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Note, this would not be the first open source music app to lock downloads behind paywall, e.g. Ardour is known for it: https://community.ardour.org/download htt

by thih9 3y ago

Note, this would not be the first open source music app to lock downloads behind paywall, e.g. Ardour is known for it: https://community.ardour.org/download https://community.ardour.org/download

FireInsight 3y ago
Didn't even know that, always installed Ardour through repos, so got the full version as an unofficial build.
- em3rgent0rdr 3y ago
  the parent user thih9 is incorrect. See Paul Davis's and my comment.
  - thih9 3y ago
    I have checked and I think my comment is correct. E.g. to me this is a paywall: https://community.ardour.org/download?architecture=x86_64&type=compiled&platform=mac&paymentSelection=options https://community.ardour.org/download?architecture=x86_64&ty...
jchw 3y ago
I believe it was the sheet music that was paywalled, not the software. That was a bit concerning since as far as I know a large portion of it was UGC and some of it even public domain, so it was weird to ask for a subscription payment for it. At this point though, it does look like they have made some amends, though I'm not sure if everyone's satisfied. Doesn't seem to matter too much in the grand scheme of things, overall, though it was an unfortunate situation to watch unfold even as an outsider.
- tgv 3y ago
  What amends? They still want me to pay for downloading a plain Bach score.
Tantacrul 3y ago
MuseScore desktop (the composition / notation app) has never been behind a paywall. This is a mixup with the mobile application which is a sheet music viewer that features copyrighted scores. The products are completely separate
PaulDavisThe1st 3y ago
Ardour is not paywalled. You can get it without charge from just about any and every Linux distribution. You can get the source code without charge from ardour.org/download (or from our mirror repo on github). You can get it (legally) without charge from anybody else who already has it. The only thing you cannot do is to get a ready-to-run binary without charge from ardour.org itself. You can opt to pay as little as US$1 for that, however.
- jancsika 3y ago
  So if Linux users actually pay you a dollar (or greater) for the download, what do they get? Is it an app image? Edit: added "(or greater)" :)
  - em3rgent0rdr 3y ago
    You get a 70 MB "Ardour*.run" file that is a bash script that contains setup instructions followed by raw binary code. And you good the feeling of knowing that you've supporting a great open source project. Also note that only a few linux distros are bleeding-edge (such as Arch-Linux, which will contain binaries for newly released package versions pretty quickly). But if you are on a non-bleeding edge linux distro, your distro's repos aren't kept up-to-date and so the advantage of the Ardour binary download is you get an up-to-date package without having to install a 3rd-party repo or build it yourself.
    - PaulDavisThe1st 3y ago
      Yep, our packages install in parallel with each other (and with repo versions too), so you can keep older versions around. And we aim to release every 2 months. People who pay monthly also get access to nightly builds, allowing them to test things out before release (useful for us, sometimes useful for them). Most of our alpha/beta testers, however, build it themselves, from source.
- thih9 3y ago
  > Ardour is not paywalled. As I’ve said, its downloads are. E.g. here: https://community.ardour.org/download?architecture=x86_64&type=compiled&platform=mac&paymentSelection=options https://community.ardour.org/download?architecture=x86_64&ty... > The only thing you cannot do is to get a ready-to-run binary without charge from ardour.org itself. This is what I’m referring to as a paywall. For a casual Windows user, source code or Linux repositories are unhelpful, as the website itself states. > You can opt to pay as little as US$1 for that, however. A low paywall is still a paywall.
em3rgent0rdr 3y ago
Note: Linux distros still provide free downloads for Ardour, and Ardour's source code is free for anyone to build. Ardour's official binary builds are what is behind a paywall. Also the "locking downloads behind a paywall" only applies to scores that users have uploaded to musical score social media sharing site musescore.com, but the desktop program MuseScore binaries are available for free on Win, Mac, Linux, BSDs via https://musescore.org/en/download https://musescore.org/en/download. You can anyway post your scores anywhere for free. And there may be proprietary VSTs that you can pay to download via MuseHub, but MuseScore's baseline audio synthesis (as well as any free soundfonts you can freely download) are free.

