With you on this, Dan! In an increasingly devalued industry, it’s absolutely fair and right that good work has the opportunity for highlight and reward. 👍🏻
I am so incredibly grateful that you made this video! I was thinking exactly the same when I was reading the comments yesterday. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. You put this in the most concise and non-confrontational way possible. Huge amounts of respect for this, Dan.
I admit I was a tiny bit wary when the first paid instrument went up, but after some thought it seemed obvious that its a good thing. So much effort goes into these instruments and people like Jon and yourself have given us so much in the past.
I think it’s possible to totally accept and support the concept of Pianobook artists while retaining a level of melancholy toward the fact that nothing in the world ever stays the same. I loved it when it was just 100 libraries from people just doing it for the love of it. I still love it now but in a different way. As David Byrne sang: “Things have an end but feelings are infinite. We’re changing but it’s alright ‘Cause only things are finite”.
I am a consumer of the libraries you guys make. And I believe we should be thankful for all the efforts you guys make to come up with great libraries. No one should be against any of you guys getting paid for what you make. You deserve it and again we should be thankful for the huge library of free instruments.
Hi Dan, thanks for this video as it went a long way for me to giving a detailed back drop as to the intention behind Pianobook Artists. The emotion even in your, as ever well-balanced videos was clearly heart felt so nice to see! The analogy of the post gig T shirt really illustrated where ‘’Artists’’ is coming from… And don’t forget ‘’you don’t have to buy it’’! I too have had a bit of a knot in my stomach over this move for the last few days and could well have been one of the hasty commentators shooting from the hip. Always better to sleep on these things and so glad I did given the timing of your YT upload today… I totally get it now and it makes total sense! A shout out to you, John all other PB community uppers for the bloody fantastic work and instruments! Never forgetting Christian who has given so much to so many for FREE! Peace & Love Dave.
Very eloquently put, and I fully agree with all your points. I never understood people who get upset about things they are not forced to take up and can choose to do or not!
Sensitively reasoned, delicately said - with some honest to goodness passion. Well done sir. Couldn't have said it better myself- or even half as well!
Music as an art, in all it's forms, is such an under-appreciated thing in today's society. Therefore I think it is fantastic that Pianobook is adding the possibility for artists being paid for their work. Kudos, and thanks for a very thoughtful video, Dan!
Thank you, Dan, for a beautifully articulated response. I am with you 100%, and I think the addition of the Artist segment is a beautiful thing that allows more independent samplist make a bit of a living from their work. Thank you to Christian for the whole idea of Pianobook, to the volunteers for their amazing work keeping it running, to Spitfire for supporting it, to the samplists contributing great instruments, and to you, Dan, for making this video!
Very succinctly put, Dan. There seems to be a prevalent attitude of mean-spiritedness, almost as if the avoidance of paying for something is 'getting one over' on the person who made it. It's ironic when you consider that someone might be happy to blow £50 in the pub, only to see it flowing into the sewers an hour later, but begrudge paying £30 for a sample library that represents many hours of work by its creator, is theirs to use for as long as they wish, and which will inspire music that might possibly earn them money. Money that they themselves would be only too anxious to receive.
I think it is great that Spitfire has created a platform for hobbyists to be able to distribute a commercial product. Opening the gates for all rather than keeping them shut is a healthy thing for the community. For Jon's instrument, I did think the pricing was a little high. Starting with a price from around $19 with a pay more option like Bandcamp would've been ideal.
Hey Dan, really appreciate the insight and I completely agree. If you don’t want the paid content you don’t need to pay for it. Meanwhile they can go download a free CS-80! Which I plan on updating as soon as the features are made available on decent sampler. Cheers
A reminder that we could also potentially find great libraries through the 'search' command if people bothered to even do the bare minimum of reviewing the stuff they are downloading for free. This would actually be a far more effective method of filtering out the most broadly useful/desirable than having them handpicked according to the specific tastes of a small number of individuals.
