Re: commercial templates bad for the community?
Posted: 07 Mar 2013 02:17
That is a bit of a slippery slope you have presented; no one is speaking in such absolutes, I think you may be mis-interpreting what some of us are saying (perhaps a bit of a language barrier). I don't believe any of us mean to imply (I certainly do not) that the user library is garbage, it is not. I in particular was saying that it is generally a resource of smaller bits that, with a bit of work, can come together into a larger all encompassing project. I also did not mean to imply that there are not any all encompassing projects out there Lpad, and the Traktor 26 control are but two of more examples. I was saying that the Lemur platform will certainly benefit form having more of these fully fledged projects around, paid or unpaid. Projects with extra attention to ergonomics, aesthetics, overall user interface and programming really show the muscle and reach that Lemur has to offer, especially to people who are not interested in, or are perhaps intimidated by programming. Think of it this way, more people who see a reason to buy the app means more revenue for for the developers to update the language and product with, which should hopefully equate to a better environment for us to develop in.Softcore wrote: There is some fault of logic in some of the arguments which I cant help but notice....
Somehow along the conversation the notion that "Lemur library needs quality stuff so you shouldnt complain for paid templates" has crippled in, implying of course that:
1. the only way for a person to create a quality template is to be paid
2. the only way for a person contemplating to buy Lemur is by finding a paid template - the free ones cant accomplish that
These above notions are presented as facts, which they are not!
I need to find ONLY one quality free template to prove 1. wrong and I need to find ONLY 1 guy who came to Lemur out of a free template to prove 2. wrong
Quite frankly, many people I've spoken with are not at all familiar, or are only vaguely familiar with Lemur as an iPad app. Not much discussion has gone into the fact that each bit of marketing materials made for any of the paid templates is basically a free plug for Lemur. The sexier that you tube video looks, the sexier lemur looks, and to be quiet honest, the best looking marketing materials I've seen for the platfrom come from A): Liine, B): commercial template demos.
What I think needs to happen, is for more people to see that Lemur can take full control of Ableton, or Serato, or Modul8 or any midi/OSC capable software, and know that if they want to do that, they don't necessarily have to learn how to code the templates. Maybe they get it for free, or maybe they have to spring $10 - $15 to get something with lifetime updates and skip out on having to devote tens if not hundreds of hours into building it themselves.
Correct, I don't think anyone is postulating that paying for something automatically grants you quality. It should however provide you with an expectation of the quality, and a guarantee on behalf of the seller to match that expectation they have provided.Creating a template and selling it is a choice - its not a one-way ticket to quality.
I disagree, try to look at it the way IBM handles Red Hat. They sell commercial distributions of it, but also aid greatly in the development of the source which also finds its way into free versions. Symbiotic relationships between open source and for pay software can, do, and will exist.I do still think that paid templates play an important role of the general unwillingness of people to help others in the forums.