by thih9 3y ago

Note, this would not be the first open source music app to lock downloads behind paywall, e.g. Ardour is known for it: https://community.ardour.org/download https://community.ardour.org/download

FireInsight 3y ago

Didn't even know that, always installed Ardour through repos, so got the full version as an unofficial build.

em3rgent0rdr 3y ago
the parent user thih9 is incorrect. See Paul Davis's and my comment.
- thih9 3y ago
  I have checked and I think my comment is correct. E.g. to me this is a paywall: https://community.ardour.org/download?architecture=x86_64&type=compiled&platform=mac&paymentSelection=options https://community.ardour.org/download?architecture=x86_64&ty...

jchw 3y ago

I believe it was the sheet music that was paywalled, not the software. That was a bit concerning since as far as I know a large portion of it was UGC and some of it even public domain, so it was weird to ask for a subscription payment for it. At this point though, it does look like they have made some amends, though I'm not sure if everyone's satisfied. Doesn't seem to matter too much in the grand scheme of things, overall, though it was an unfortunate situation to watch unfold even as an outsider.

tgv 3y ago
What amends? They still want me to pay for downloading a plain Bach score.

Tantacrul 3y ago

MuseScore desktop (the composition / notation app) has never been behind a paywall. This is a mixup with the mobile application which is a sheet music viewer that features copyrighted scores. The products are completely separate

PaulDavisThe1st 3y ago

Ardour is not paywalled. You can get it without charge from just about any and every Linux distribution. You can get the source code without charge from ardour.org/download (or from our mirror repo on github). You can get it (legally) without charge from anybody else who already has it. The only thing you cannot do is to get a ready-to-run binary without charge from ardour.org itself. You can opt to pay as little as US$1 for that, however.

jancsika 3y ago
So if Linux users actually pay you a dollar (or greater) for the download, what do they get? Is it an app image? Edit: added "(or greater)" :)
- em3rgent0rdr 3y ago
  You get a 70 MB "Ardour*.run" file that is a bash script that contains setup instructions followed by raw binary code. And you good the feeling of knowing that you've supporting a great open source project. Also note that only a few linux distros are bleeding-edge (such as Arch-Linux, which will contain binaries for newly released package versions pretty quickly). But if you are on a non-bleeding edge linux distro, your distro's repos aren't kept up-to-date and so the advantage of the Ardour binary download is you get an up-to-date package without having to install a 3rd-party repo or build it yourself.
  - PaulDavisThe1st 3y ago
    Yep, our packages install in parallel with each other (and with repo versions too), so you can keep older versions around. And we aim to release every 2 months. People who pay monthly also get access to nightly builds, allowing them to test things out before release (useful for us, sometimes useful for them). Most of our alpha/beta testers, however, build it themselves, from source.
thih9 3y ago
> Ardour is not paywalled. As I’ve said, its downloads are. E.g. here: https://community.ardour.org/download?architecture=x86_64&type=compiled&platform=mac&paymentSelection=options https://community.ardour.org/download?architecture=x86_64&ty... > The only thing you cannot do is to get a ready-to-run binary without charge from ardour.org itself. This is what I’m referring to as a paywall. For a casual Windows user, source code or Linux repositories are unhelpful, as the website itself states. > You can opt to pay as little as US$1 for that, however. A low paywall is still a paywall.

em3rgent0rdr 3y ago

Note: Linux distros still provide free downloads for Ardour, and Ardour's source code is free for anyone to build. Ardour's official binary builds are what is behind a paywall. Also the "locking downloads behind a paywall" only applies to scores that users have uploaded to musical score social media sharing site musescore.com, but the desktop program MuseScore binaries are available for free on Win, Mac, Linux, BSDs via https://musescore.org/en/download https://musescore.org/en/download. You can anyway post your scores anywhere for free. And there may be proprietary VSTs that you can pay to download via MuseHub, but MuseScore's baseline audio synthesis (as well as any free soundfonts you can freely download) are free.