Licence cost ?
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I am pretty much settled on the licensing scheme and different distribution channels of instruments that are built with HISE which I think will be covering both low budget projects as well as big flagship products in a more user friendly way.
I won't spoiler too much publicly until it's really thought through and lawyer approved, but if you're really interested PM me and I'll talk something more about it.
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@Christoph-Hart Any news on the current licensing scheme for commercial plugins made with Hise?
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I confess I didn't read all the comments, anyway, at the moment I'm still in the learning stage about HISE and if I will complete the two projects (an only oscillator modules FM synth and a sample based instrument) for a company, the HISE commercial license cost will be bought from the company, just only need to know the exact price. Personally I like create free and open sources instruments. I'm developing with Kontakt for some time and though there's a large market, we don't forget that people are obliged to have Kontakt full (399 €), instead HISE allows to create, through XCode and Visual Studio, compiled plugins that people can launch on a DAW without use another plugin of 399€ cost further.
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I understand that freelance developers could get some problems to spend an expensive license cost (as me for example), and if the company that is interested about create compiled plugins didn't contact me, I surely used HISE only to create free instruments. But if you think that to study C++ ( programming course) and so improve a very good skill with it to can create a virtual instrument without other tools than C++ (like Ivo Ivanov for example) is quite expensive including the Professional license cost of Visual Studio ( 641 €), well... By the way, I love use Kontakt, but creating compiled plugins is more nice ;)
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@Flexinoodle said in Licence cost ?:
It is far from a valid comparison, Kontakt offers huge market potential, why do you think there are so many library suppliers for Kontakt, 99% of which never licence anything from NI.
There are many other companies that develope vst plugins directly using C++ and get their market too. EastWest for example selling their instruments that run on their own engine. Smaller companies as Sugar Bytes or U-He get very nice vst instruments compiled on C++. NI Kontakt gets an huge market because many companies made libraries for Kontakt, Spitfire Audio that is one of the most famous, if you noticed, started to compile their own vsts without Kontakt with Hans Zimmer Strings and now with the LAB series... so I think that though Kontakt still remains a lovely platform, the companies tend, however, to develop compiled plugins IMHO ;)
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Unlickily, my programming skill is on Object Pascal and I have a very basic knowledge of C++ so the HISE framework is a nice chance to me about developing a compiled plugin.
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@Christoph-Hart said in Licence cost ?:
I am pretty much settled on the licensing scheme and different distribution channels of instruments that are built with HISE which I think will be covering both low budget projects as well as big flagship products in a more user friendly way.
I won't spoiler too much publicly until it's really thought through and lawyer approved, but if you're really interested PM me and I'll talk something more about it.
That's nice thing :)
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@Christoph-Hart said in Licence cost ?:
Yes, I most definitely want to adapt this licence model draft for smaller developers. Although I am not sure about the subscription model, I don't like this kind of dependency towards a company (like Adobe with their Cloud system).
Also people really seem to forget the HISE Player (which is pretty easy because it doesn't exist yet :). It will be a commercial plugin with a low retail price that allows you to sell HISE libraries without any licence fees (but the end user will have to buy the plugin for a pretty low price, something like 20$). This is ridiculously less than a full KONTAKT price, which is needed by the end user to play your "free" KONTAKT libraries.
Most people complaining about the high licence costs are small developers who just want to sell their plugin with a tight margin and that's OK.
But honestly, I really don't understand why people are reacting so aggressively. I chose the open source way because I think it is great to give people without commercial intentions the best tools available and let companies that create revenue carry the financial recompensation (a scheme that is widely adopted in other parts of software development).
And let me be clear: I certainly didn't spend three years of developing this engine just to mess it up because of a licensing scheme that is too restrictive so I am positive we will find a way that everybody will be happy.
What about the Hise Player? When it will be avaiable?
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@ossian1961 said in Licence cost ?:
What about the Hise Player? When it will be avaiable?
I've been wondering about the Hise Player too. It was announced 2 years ago. I hope it'll come out eventually somewhere in the future.
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Forum search is your friend - https://forum.hise.audio/topic/791/hise-player
Libre Wave - Freedom respecting instruments and effects
My Patreon - HISE tutorials
YouTube Channel - Public HISE tutorials -
@d-healey Thank you, just read it now :)
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@d-healey said in Licence cost ?:
Forum search is your friend - https://forum.hise.audio/topic/791/hise-player
Thank you for the link. That's sad that the project was put aside. I hope he'll complete it someday.
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The commercial license aspect of Hise is what prevents me from working with it. It's unclear of what you can and can't do with it. On the front page of the Hise website it says to send an email to get more details about commercial license. I've send an email and nothing. No answer, just nothing. It doesn't inspire confidence. I see that the Librewave company separates the wav files from the Hise project, making the former payware and the latter open source. It seems to be the way to go but I'm not 100% sure it is because the Hise Sampler developer said on KVR: "GPL means everything you need to compile and use the plugin must be made availabe to the public, which includes samples and all HISE files."
