FabFilter

Hello,

I think most people agree that Fabfilter's products are amazing, however, many people can't use them because they just can't afford them. Many competitor companies offer a subscription and access to their whole list of products (Antares, Slate, Waves, Kush, and so on...)

I think Fabfitler is leaving a lot of money on the table by leaving out a huge amount of potential customers who would happily pay a subscription fee for years. That money is not coming in right now, so why is the resistance? I think thousands of new costumers would join, creating extra revenue. I'm really curios what is the strategy behind this. Thank you!

If you will consider this: please please please let the non-subscription model intact. I just hate subscription based systems, since I do not find them attractive at all ...

I'm also happy with the price model of the FabFilter plugins and do highly prefer a non-subscription model.

Roland, I can assure you that FabFilter would lose a huge number of existing customers if they ever went subscription only. Look at what is happening right now among the users of Waves plug-ins.

If FabFilter offers subscription in addition to outright purchase, that's fine. But subscription only? No way.

Waves has basically been a subscription model this whole time (the entire pro audio industry has been). By moving to admitting it they're actually doing the right thing and being *honest*, since previously their strategy was to just pretend like all their products were on sale just to hook you in to the upgrade plan. And this wasn't like their idea. Major DAW developers have always relied on annual service contracts for income.

The alternative is staff cutbacks and being directed to support forums for help which sucks if you have a client looking over your shoulder in a commercial studio. This is why commercial studios are happy to pay maintenance, as this in turn guarantees an additional layer of reliability with the services they offer their own clients. Good luck justifying charging for the time you spent on the Reaper forums since they don't answer their email and don't give you an emergency number to call.

echo1976 please speak for yourself. By a wide margin the Pro community hates subscription models. If you look at the forums of Avid, KVR, Gearspace, UA, Waves, Social Media Platforms, and Youtubers you'll see the backlash of Waves decision to go subscription only and I've never seen anything like it the Pro Audio community. I understand this may differ for large commercial facilities, but the majority hates it. You and a few others have said the Waves WUP was a subscription anyways, wrong. You were not forced to buy a WUP plan until necessary due to OS changes or other features/plugins you wanted. Plus by not buying a WUP you could still use your perpetual licenses unlike a subscription plan. For one I own all of Waves plugins and I just purchased a $240 WUP on January 12th. I was expecting as we have always been able to, to receive new plugins and upgrade to V15 when released, but no. Now Waves have said they will only allow me access to V14 updates til Jan.12th 2024. The purpose of purchasing a WUP was for all upgrades, updates and new plugins, but Waves have went back on their word and basically did a bait and switch on me and others who recently bought a WUP.

I am posting to agree 100% with what Eric Matthews has stated so well on this forum earlier today. Some subscription plans are intended to simplify, but many are based purely on greed. Waves has this week disgusted their longtime loyal customers. To be clear: FabFilter is not a greedy company, and has done nothing but show us all complete respect. And what's more, I don't think that'll ever change.

What Waves has done, in going to a subscription-only model suddenly and without warning, is tantamount to spitting in the faces of all of us who have bought their products over the last decade or two, whenever we could afford them, creating their own public s**tstorm and spinning us into a dimension of pissed off that we've never experienced before in our entire lives (to quote a famous comedian). We were led to believe there would always be an upgrade path. Now all our past plugin purchases will be worthless, unusable, unsellable, probably with the next OS update (or with a Waves subscription which reportedly breaks all their plugs you own), and this has resulted in an upheaval of their customer base unprecedented in the 20+ years I've been fooling with Pro Tools as both a pro and now as a serious hobbyist.

I certainly do not mind, and even eagerly *welcome* paid upgrades that add many new features to plugs. I have enthusiastically paid to upgrade to Timeless 3, Pro Q 3, Saturn 2 for the new features offered. I will soon upgrade to Twin 3.

Plugin Alliance found a great way to go subscription and still honor their loyal customers. So did Avid. Maybe Waves was going out of business -- it's a very competitive market -- and wanted to make one more huge money grab. I don't know, and I don't care. They're now dead to me, and to many others I've spoken with or read about.

What am I doing this evening? I'm tweaking my Timeless 3 presets to surpass the capabilities of the Waves Abbey Road ADT plug. Thank goodness FabFilter is a truly honest company. You get what you pay for here, and then some.

I have to admit that I hate subscriptions. If Fabfilter someday decides to do this, I hope they will consider leaving their current model in place and just add the subscription as another alternative for acquiring plugins.

subscription models are very bad. I would really hate to see this.
only subscription software I use is antivirus.
I agree with previous comments, that subscription models by other companies are mostly based on greed and FF would lose clients.

if motivation to ask for subscription because the entry price for owning fabfilter is too high, just make the math with products by other companies - within 1 year or 2 you pay way more in subscription models.

subscription models leave a really bad taste of capitalism in the mouth.

I’ll just echo all the anti-subscription sentiment here

same. no subscriptions. ever. please.