I am new to SA and Pianobook, and basically anything MIDI, as of just last August. I must be too new to being having any difficulty wanting to pay for sample libraries. Actually, just the opposite. My first library was LABS Foghorn, then, after understanding how the player worked, added a couple more. I almost felt guilty and obligation to make a real purchase. Then I came across videos for Hammers and Aperture: The Stack, and made the determination that these were exactly what I needed, and probably will for a long time. I had pretty much stuck to the SA dedicated player stuff, then got into Decent Sampler stuff and experiencing a different type of player. Now I'm roughly getting used to the free Kontakt Player. Not sure I like it so much. SA dedicated is about right for my simple mind to grasp. Solar Mercury kinda blows my mind, though I love the sounds!!! I saw Jon's video on how he approached the making of Feather Flute and its transition from Pianobook to Spitfire. I bought it because it's awesome, I really like Jon and his channel, I think it's wonderful, and I love supporting these artist creating things we can all use, whether they are free or purchased. I'm hooked either way!
Thank you, Dan for this video. It's quite important for everyone to understand how this community works and how people like Jon came to this point where they are now. For myself personally, pianobook community has been a space where I've built and still am building friendships, professional relationships and knolewdge. This is what matters. I think pianobook artists is a fantastic opportunity for talented and hard working individuals who are ready for that next big step. We should be celebrating 🥳🌈
Agree. If you spend any of your time to create something for others, the creator deserves to be compensated. If it's a penny or a dollar, it helps that person continue to create.
Well said mate! This was a fantastic explanation. Expectations are an important thing to establish and I feel anyone who sees this video will understand that there's a long game transpiring. Things are ever changing and people, unfortunately, will always fear change.
Hey Dan! Love your content so please excuse me for writing a comment wholly unrelated to the video at hand. If I may, could I suggest you make more content along the lines of guides for the aspiring composer? I can only speak for myself, but I look to you to improve my own craft. Since your gear review videos have done exceptionally well, I would suspect a lot of other people are also in my situation. I myself would at least love to see comparisons of sample libraries (ensembles, soloists, jazz, choirs, synths), keyboards, daws, microphones, books, educational pathways etc. so that I can use your recommendations to make a more informed decision. I know that this format can easily become cookie-cutter and stale, but I do suspect a lot of people would value your opinions. Anyways, just my $0.02.
Another great and thoughtful video, Dan! As I posted elsewhere, IMO the initial mistake which got many salty about the whole thing was to start the pricing of the first “Paid” Pianobook library so high @£99! I’m sure Mike’s Guitar library is fantastic, but for a niche library maybe it should have been around the level of £50 maximum. I have no problem with the price of Jon Meyer’s one, and as someone else mentioned here, maybe have a lower minimum price for Artist libraries with an option to pay more like Bandcamp would work? As someone who works for Spitfire, you can obviously see that the company hit a “sweet spot” with the pricing of the Originals line of libraries, and many potential buyers would compare an “actual Spitfire Library” @£29, to whatever price a Pianobook Artist is library is pitched at.
I've been enjoying your brilliant mind and impressive musical skills for ... well, almost the beginning of your channel. So, instead of paraphrasing your already excellent take on this move and the future of Pianobook, allow me to maybe point out two aspects that stand out for me after watching your video: 1. It's all (much) about networking with those who're "leading the pack" or are going to in a manner of speaking (really, it's about networking with all those present in the field). 2. It's also about the ethics of (financially) supporting the artist(s) in all walks of the creative business. I can bet behind both (although at this point I don't get to walk my talk much, very unfortunately; but I know I have when I was able to and will resume so as soon as I'll be in a better position). The one thing, that seems to become apparent for me as a side effect from the transition(s) the music industry or really, the creative industries have seen over the past decades, is that it seems we're all doing it for ourselves first - and supporting each other where we can and when we can, something like that. I think that is more of a plus than a "downer", really. That way, we all can much more count on getting better appreciated by those who matter to us at heart: Other artists. (But non-creatives are sill and always welcome along for the ride ;-) ). Thanks, to you, to Christian Henson, to Spitfire Audio, Pianobook, LABS... and really everyone passionately devoting their skills to this.
I love this explanation. It did occur to me during Christian's video and it continues during yours, that everyone who is being "rewarded" for displaying their "great generosity" and "contributing in a big way" all look like me. I hope there are plans at Pianobook to zoom out from the POV of a very specific type of person who seems to be the focus of the site.
Great video, Dan! It's amazing to me how quickly some have become 'entitled' to something that didn't even exist 5 years ago. It's ironic that they might call a Pianobook artist 'greedy'. The real greed is that person expecting the artist/craftsman to always give them something of value for absolutely nothing. I am hopeful that we as a community will dispel that greed/attitude, be happy for and supportive of the Pianobook artists... and... like you said... buy their wares if you want them, and simply don't buy if you don't want to... without whinging.
