Some companies deserve to go bust; Cakewalk

[I'd Rather Play]

Hi there,

I was about to buy Cakewalk's Dimension Pro and Rapture when I discovered they are not (yet) compatible with Lion (despite it being a year old). I decided to contact the manufacturer to check if there were any last minute updates, but;

As a potential customer you can't contact Cakewalk (US) via their site email without an order or product serial number.
You can't email Roland (UK distributor) without creating a Roland customer account and giving them loads of personal info for their marketing.

Any fool knows that in business when a potential customer has an enquiry everything stops till that customer is satisfied (and hopefully makes a purchase).

They deserve all they get.

[Dave B]

Roland aren't just their distributor, they are Cakewalk's owner iirc. I don't see them going bust quite yet...

[I'd Rather Play]

Roland; take a look at their latest annual report, all gloom and doom.

So on one side we have Roland, where the only way you can even ask them a question about a piece of their equipment you want to buy is to submit to a disclosure of personal data.

Or software company, like say u-he, who say "Interested in our product, yea sure, try it for as long as you like, then buy it if you like it."

You tell me who's the dinosaur.

[_ Six _]

Why would you buy Cakewalk when you have Logic and Pro Tools available?

Have you been sniffing glue?

[C.LYDE]

Hi there,

Any fool knows that in business when a potential customer has an enquiry everything stops till that customer is satisfied (and hopefully makes a purchase).

You've answered your own statement/question - how does Roland/Cakewalk know that you ARE a potential customer if you're not willing to disclose any info?
Keeping in mind that their prime target were MS users for many, many years no-one is going to loose sleep over the odd 'possible' MAC user - so unless you're part of a 1000; IMHO don't hold your breath...

[keeno]

...I decided to contact the manufacturer to check if there were any last minute updates

Another person who clearly doesn't understand how retailing works. CONTACT A DEALER, NOT THE MANUFACTURER!

You wouldn't call Samsung to ask about the spec of their new TV would you, you'd go into a TV shop! If Roland UK handled every pre-sales enquiry for all of their products, they'd need to employ a vast number of extra staff, and Roland UK wouldn't exist anymore.

Retailers are there to handle pre-sales. In the same way as if you have a warranty issue, you contact the shop you bought it from. You're only upset due to unrealistic expectations of a company.

[I'd Rather Play]

Six; despite using Pro Tools and Logic I need Cakewalk DimPro and Rapture because a client (THAT'S A CUSTOMER) has requested it. By offering the service my customers want means my recreational drugs budget stretches a little further than glue, so I'll pass on your offer thanks.

As for having an unrealistic expectation about a company, Keeno you seem to be a little confused. Are you seriously suggesting that it's good practise for Roland and Cakewalk to retail products via their websites without providing a direct enquiry service?

[Billum]

Hmm, not exactly going bust, but the founder and president of Cakewalk, Greg Hendeshott, resigned last week - so a head has rolled:

http://www.cakewalk.com/Press/release.aspx/Michael-Hoover-named-new-President-of-Cakewalk

[OneWorld]

Hi there,

I was about to buy Cakewalk's Dimension Pro and Rapture when I discovered they are not (yet) compatible with Lion (despite it being a year old). I decided to contact the manufacturer to check if there were any last minute updates, but;

As a potential customer you can't contact Cakewalk (US) via their site email without an order or product serial number.
You can't email Roland (UK distributor) without creating a Roland customer account and giving them loads of personal info for their marketing.

Any fool knows that in business when a potential customer has an enquiry everything stops till that customer is satisfied (and hopefully makes a purchase).

They deserve all they get.

I started a post on here on a similar topic. I will studiously avoid buying any more Cakewalk products. The products in themselves are good, but the customer support is woeful.

I built up a new DAW and went to get updates etc, to be told my email wasn;t registered, even though I had received an email saying my email wasn't registered!

Cut a log story short, they set me up with a new account - hooray - not!

When I log on to my new account it still doesn't show all the products I registered. I have emailed tghem several times over the past 2 weeks and no reply. I can't think of one good reason to continue to buy their products when my mate goes on Pirate Bay etc and gets none of the grief and everything free, I thought doing the right thing and buying software gave the purchaser that edge - support, am not fully convinced of that sometimes.

[blue manga]

Why would you buy Cakewalk when you have Logic and Pro Tools available?

Have you been sniffing glue?

[Dave B]

I can't think of one good reason to continue to buy their products when my mate goes on Pirate Bay etc and gets none of the grief and everything free, I thought doing the right thing and buying software gave the purchaser that edge - support, am not fully convinced of that sometimes.

There's a big difference between refusing to have anything to do with a company and stealing their software. It's called the law...

