Keep in mind that Reason, even now with LANDR, essentially has to reinvent itself. They first need to conduct market research to determine what people are willing to spend their money on and what product offers added value to the customer.

If the business decisions are wrong, Reason will fail, and LANDR will incur a loss. It is essential for a company to have sufficient funds for several months or years to create something new, or to adapt its product to people's needs.

 

I'm not a Reason user, but I knew a guy who was using just that and made wonderful tracks, speaking of 15 years ago or so.
I just used Europa and IMO is awesome, really easy to learn and very, very powerful.

Few years ago I would have just laughed, but now...

 

Did you know that the Europa series has essentially been discontinued; you can no longer buy it individually? You must buy a REASON+ or REASON 13! It was a synthesizer where Reason Studios did everything right. If you have such a stupid business model, you shouldn't be surprised that you hardly sell anything!

I made a sound set once.
The TAO Soundbank by Che for the Reason - Europa VSTi

Infos: www.kvraudio.com/product/tao-soundbank-by-che-for-europa-by-sonic-sirius
Free Download: https://mega.nz/file/j7hhCKrb#8KVOcGL5Jj33EHR-0G6b9cjdyGNIVFzYwlz5Q4JHMf4

 

You are right, their business model is really stupid - every rack extension sold should have a downloadable vst plugin version so if someone wanted to use an instrument they don't need to buy the full daw to use it.

 

The fact that they have (finally) been bought shouldn't even be surprising.

Creating Reason in 2000 was a genius move but unfortunately Propellerhead proved unable to follow on this.

Essentially, their refusal for almost 20 years to make Reason vst compatible proved to be wrong. And when they finally decided to open Reason to the VST standard, it was basically too little too late:

Their customer base shrinked so much during all these years that it didn't matter anymore because there was so many other mature options available.

In a way, it took about 20 years for their stubbornness about vst to be sanctioned. And they might feel relieved to have been bought otherwise they would be most likely shutting down before the next two years.

I loved Reason when it was released in 2000, I really loved it but it was more than twenty years ago. Now I moved on and there's no way for me to look back.

 

Last edited: Jan 7, 2026 at 7:17 PM

Oh wow, that was you? I remember it, and still have it. Very cool!
I did not know they did that with Europa, but I've been minimally to not at all engaged with Reason for years now.
"Reason Studios" was clearly the beginning of the end. Apart from Reason as a plugin (arguably, I guess) they've basically made an endless list of stupid, increasingly restrictive and highly irritating moves for years now.

 

Thanks @Flike for the praise! You've really nailed the Reason problem.

 

Totally agree with you.

 

Reason had a website allihoopa.com i think it was spelled, loads of users were posting their songs on it and other people could remix them, had a social element where people could like and comment on songs, it was really good. when they shut that down it was another nail in the coffin for reason - it was a one-click upload to the site, one click open a song in reason - so many people were using it.

They made a series of stupid decisions, and continue to make them.

 

Like closing down their own user forum for no obvious reason. Tons of information in there. Thousands of Reason project files gone.

 

Usually, when a company no longer generates enough profit, the classic red pen is wielded, and, for example, a user forum is shut down or a different payment model is introduced, in the hope of saving costs and attracting new customers.

If the balance sheet remains negative and demand for their product dwindles, they go bankrupt or are acquired.

Perhaps the new investor (the financier and savior) is interested in Reason Studios' know-how and customer data; however, it's also possible the investor makes a bad investment, in which case the money is gone!

 

If a company has to shut down their own user forum to save money, they are already beyond salvaging the company. The bandwidth and storage space are so little in additional costs beyond operating any website at all. Manufacturer and developer forums are never what anyone would call "high traffic". Shutting down a forum never is a good signal to any potential new customers. It's one less avenue for tech support for the thing they are buying, but it is also about as bad as putting a For Sale Sign on their index.html.

 

SONAR by Cakewalk by Roland and Gibson by Twenty Tone Systems
Cakewalk by Bandlab.. Cakewalk is the name of previous developer or now it is DAW?

Reason by Reason Studios by Propellerheads by LANDR

Sound forge by Sonic Foundry by Sony by Magix by Borisfx

Brainworx by plugin alliance by native instruments

Fuck what happens

 

Last edited: Jan 8, 2026 at 12:47 PM

Cakewalk was formerly known as Twelve Tone Systems, Inc., and was founded in 1987. Eventually, other DAWs emerged, creating competitors and shrinking the market. In 2013, they were acquired by companies like Roland and Gibson, and by 2018, the company was closing down.

Cakewalk Project 5 v2 - Virtual Studio [Windows] - DAW Software
www.soundonsound.com/reviews/cakewalk-project-5-v2

Cakewalk by Roland - Sonar V-Studio 100 (Portable)

 

I think you underestimate AI, considering there are many different technologies being developed, including different forms of hardware like hybrids between lab grown brains and digital computers, not only stuff similar to tech behind LLMs and we talk about theoretical future, so limitation would be different. But we will see, who knows...

 

I gave you the graph of interest from 2004 to today in the same post. If it is not enough proof, check the infamous Russian tracker where you can see the most popular DAW downloads and seeds/peers, I think atm FL's most popular version has double the amount of people than next daw Ableton Live in the most popular uploads. Like I said, FL has gigantic user base of hobbyists

 

I own Reason 13, but I gonna need VR and R2R's help here because I want to keep using it as it is, without worrying the online activation of licenses will survive the v14 or watever major transition is coming. Reason has a (seeminly) complex authorization system between the DAW itself, the rack devices, and rack extentions. I worry of how LANDR is going to spin that into their expanded susbcription services.