How many of these people leaving complaints would actually turn down an opportunity to be financially compensated for their art/hard work? I'll wager 0! Well said, sir!
Buy it. Don’t buy it. Rant about it. Don’t rant about it. Enjoy it. Don’t enjoy it. It’s your choice. It’s not your choice. Nah…it’s DEFINITELY YOUR CHOICE. Nice vid 👍
Well said! I'm all for opportunities and I think it's great that samplists will get more rewards for their hard work. As long as the majority of the content remains free, I don't think there is a problem. It looks like there will be about one premium library each month and probably dozens of new free stuff. I guess some people might be worried that the best samplists will only release premium libraries from now on, but as you said, it's not like the same person is going to be the featured Artist every month. I only thought that it might be cool if these libraries would run in the Spitfire player instead of Kontakt. That way there wouldn't need to be an expensive Kontakt fee and it might be possible to make these libraries even more affordable and even more people might be able to buy them, since a lot of the users on Pianobook seem to be young aspiring composers without a lot of money. Maybe something similar to Spitfire Originals? At least with the guitar it was a pretty big jump from 0 to 99. But I know that it's probably a lot easier for people to work with the Kontakt scripting and I can imagine that it would be quiet difficult to move them over to the Spitfire player. Anyway, I'm fine with the way it is now, it was just a thought. I love Pianobook and I'm excited for the future! Btw I also really like Phoebe Bridgers.
Well quite. And for what it's worth £39 is a snip for a library of the quality of Feathered Flute. However the thing that really amazed me about that video is that you'd never encountered some huckster selling knock-off merch outside a gig before - you'd have to fight your way through them on the way out in my day!
I'm struggling to find any library with over 1000 downloads...therefore the community seems relatively small which makes the decision seems strange to me. Monetizing pianobook goes against what I personally thought it was all about (I was wrong I guess). Sure i totally support donations or pay what you can. But I would've thought there were many other options available if you wanted to commercialize your libraries.
I preferred its original concept , rusty bin lids , and other obscure samples .That was the whole idea of it ,for fun and free . Now it's just another paid for sample site . Although people can still post free samples , now money is introduced , you will gradually see far less free samples .
Good luck with it all. You are much more comfortable with the idea of a transactional and elitist community in which aspiring professionals can seek to prove themselves, and aspiring customers can learn what they want to buy. There is nothing at all wrong with that (given the background conditions of life) and you put it very eloquently. I do agree that this merely brings to the surface the measure of self-interest that is mixed with Christian's genuinely goodhearted gift of Pianobook. It's not something I would have wanted to mention had you not done so, as I am very grateful to Christian for all he has done and continues to do to help aspiring professionals, and even amateurs. This version of Pianobook is not for me; but it is great for those that it is for. It shouldn't be surprising if, when something changes, that there are those who have no use for the new direction; you shouldn't feel bad about it, or feel as if you are being judged. I don't know what being 'salty' means; does it mean being upset, or having different values and expressing them? I looked it up, but you can't trust brief definitions to capture the nuances. I didn't get the impression that you were trying to belittle those with different views as disgruntled losers! I'm merely personally sad that something that looked so wonderful to me is gone; and it has become something that may be wonderful for other people instead, but has no place in my own life unless I want to use it to benefit myself; I am not an aspiring customer or patron of the arts. So, for those for whom these recent changes look to be positive and valuable - in whatever way, not necessarily in any of the ways I've considered here, or that Dan Keen has discussed - I wish you all the very best. There are other places I can share my work with others in a mutually appreciative and non-commercial context.
Thank you for your feedback. It’s interesting for me, not to add fuel to a burning fire. If I may, why does the move to commercialise a very small number of products make the whole site “not for you” anymore? Pianobook is the same in every other regard, and continues to be free despite these few endorsements
@@DanKeenMusic I disagree that everything else remains the same. A community, a project or activity is not a set of discrete modules with no interaction between them. For me, though, it was ratings and tipping that were the big problems. I waited to see how it would develop, and then there was this next step. In your video, you capture many things about what is good about this newly transparent and pervasive transactional and elitist ethos. But for me, Pianobook was never about free libraries, it was about the art and sharing the joy of it. Yes, it was a good place for aspiring professionals; but it wasn't a place in which people became (semi-) professional. Being transactional (just having a tip jar does that) and elitist (the 'best' libraries, rather than cool, fun, intriguing, etc. - I'm not knocking elitism as such, even though it gets used as a negative by some), it is something that only appeals to me in limited respects: self-interested ones. And that's not what I'm looking for. For those who find this no barrier to fun, friendship and who are happy to spend their social time in an an environment where the pinnacle of success is making money off of the community, then this is great. No-one needs to obsess over these things; but some of us find it spoils the whole. I don't know if that helps you understand or not. I'm certainly not trying to persuade you of anything! Just share an explanation of why I and others will end finding somewhere else to share our work and interests.
