if they have a clause in their EULA that allows this doesn't automatically mean they have a right to do so. It's not like they can write their own laws which are above everything. Often companies simply hope/speculate that noone is going to sue them. But there are cases in which judges decided against malpractices comparable to this.

[robindrieghe]

too bad, just found an unregistered boxed spectral delay in my hoarding chamber

[digitalboytn]

Back in the day,Native Instruments was one of the kings who ruled over the land,but there are so many great alternatives these days with less aggravation and more inspired delivery...

The truth is that we're so spoilt for choices these days, it's crazy...

We can easily over complicate the music making process and convince ourselves that we need all of this "stuff" to make music,but that's just self justification...

Even in the brand new world,the actual elements of music remain the same as they always were and there is no substitute for talent...

Great songs and strong compositions with great players and inspired performances...

We need very few tools to capture this delivery from an engineering and production point of view,but many people convince themselves that by having a gazillion plugins that they are somehow going to make the music better...

That's funny

[EvilDragon]

too bad, just found an unregistered boxed spectral delay in my hoarding chamber

You CAN actually authorize the latest update of Spektral Delay (1.6) with Native Access. Same for last Vokator update (1.2).

I wonder how Battery 3 and Kontakt 4/5 can be installed and activated. I don't see them in NA.

NA cannot install them (use the original disks they came from, or ISOs if you can see them available here), but it will authorize them.

[Teksonik]

I wonder how Battery 3 and Kontakt 4/5 can be installed and activated. I don't see them in NA.

I see Kontakt 5 in my Native Access.

[panspOrmia]

Especially as they promised that they continue to authorize them after the initial announcement.
Now you know how honest this company is and why I strictly don't buy challenge response software anymore.
I am super happy since I moved to UVI. Very robust engine and superb libraries.
Just today I bought the gorgeous Ircam solo instruments 2 for the sales price and with my 40 eur loyalty coupon

I newly on board with UVI. I just bought UVI SHADE and I`m totally impressed. I`m now saving up my nickels for Falcon + Drone.

[pandashake]

How can they be authorized, ED? They are showing up as Demo for me.

[glokraw]

I can see not providing updates or support for old plugins. I don't think any reasonable person expects that but to just break the ability to install them even with us accepting and knowing full well they are no longer supported is a repugnant move in my opinion.

It's basically extending a giant middle finger to the people who supported them for all these years and put N.I. in the market position they are in today.

It's probably not an illegal move but in my opinion it's certainly an immoral move.

Compare the NI attitude with those who freely gave Surge synth to the winds, in case someone would find it useful. And now, after heavy development, I think most musicians would prefer
Surge XT over whatever warmed-over stew that steinberg
has on offer at high prices...

[dune_rave]

When they will announce they discontinue Absynth, Fm8, Massive, that will be intereting!

[EvilDragon]

How can they be authorized, ED? They are showing up as Demo for me.

I remember I didn't have any trouble authorizing them back when we were testing this all. Was it just reentering the serial or if NA picked it up automatically if it wasn't authorized, but the key was definitely to first update it to latest available version otherwise it wouldn't work (because prior to those latest versions an older auth scheme was used that NA doesn't support).