Looks like a legal imbroglio to me.
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Every time I use the word free in the following text I'm referring to freedom not price.
I see that the Librewave company separates the wav files from the Hise project, making the former payware and the latter open source. It seems to be the way to go but I'm not 100% sure it is because the Hise Sampler developer said on KVR: "GPL means everything you need to compile and use the plugin must be made availabe to the public, which includes samples and all HISE files."
This isn't quite accurate. There is a difference between open source and free software (although most of the time the two are indistinguishable). The GNU GPL is a free software license, samples aren't software as far as the GNU GPL is concerned because they don't have source code and aren't embedded in the binary.
The HISE gratis license requires the samples to be free, for this reason my (librewave) samples are released under a creative commons plus license.
For most people it seems complicated to work out all the licensing issues so some people do release sample libraries (samples included) under the GNU GPL. I don't think this is wise as derivative works have to be licensed under the same terms. This means anyone who writes music using "GNU GPL samples" has to release their music (sound recording not midi or notation) under the same license, which doesn't make sense since a sound recording doesn't have an editable source code equivalent which the GNU GPL requires.
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I am replying from viewpoint of end user rather than developer, with my limited understanding of the sampler/vsti market.
What about HISE having a marketplace that allows developers to sell their products and takes a commission? Something like Kontakthub?
I saw a quote of 2 million DAW owners vs 50,000 full kontakt owners. So there must be a lot of casual DAW users who do not want to pay the large price of Kontakt. I am one of those users that have decided Kontakt is too expensive, even though the sight of all those interesting and low cost libraries is tempting.
So for me, and perhaps for many others, if there were an alternative marketplace that sold Kontakt like sample based instruments for not too much then I would buy them. I mean up to $50 or maybe $100.
I see that Kontakthub has instruments starting from a few dollars. How do developers make money I wonder at those prices?
Personally I don't think there is much difference for end user between $3 and $10 or maybe $20. But for developer and HISE, the difference of 1000 copies sold at $3 or 1000 at $10 is a lot.
All those libraries for Kontakt on sale at low prices are tempting, but the need for full player is an obstacle. Perhaps users would more easily part with a slightly higher price for a sound library that does not need a 399 euro investment to use.
Another advantage of a marketplace is that it is a central place where all activity and buzz about HISE would be concentrated. It seems to me that for something like HISE to succeed it needs to gather developers and consumers and thereby create the kind of buzz that a market or mall has. Otherwise you get skilled artisans tucked away in backstreets that only a few know about. Yes there is web search but sites get buried unless they are significant.
The marketplace would benefit HISE because it would get commission on the sales. Technically this would need some kind of licensing so that only items bought and registered through the marketplace function. Or perhaps some developers prefer to pay a one off cost and retain the right to sell direct, the option could be available. Although I believe a centralised marketplace would benefit everyone.
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@steve_uk Decentralized systems are better. With a central system there is a chance of instant collapse! BTW the owner of KontaktHub also runs sampleism.com which is the kind of market place I think you'd prefer :)
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@d-healey That samplism site seems rather confusing to me. A lot of the products are patches for other products, and there are a few loop libraries on offer. One product was a set of patches for Roland Juno.
Honestly not what I was looking for at all.If I want samples I go to Loopmaster, if I want synth stuff I go to plugin boutique.
The Sampleism seems a heap of things thrown together.For example:
https://www.sampleism.com/price/upto-10I saw items on the screen for £74.00 (Bloody Nightmare). Not sure if that was a promoted item, but there were loads of others for more than £10.
I won't be bookmarking that site.
Yes there is a chance of instant collapse with a centrally run site, but if HISE run the site then it is in HISE interest to make sure it is professionally run.
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@steve_uk As long as the central site is not the only option (well then it it wouldn't be central I suppose) I'd be okay with it.
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@steve_uk said in Licence cost ?:
I saw a quote of 2 million DAW owners vs 50,000 full kontakt owners. So there must be a lot of casual DAW users who do not want to pay the large price of Kontakt. I am one of those users that have decided Kontakt is too expensive, even though the sight of all those interesting and low cost libraries is tempting.
NI allows to create libraries for the free Kontakt Player, you just pay them a quite expensive fee and so your libraries can run on the Player and customers don't pay 399 for the full Kontakt. I know that a free lance developer can't pay that fee to NI and I'm agree with you about NI philosophy but I don't think that NI could never give the chance to free lance developers to create libraries for the Player for free, full Kontakt sales would collapse instantly.
Hise, in this case, is less expensive. The alternative would be to become C ++ wizards ;) -
@steve_uk said in Licence cost ?:
I see that Kontakthub has instruments starting from a few dollars. How do developers make money I wonder at those prices?
Well, though I can't survive with my libraries, through nine months, I earned £ 1.240,00 ca from Kontakt Hub, so, I have largely amortized the cost of Kontakt full :)