Absolutely. There are amazing contributors without UA-cam channels. I think it just helps to get noticed at the start, and that influx of attention probably spurred us on to keep contributing
You've defined the reasoning behind monetization well. At first, one may be thinking; Oh no...something so cool, for free, couldn't last in the world of capitalization 🙁 There's always some corporation wanting to cash in on a good thing. However, the reality is; some of these libraries *are* stellar. And, composers will probably use them in work that they are being paid for. And, yes, there are considerable basic website maintenance costs, that someone, somewhere will be covering. $40 for a library that you love, is not too much. If this had come out with a bigger price tag, then I'd see the justification in push back. My only one wish is for there to be a trial version of a library. I've bought quite a few sounds, from other sources, only to find out it does not satisfy my personal taste and needs when I get it into my own environment. Other than that, if the price point stays affordable, this is a fair offering for quality inspirational sounds in our musical world of creativity. Thanks for putting the conscientious time and effort into explaining your view points.
I haven't really kept up to date recently on what is happening in PianoBook. However, based on this video what pops into my head is this. PianoBook now has a ratings system, tipping system and possibly more. Releasing a new "League" for paid libraries absolutely makes sense. My only question is how is someone/contributor recognized for the new Artists "league"? I use the word league as I fall back to Football analogies "Premier League as opposed to Division1". Up till now PianoBook has only had Division1, but some exceptional contributors can be classed in Premier League status and Artisits affords them of that accolade, respect and compensation. Maybe I need to watch Christian's video now...
Agree with your sentiment man! I was just happy for Jon and confused why anyone would be salty ? Come on! It reminds me of what you said in an earlier video... I think it was "We don't have to be in competition with each other... There's enough parts of the cake for all of us!" (I'm paraphrasing).
the thing is... not only Jon was born out of \ with pianobook. Bunker samples also had some love from Christian and yet they are not selling their stuff there, but Jon has his own store. Pianobook became loot audio but with better marketing, which is sad but not suprising. A lot of composers won't get a job and only 1% will, so now we are at square 1, selling our own stuff to other composers. Honestly i am a bit sad :\
I see opportunity for everyone in many different factions at Pianobook: those learning to make their first instrument for Kontakt, those writing demos for libraries, producers lending a hand in sculpting sounds within the community, etc etc. In this world of saturation, I think it only makes sense that everyone diversifies a little, and composers often know exactly what they want out of samples and are well-placed to create them for others to enjoy
@@DanKeenMusic understandable, yet the library, at least now, sells on spitfire audio website, not on Jon's website. Saying that, all reasons why pianobook is not sustainable for Christian to pull off on his own is understandable and we all should diversify a little so why not make it pianobooks bank? sell it so we can support community- no problems. But when something has a price, you have expectations, there is a reason why people buying box factory and write trailer tracks with it and not with free 1 note stretched drums from pianobook (no hate there). Kinda seems "scummy". Christian has a great client base at spitfire, so i don't see any reason why anyone thought that pianobook wouldn't be a success too, especially at the price of 0! Again sorry, that's just my opinion.
@@yurabronsky I think it does make sense to host libraries through Spitfire as they already have the infrastructure to look after files and issue licenses etc, but I can see what you're saying. I think there's definitely a marked difference between Pianobook and Pianobook Artist libraries. I'd hope that any product with a price tag has a feature set and tech support to go with it
People expect creative stuff online to be free - bottom line. It goes back to the days of Napster. No one buys music anymore - sad but true. And now we have creatives bemoaning the fact they have to pay - again sad.
Amen to the 'You don't have to buy anything"! It's the internet some people don't have anything better to do than complain. I do get that the spirit of it has changed a bit. But things change, that small community is sort of a victim of its own sucess. Must just be akin to the "sore losers" of the Spitfire Scoring competition. There is a bit of luck involved in everything we do folks. Enjoy your luck and stop raining on others luck.
