On Nov 20, 2013, at 11:00 AM, Craig Parmerlee <[email protected]> wrote:
> On 11/20/2013 11:15 AM, Eric Dannewitz wrote: >> I think both finale and Sibelius are pretty much the top of what you can do >> with notation. I don't really know what people expect other than little >> refinements to the programs in each version. > > Everything about the process of notation can be made a full order of > magnitude more intuitive and productive. But you fail to list anything........ > > Where are their future customers coming from? There are many potential > customers who have tried these notation products and found them > overwhelming. I know a lot of folks here wear the Finale learning curve > like a badge of honor. But the flip side of that coin is that it > prevents sales to much larger numbers of customers. You have to make the > product less arcane by a factor of 10 to reach these customers. And it > can be done. It just takes more vision than has been demonstrated. Honestly, there is hardly any difference in the "learning curve" of Finale compared to Sibelius. Finale 2014 is WAY less "arcane" than say Finale 2000. They have made HUGE leaps in making the program easier. Some of us might even call it dumbing down the program. Future customers? Honestly, you expect a notation software to take off like wild fire? Future customers are those who are interested in writing out pieces to be performed by people. There is a very very tiny market for that compared to say something like Ableton Live where you are looping stuff together and could care less what it looks like notated (and the average Ableton user probably can't read music to being with). The "future" customers are going to be those concerned with the written/printed notation, and those persons are going to want and easy and flexible tool to use. Finale is that tool. Sibelius is easy, but you can't make it do stuff like you can in Finale. > > Moreover, a good part of the potential market is sophisticated musicians > (and educators) who are very tuned into the broader world of "music > technology". If MakeMusic wants to reach the next generation of > musicians -- the real opinion leaders -- Finale will have to be much > more interoperable and seamless with the DAW world, and much more > inclusive of the best plug-in technologies that are ubiquitous in the > DAW world. I don't really know how MakeMusic can make headway here. It does something, and does it well. It notates. While I'd LOVE to see it include DAW features, I don't think it will. That would be pretty much like writing a whole new program. If you look at what Avid did when it first got Sibelius, the next version of ProTools had some rudimentary talking between the two programs. I don't think Avid has done anything since with that (I don't know as I don't use ProTools anymore currently). I think it was a great idea, but ProTools really doesn't have very good Midi editing abilities (at least last time I used it) compared to say Digital Performer. Perhaps if big DAWs adopted MusicXML format......but that has been around for a long time, and I don't think ANY of the DAWs I use (Digital Performer or Logic X Pro) have anything MusicXML in them. > > Makemusic will not have a financially viable product in 2 years if they > do not embrace those concepts. I realize that functionally, Finale will > continue to suit most folks here just fine, but there will simply not be > enough revenue to fund the product's continuation. And I assure you > that venture people are very tuned in to the ROI. They don't look upon > this as a civic cause or a charity. So the concepts are what again? Make it less "arcane" to get more customers, make it more "intuitive and productive", and make it interoperable and seamless with the DAW world. Again, they are DOING that. What about just having MakeMusic make the best tool for notation that is out there? I think they are still doing that, and I will happily buy an upgrade when TGTools works with it. Venture people invest in something that has potential. I worked at a startup that was trying to be bought by several venture capital companies, and they are very complete usually in looking at the books, talking to the staff about what is going on. > > Regarding Avid, the situation is much more severe than you described. > Sibelius is not being developed in any significant way. It is as close > to an end-of-line product as one gets without formally announcing > that. There may be small tactical releases in the future, and perhaps > some merging of function with ProTools, but no major new advancement of > the notation art. The developers are all with Steinberg now. It > appears to me the venture guys running MakeMusic have decided NOT to go > the direction that Avid went. They are well aware of Steinberg's > efforts and fully understand they have something like an 18 month window > to establish their strongest position when the Steinberg product comes > to market. I hear that there is a Sibelius 7.5 coming. Again, you keep saying this "innovation", or "major new advancement of the notation art". What the HELL are you wanting? I mean, seriously. What do you want, a direct brain hookup ability? What? SPELL IT OUT and then maybe we can discuss it. Perhaps you have good ideas? But just complaining about the lack of "innovation" is just annoying. Finale 2014 is very nice. Lots of things that make me think the company is still moving forward. Until the Steinberg people ship something, they don't count. Vaporware. Steinberg could very likely shitcan the whole thing next year. Or next week. Who knows. Or perhaps Notation (the software) will introduce some awesome things in their next version (they have a nice product). _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list [email protected] http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