[OneWorld]

I can't think of one good reason to continue to buy their products when my mate goes on Pirate Bay etc and gets none of the grief and everything free, I thought doing the right thing and buying software gave the purchaser that edge - support, am not fully convinced of that sometimes.

There's a big difference between refusing to have anything to do with a company and stealing their software. It's called the law...

Yes and there's another law which states that when a purchase is made then said item must be fit for purpose, and as advertised, so it cuts both ways. You give me one good reason why a person should shell out not inconsiderable amounts of money in good faith and then be left short changed? Why should it be that manufacturers can run about with gay abandon when it comes to after sales service/support. In one case I bought some software costing £70, (ANd I spent a lot more than that with Cakewalk, whose support is found wanting) with the software being advertised as getting lifetime upgrades, shortly after that, even though the website is there and apparently taking orders, is not responding to support queries, even though it was only a query about why a promised upgrade has not been made available.

It isn't just software either as anyone knows who bought into the MLAN concept, being told in the literature that the format is, and I quote from sales literature "MLAN is future proof" well we all know what happened to MLAN. Yamaha left the purchasers of said equipment completely abandoned with some equipment that is now rendered useless.

It isn't only purchasers that should be morally and legally bound. Why should it just apply to buyers and not sellers? Heard of the Barclay's Bank debacle by the way? A customer makes a fraudulent declaration on a mortgage application and that's taking pecuniary advantage, the customer would expect a prompt visit at 6am from the enforcement team whose have one of those universal door keys that knocks the door off the hinges. The organisation itself has been found to have been fiddling the rates and that was OK.

Point being what's good for the goose is good for the gander, it's about time we, the consumer were able to enforce our rights. When we buy software/hardware we buy it because we want the support and are informed by the literature when making that purchase, not just fed a load of what makes the grass grow tall in Texas, with the sellers/suppliers etc just basically saying "we've had your money, adios muggins"

I suggest you turn your sanctimonious comments to the sellers as well. I don't need to be told about the differences between bought and copied software having spent more than I care to think about on the former - I sometimes get to thinking the software sellers must often quote and laugh at that famous quote made by some rich businessman "No one ever went broke underestimating the gullibility of the general public"

[I'd Rather Play]

I would agree that customer support, when required, tends to be absolutely vital to making the s/w purchased work
properly, if at all.

On that note let be big up GForce.

Last night(Sat/Sun) I bought Virtual String Machine, only to find it didn't work under AU on Lion! I mailed GForce (based in the UK) at 3.30 am. By 8.47am they had replied with the solution!

OK you could argue it should have worked with Lion in the first place, but that is outstanding Customer support.

[Dave B]

Hmmmnn ... what part of 'the difference between avoiding a company and stealing it's goods' seems to escape you?

Here's a nice simple analogy:

I go into Tescos. I buy a tin of baked beans. I decide I want to talk to customer services about my new tin of beans. There is nobody at the desk. I wait for 30secs. Nobody shows up. So I go back in and steal a load more stuff because 'it's about time someone stuck it to them'.

I'm guessing that at the resulting court appearance, my awe-inspiring legal defence won't wash ...

We have tools now to make our distaste known. We have the ability to consume those opinions. Never have we had so much information before making a choice.

And yet you still think that theft is a viable option?

Very sad.

If a company has bad service, let it go to the wall. It's not rocket science.

[blue manga]

Anyway .. agreed ..
Being dis satisfied with customer service, is no legal or moral justification to start stealing.
A total nonsense .. and a bit of a sort of 2006 suggestion really ..

[OneWorld]

Hmmmnn ... what part of 'the difference between avoiding a company and stealing it's goods' seems to escape you?

Here's a nice simple analogy:

I go into Tescos. I buy a tin of baked beans. I decide I want to talk to customer services about my new tin of beans. There is nobody at the desk. I wait for 30secs. Nobody shows up. So I go back in and steal a load more stuff because 'it's about time someone stuck it to them'.

I'm guessing that at the resulting court appearance, my awe-inspiring legal defence won't wash ...

We have tools now to make our distaste known. We have the ability to consume those opinions. Never have we had so much information before making a choice.

And yet you still think that theft is a viable option?

Very sad.

If a company has bad service, let it go to the wall. It's not rocket science.

So let me get this right. A customer who has bought something in good faith is wrong, but a company that does not fulfill their end of the contract can just stick 2 fingers up to the customer? What is the difference apart from semantics? If a paying customer is short changed, then that's OK is it? I don't think so, we have been shafted left right and centre and it is about time the software, and to some extent hardware sellers were bound by their promises. How many people would have gone out and bough into MLAN for example if Yamaha had been truthfull and said "This is future proof, except we can define future, and when it suits us, the future stops arbitrarily, at our whim" and you're trying to justify that. Many companies are running rough shod over consumer lawso yo give me one good reason why a pirate is illegal and a software company isn't they both pee in the same pot as far as I am concerned, one doesn't give a hoot for the seller and the seller doesn't give a hoot for the buyer.