It’s not about complaining it’s about awareness….It’s also not about luck ….. it’s about making music from the heart, if your intention is to make money out of it ….. forget it …. when your creativity is standing out your own authenticity is standing out, not a marketing machine
@@remcovanvelzen8680 My luck comment was more aimed at all the sore losers of Spitfire Scoring competition, particularly the West World competition. It's a subjective contest. Winning probably has as much to do with who the 1st person on the review team is to watch your piece and see if it's worth forwarding on and what their mood is that day as it does with the amount of skill, talent and uniqueness of your piece. There is definitely plain old luck involved. It's probably at least 50% of the reason why person A beats out person B in such contests. The same is true in who "makes it" as a composer. Pick any big name or even B list composer. I bet you luck, or just happening to be in the right place at the right time has as much to do with their success as any other talent, skill or personal trait. I'm not a media composer, but I doubt that part of the industy is any different than what I do when I say, the vast majority of my success can be summed up because I was in the right place at the right time and because I knew someone or they knew me and passed my name along. Sure skill, talent and hard work play a big part too, especially after the door is opened for me. But pure old luck plays just as important a role. If someone is unhappy that some folks are making a few bucks off their hard work, what else would you call it other than complaining and sour grapes? The folks chosen put in the hard work, but were also lucky as well, they were able to jump on something when Pianobook was small and just getting started and a global pandemic probably gave them more free time to do so. Jumping in now to try and be one of the select few is probably a much more difficult climb. So again.. luck of being 1st in line and being in the right spot at the right time. I doubt when Pianobook was started they had much idea of just how successful it would be. Again, luck played a part. It could have just as easily become a tiny, forgotten about web site with a handful of folks exchanging some free samples. A global pandemic came along and gave a lot of folks free time, probably boosting that web site up a lot and doing so fairly quickly. What would you suggest they do? There is real labor and expense involved in maintaining that site as it grows exponentially. Should they limit the number of submissions? Throw away old uploads when they run out of server space? Those things have to be paid for somehow. So either you start charging folks to use it, or pass a hat or maybe you sell a few things, bring in some money and it can at least help pay for itself. That's why I said Pianobook is in a small way a victim of its own sucess. All the ways you could keep it this small little self run community would require excluding folks some how. Or you have to charge something. Or you have to get a few people with deep pockets to just pay for it out of the kindness of their hearts. So what do you suggest? Sorry... it's complaining.
@@rbingraham Thank you for your honest and detailed reply, Imho the music industry has to change drastically right now ….. my idea is to setup a platform where (unknown) musical talent can expose there talents on a NFT based principle. It will be rewarded and rated by the listening and viewing people, completely independent. That is a fair chance for everyone and a possible step up to some major labels with future contractpossibilitues …. The most honest and reliable way to express your music. When you stand out you will be rewarded accordingly based on your own authenticity. That is my vision about the new music industry. Not a marketing machine or a network. Just general worldwide independently ratings. Fair, honest and complete transparency.
@@remcovanvelzen8680 OK, that sounds interesting. But I think that is a very different animal to what Pianobook is and what it's trying to do. I seem to remember them talking about a doing something for those creating demos using the sample from Pianobook but that never seemed to happen and if I remember correctly, they looked into it and decided it was just too much to deal with and not really the main focus of Pianobook. Anway a site promoting new music just feels like a very different goal to me and maybe some of the grumblings about Pianobook's newest ways of working are based in a similar goal, but from what I've read it's a lot of misplaced grumbling that isn't taking into account the necessities and complexities of running such a site. I read most of the criticism and think, "well if you could do better, then go ahead and do it, build your own site".
