I thought i'd write this question on the official forum, but they would probably delete it.

My question:

Why do you think the Ableton Live copy protection is so weak?

Ableton Live new versions are usually online on the warez sites on the same day as on the official sites. In the case of the latest update 9.6.1, it has been available on a specific site since 7.04 although still not available on the official sites.

Couple of possibilites:
1. It is the best copy protection they know inhouse? Good protection too complicated or expensive? Obviously 3rd party protection like iLok and Codemeter are expensive and cumbersome, but some companies have good inhouse copy protection aswell (u-he... there was supposed to be a list, but i actually don't know any)
2. Business model? Although somewhat "shady" or "counterintuitive", it might be part of the business model? For example. I used to be an Ableton "torrent" user couple of years until i bought a license on a good deal. So, Ableton probably knows that there are tons of warez users, but does not do anything, because it increases their userbase. However, it cannot confess this publicly, since the paying customers would no be cool with it.

Reason used to be the "go to" DAW for a good simple warez experience, until they changed to codemeter. Now Ableton has 500k likes on FB, where Propellerhead has 85k. Coincidence?

Discuss.

 

i believe its the second

you lure people in to learn how to make music using your software, they're more apt to stick with it in the long run. Sure it might seem like youre losing money but really in the grand scheme of things you are the winner.

i was big on propellerhead reason, until after they killed it at 6. i just lost interest. went to warez ableton until i finally bought it last year.

 

Yes I also agree with the second.

Take a look at Windows if you want a good example of this. Also take a look at Cubase of which I used from the early days (Atari ST!). I then went on using it all the way through it's PC versions. All the way up to v5 (I think). Then came along the 'uncrackable' protection.

So what happened? Live became a lot more appealing to me. Although I resisted at first, because learning a whole new system can very daunting. But anyway, the more I learned about the Ableton 'way' the more I saw just how dynamic the whole system was. It also seemed as there was a lot of people using it, lots of tutorials and it then seems to 'become the thing that people use'. Ubiquity.

Whereas Cubase become more for the die-hard elite! There are less tutorials and general interest and support. It kind of dies.

Once Ableton has such a reputation, of course they are going to sell more. Some times there is no such thing as bad publicity.

P.S. And Reason is a classic example of a closed down system where you can't exchange between Reasons proprietary format. This lock down method is doomed. (let's just ignore Apple for a moment though!)

 

Last edited: Apr 12, 2016

Many software companies prefer you use a pirated version of their software than a legal copy of a competing company.
They bet on you becoming a legal client sometime in the future,because you know their product already.
Of course they won't admit to this...

 

I remember Ableton had this timebomb thing for pirated versions, it may make your projects unreadable, and buying it would fix the issue.

Also,

http://www.highsnobiety.com/2014/10/14/ableton-ceo-gerhard-behles-interview/

 

Look at FL Studio too. All it takes to crack it is a .reg file.
And as a demonstration of your second point look at how many youtube videos/tutorials (made by people who doubtfully have a legit version) are out there for both softwares. It's all publicity for both Ableton and Image Line. Many people who eventually become "pros" could probably buy that software because they are either lazy to switch to something different or they just want to support the company after their software helped these producers or any media creator.

 

Newbie story

Used pirated Ableton
Make crap music, learned the software (not 100%)
Purchased Ableton Suite
Purchased few Midi controllers that work for Ableton
Looking to buy Push 2 soon
I recommend Ableton to my friends

So, I pirated first but on the long term, I gave them my money

Did I forgot to tell you I make crap music?

 

Same here. Used craced Ableton for half year, now I have legal copy and all other copy of live will be Legal. Ableton is such a good DAW but is little out of date now

 

Started with free Samplitude.
Bought an EMU 102 audio interface from Ebay which came with Cubase 4, Sonar, and Live 8. It costed me 225 Euro as I remember.
Once I had Live 8 standard, I tried the trial version of Suite. Ableton told me that if I was working on a project there was no problem with extending the trial period, so I used it quite a while for free. They anticipated that I would go for it anyway.

Clever marketing I would say.

According to AskAudio they are quite popular nowadays:

https://ask.audio/articles/the-top-11-most-popular-daws-you-voted-for

 

Photoshop provided the blueprint, although greed and/or a lack of innovation will kill every software product eventually. There are companies such as Oracle who have managed to stay on top, but they are the exception rather than the rule.