If you go into Tescon and buy 500 grammes of beans, that's what you get 500 and not a gramme less, if they sell anything less than that, they have stolen from you, just the same as if I had paid anythign less than the marked price. Why doesn't that apply to software manufacturers? Fancy lawyers might lucratively argue ad infinitum over the semantics, but if it walks like a duck you can work out the rest of it.

But if Tescons sold one milligramme short of the beans I bought, I could take the tin back and get my money back or equivalent - how far woudl I get if I wrote to Cakewalk, Tascam, ECS, Yamaha and the rest of it and said I want my money back - they'd say I must want my bumps read.

Since the beginning of time, the powers that be have imposed sanctions on the great unwashed, and in some cases, even though against the law, some people have got to the stage where they totally utterly and completely miffed, with whatever law. It was against the law for women to vote - but now they can. They try and enforce anti-piracy laws, how far are they getting with that? No-where. Everytime I buy software I wince, and pray to the gods of software, that the software and support will be as advertised, and sometimes it isn't and so I am begining to sympathise with the piratees, because while I beg for updates promised, those that have downloaded cracks are laughing at me for trying to do the right thing, for what reason?

Only today I came across Kontakt 5 for £20, when I have just last week shelled out £100's, when after my recent experience with Cakewalk I question my wisdom as i am not getting what I paid for, but yes, that's ok isn't it as I am an honest consumer mug, but am beginning to look those friends of mine who bought cracks and feel such a dunderhead when i say I bought the software and can't log onto my account lewt alone download the updates!!!!!!

Now who's the tea-leaf, me or Cakewalk?

[Blott]

I agree with you about the support, but not the piracy.
It is terrible with software that vendors can sell a product not fit for purpose and yet you have no option but to grin and bear it.
Sometimes via updates it becomes fit for purpose, but other times it simply does not and you have absolutely no redress for the situation which is shameful IMO.
So I think much of what you say is valid - it doesn't excuse theft, but then if a vendor sells you something that doesn't work as it is supposed to, that's theft too isn't it?

[johnny h]

Its all very well to get incredibly pious and self righteous about piracy, but the fact is it not only exists, it is rampant. That's not to say its morally acceptable.

But, if a company treats you with total disrespect, do you morally owe them anything? I would argue no. In fact, just accepting being treated like that actually reflects badly on your strength of character. The law is there to enforce behaviour which suits the ruling class. Whether you choose to accept it, fight it or selectively ignore it is completely up to you.

[MadManDan]

Its all very well to get incredibly pious and self righteous about piracy, but the fact is it not only exists, it is rampant. That's not to say its morally acceptable.

But, if a company treats you with total disrespect, do you morally owe them anything? I would argue no. In fact, just accepting being treated like that actually reflects badly on your strength of character. The law is there to enforce behaviour which suits the ruling class. Whether you choose to accept it, fight it or selectively ignore it is completely up to you.

Again, there is no equation between dissatisfaction of a poor product and stealing it. In fact it begs the question, why WOULD you steal something you don't see fit to own? A product that by your own reckoning is out of date and not supported? Makes no sense. What are you waiting til it runs on Lion before you steal it?

At the risk of being cliched, two wrongs really Don't make a right, and I don't think you can easily convince most of us here that they do.

[johnny h]

Its all very well to get incredibly pious and self righteous about piracy, but the fact is it not only exists, it is rampant. That's not to say its morally acceptable.

But, if a company treats you with total disrespect, do you morally owe them anything? I would argue no. In fact, just accepting being treated like that actually reflects badly on your strength of character. The law is there to enforce behaviour which suits the ruling class. Whether you choose to accept it, fight it or selectively ignore it is completely up to you.

Again, there is no equation between dissatisfaction of a poor product and stealing it. In fact it begs the question, why WOULD you steal something you don't see fit to own? A product that by your own reckoning is out of date and not supported? Makes no sense. What are you waiting til it runs on Lion before you steal it?

At the risk of being cliched, two wrongs really Don't make a right, and I don't think you can easily convince most of us here that they do.

I think you are getting your wires crossed here. I am not the original poster, and I would never use cakewalk for anything.

[MadManDan]

My bad Johnny. Navigating the web on my phone is such a pita. I get stuff mixed up

[I'd Rather Play]

Having started this thread I find another company who refuses to talk to their customers and potential customers.

I had a query about an Acoustic Samples Wurlitzer Keyboard software.
The company invite inquiries about their products .. . . THEN DON'T REPLY!!!!!!!!

OK I can understand a short sighted, selfish company, ignoring their existing customers.....They already have your money!

But to ignore a new customer....DOH!

WHAT IS WRONG WITH THESE PEOPLE?