A couple of comments. First, I think you're probably wildly overstating the likely income for all but maybe the top three or four PB "Artist" libraries. This has implications for what the consequences of this income will be. Second, "you don't have to buy it if you don't want to". I don't think that anyone has said that "we're being compelled to buy" was a problem. As you yourself somewhat poetically described at the start of this video, PB was a "community" with a certain ethos, and what's upsetting is not that anyone will be forced to pay for stuff, it's more that the ethos of the community is being changed without actually consulting that community. Third, your description of "what finished means" might well be applicable to sample libraries. Be assured that it's not true of releasing software (including, and especially, audio software). Fourth, you sound very confident about what the future evolution of PB (and specifically, PB "Artist") is going to be. This seems odd, since the evolution to get to where PB is now seems to me to have been quite unpredictable. More importantly, it has absolutely not been subject to any direct control by the PB community itself. I love Chris and what Spitfire does (even if its hard for me to use what they do due the system requirements that they focus on). I think they have considerable artistic and aesthetic sincerity and credibility. But I don't think that anyone outside of CH and Spitfire is in a position to speak confidently about what the future path of PB will be - and quite likely, not even CH *right now*. Right now, it seems pretty unlikely that PB will ever require a paid subscription style membership. But last year, PB "Artist" would have seems about as unlikely. I'm not making any specific prediction, more just noting that it seems a little unwise to be so confident about where PB is going and where it will end up. Finally, I would not focus much on the cost of running PB as a service. I haven't checked what hosting service it runs on, but the costs are likely less than you're imagining. Not zero, to be sure. Several hosting companies offer unlimited storage and unlimited storage for almost absurdly low rates (granted, their effective bandwidth is likely not so great). Paying web developers is a much more significant expense - as a comparison, we recently finished a reimplementation of ardour.org, and that cost us roughly 12 years of hosting costs (there will no doubt be more such reimplementations before that 12 years is up too).
I think something worth thinking about is the fact that so many music platforms (be it distribution of music, streaming, tutorials, sample packs, libraries, etc) have and will continue to drift towards monetizing their platforms in various ways. To support the websites, to support the userbase, or to support those who created the platform. It's kind of inevitable, and doesn't stop at music. Years ago SoundCloud introduced premium features, and now they provide mastering, distribution, and royalties. Netflix is introducing additional fees for "extra houses". Things change, and we as users change. The thing I really respect about what Christian and the PianoBook team are doing here is nothing is changing if we don't want it to. There will still be free libraries, curated for us to download and use (or add to a growing folder of "I'm sure I'll use this one day" sounds). And Spitfire will continue to release $300 libraries that we can only hope to need one day to justify the cost. And sitting in the middle will be those $30 libraries that we can look at and think "yes this is worth buying", or we can look for other alternatives. Bit of a ramble and a waffle, but at the end of the day we just have to roll with the changes and either it'll be fine, or things will keep changing and we'll just have to deal. Thanks for the video Dan
Haters gonna hate. F**k’em all! Keep up the good work folks! I would pay for library if I like it. And it’s awesome that people have such support from SA!
Dear Dan Keene, it's almost pitifully pathetic to see how you might want to save the image of spitfire, Christian and pianobook …. but really you have the perception of reality not very high. Bottom line it's all about the money…. and Christian Henson wants to profile himself as sample guru marketing supreme….. and eventually just cash in…..just doing more and more….. If people don't see that by now……it's really horrific to see how he's self-glorifying trying to get to a higher level every time…it's really disgusting…. so I understand all those fair criticisms, well don't try to correct that..... but you are probably the apple of his eye 🥴😤 I think you still have a lot to learn in this life ..... 🙏 One lesson ; don't idolize a music marketing guru, and cobbler stick to your last…. do not commercialize pianobook, do so on your own label without any interest or reference to pianobook, your own authenticity is what counts!
You're correct, but I'm not sure it's for the reason you think. It's definitely about money. Did you know that AWS, what most corporations use for hosting websites and storing data, can cost well over $5000 a month just for the service itself, and that doesn't necessarily include storage of data. Is Christian just supposed to pay that out of pocket? It would be extremely unreasonable to demand he continues to do that. So what other option is there? Well, since it started as his own side project, he could just give up and shut down pianobook. He was under no obligation to keep it going. To make him the villain in this story is rather strange in that he had already given and given. And while I have no idea of the internal workings of Spitfire, I can imagine that if he shifted the cost away from himself and onto Spitfire, he had every right and it was an extremely reasonable move. Such a move would allow Pianobook to continue to thrive and offer "free" content to everyone. Of course, nothing is ever free. It may cost you and me nothing to download the samples, but each download and each gigabyte was paid for by Christian, or Spitfire, or somebody other than you, and me.
And I think it's probably best to reserve our judgments about people until we've gotten to know them. To color Dan's defense as pitiful or to say he has much to learn without having met him and coming to conclusions about him from just a video... It's just unreasonable. When I read comments like this, my impression, which I believe many would share is this: "Gosh, that was strange. I hope that person is ok."