 

Last edited: Apr 12, 2016

Maybe they sell a lot of the push 2 units.

 

I think it's #2. I first tried a warez version FL 8 back on my Mac via Boot camp back in the day. Kind of liked it but I was a Logic user at the time just wanted to test it out. Then I had built a Gaming PC. FL 10 was out at the time. So I got a warez version of it. Messed around with it and started to put some effort into learning the work flow. Once I learned the workflow I bought the signature version of FL 10.

 

Unlike many developers will claim,
Piracy DOES increase sales. Basically, these big companies get free advertising, free beta testers.

Let's say, a 18yo guy is studying the piano, and decides he wants to record and compose some tracks.
If daddy is rich, they will go to a store, ask for some info, and the sales man will kindly ask him to buy the hardware and software where they can make a better profit.

If he is broken, like most of us, he will search on Google for the best daw, and next search, he will add 'free'.
Chances are he will find some links to a 'free' version.

That guy will use, say, ableton, during 3 months. And 6. And 12. 2 years later, he still uses ableton. He knows everything about the app, all the features, and is used to its work flow. 3 years later, he grabs the cash he got, at Christmas, adds a few bucks, and buys Ableton live full version.

There we have. The guy was using a '3 years-trial' version, but ended up giving his money to ableton.

That guy , during 3 years, was a potential future Cubase, reason, protools or studio one, customer. But none managed to 'capture' his money.

during 3 years, that guy has found some important bugs, and he has provided some help, to 400 or 500 forums users. For free.
Also, during those 3 years, 6 room mates, 8 students, 3 teachers and a bunch of friends, became aware of ableton live, and how cool it was.
Free advertising.

When a guy is using a cracked daw, the developer has a big advantage over ALL the other companies : they already have a foot in that guy's house. In theory, they have 100% more chances to selling him a full license, than all the other companies.

Also, when an app or daw gets cracked and released, something important happens : now that the guy was able to, say, find and use Ableton live, there are very few chances for that guy to become interested by X DAW from X company . As his 1st daw, that guy simply picked the daw that was the most easy to grab and use. In our case, Ableton Live. Once he has found it, he no longer cares about Cubase or bigwig (OK, there are people who need and use several daws). He found Live, he sticks with Live, fck the other daws.

Of course, Ableton are much clever than, say, steinberg. When steinberg only breathes and lives for their elicenser thing, because they don't want people to use Warez, and eventually, make them lose 2 or 3 euros (strict this, strict that, if during their yearly inventory, they must have 12'500'000 euros, and after all the calculations, they only have 12'499'999 euros, the culprit risks his life), other companies were much more smarter, learned how to deal with Internet (its bad and good things), and adapted to the 2005 - 2016+ crazy Internet, where everybody can win.

A few years ago, all the tutorials on YouTube were made with logic, live, reason, etc. Only when Cubase sx3 and v5 got cracked, more people started to use it. I'm sure many Cubase 6 sales were convertions from sx3 and Cubase 5 users, who ended up enjoying what the daw had to give, and finally bought a legit version.


Why doesn't ableton update their copy protection system? Because the current situation perfectly fits their business, like explained above.
it's a win win situation. It clearly is. And other companies do the same.

it's just a matter of a 1.x version, for some daws to have 99% of Cubase features. And the day that happens, while thinking of Cubase, words like greed, arrogance, neglecting users, lazy, stubborn and DEAF, will pop up inside my brain, and it will be a huge pleasure, to stop using cubase, and welcome another company, that will be at least 100 times more user/customer friendly.

Bitwig 2, studio one pro 4, ableton live 10 and logic XI, releases, until December 2016, will make steinberg lose 20 - 30 % of the Cubase users.

After Yamaha, who will save steinberg? Apple? Or could Google buy it, to also have a full catalog of desktop and mobile apps, like apple?

Or nobody will save steinberg, who will then sell wavelab 10 pro, for 19 euros?

 

It's the most powerful type of marketing there is. In fact, it's the newest and smartest. This method can only work when a product or service is so confident in it's ability, that even though it can be acquired for free; people will still buy it after using it. The same goes for music [to a degree]. When you put out a record for free, with the option to BUY [bandcamp] more often than not you'll get a lot of buyers given that the track is quality. People can respect that the time we live in is very polarized; poor / rich. The middle area is very small. When someone offers their hard work for free / or cheap, you suddenly gain an even higher appreciation. It's beautiful