@@CordaroRodriguez keep on dreaming, seems to me you’re not from planet earth…. far from reality, I rest my case ……with this sort of infected wannabe’s, idolizing marketing machines and demonizing fair criticism is not worth a single word or discussion anymore, good luck !
Any critics of pianobook going commercial should provide an alternative. Pianobook is not forced on anyone, and the truth is nothing is ever free. It takes a lot of time to sift through the free samples to pick out the ones that are more likely to be high quality. That time is money. If I may add, this challenge of picking the good from the bad also applies to paid sample products, which unfortunately rarely have a return policy, as all sales are final. Pianobook artist is a good idea to develop an ever increasing collection of budget friendly samples, using the infrastructure of Spitfire as a vending platform. It makes a lot of sense. Because it takes a lot of effort to build that kind of infrastructure, of sales-product support-downloads-optional disk-packs-script management, versioning, etc, etc, just to support one or two sample packs. It also means the sample author does not have to become a sample business, but still has the opportunity to contribute one or two outstanding samples to the world, and be rewarded for it. Each of us has different levels of productivity. A certain level of prolific output will lead to setting up a business like Spitfire, but only few people will reach that level, and it will take lots of collaboration to achieve that as Spitfire has done. Some will only make two or three outstanding sample packs in their lifetime, but selling these few packs still benefits from the kind of infrastructure of Spitfire, which lends a lot of credibility to that product. I think Pianobook artist is a fantastic idea, that opens up access to curated products for lots of end users and many sample creators, who no longer have to be forced to create a whole business which may not be their forte - leaving Spitfire to handle that side of things. I for one get a bit jaded after downloading 4 or 5 samples from pianobook for free, and can't really use any of them long term - nice fun exercise, but my business is composing music, not wasting my time being a perpetual beta tester for uncurated samples. Time is money, there is no free lunch. Piano book artist is a happy medium to variety, a minimum assured quality of product, and a service delivery that has been well honed and will continue to be improved by Spitfire Audio.
I am actually excited for this. As someone who isn’t the best sample maker, I do have the most demos and hope something is also in the works for demo makers. 🥹🤣
With you on this, Dan! In an increasingly devalued industry, it’s absolutely fair and right that good work has the opportunity for highlight and reward. 👍🏻
I am so incredibly grateful that you made this video! I was thinking exactly the same when I was reading the comments yesterday. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. You put this in the most concise and non-confrontational way possible. Huge amounts of respect for this, Dan.
I admit I was a tiny bit wary when the first paid instrument went up, but after some thought it seemed obvious that its a good thing. So much effort goes into these instruments and people like Jon and yourself have given us so much in the past.
I think it’s possible to totally accept and support the concept of Pianobook artists while retaining a level of melancholy toward the fact that nothing in the world ever stays the same. I loved it when it was just 100 libraries from people just doing it for the love of it. I still love it now but in a different way. As David Byrne sang: “Things have an end but feelings are infinite.
We’re changing but it’s alright
‘Cause only things are finite”.
I am a consumer of the libraries you guys make. And I believe we should be thankful for all the efforts you guys make to come up with great libraries. No one should be against any of you guys getting paid for what you make. You deserve it and again we should be thankful for the huge library of free instruments.
Hi Dan, thanks for this video as it went a long way for me to giving a detailed back drop as to the intention behind Pianobook Artists.
The emotion even in your, as ever well-balanced videos was clearly heart felt so nice to see!
The analogy of the post gig T shirt really illustrated where ‘’Artists’’ is coming from… And don’t forget ‘’you don’t have to buy it’’!
I too have had a bit of a knot in my stomach over this move for the last few days and could well have been one of the hasty commentators shooting from the hip. Always better to sleep on these things and so glad I did given the timing of your YT upload today…
I totally get it now and it makes total sense!
A shout out to you, John all other PB community uppers for the bloody fantastic work and instruments!
Never forgetting Christian who has given so much to so many for FREE!
Peace & Love Dave.
Very eloquently put, and I fully agree with all your points. I never understood people who get upset about things they are not forced to take up and can choose to do or not!
Sensitively reasoned, delicately said - with some honest to goodness passion. Well done sir. Couldn't have said it better myself- or even half as well!
Music as an art, in all it's forms, is such an under-appreciated thing in today's society. Therefore I think it is fantastic that Pianobook is adding the possibility for artists being paid for their work. Kudos, and thanks for a very thoughtful video, Dan!
Absolutely spot on Dan….sincere thoughts brilliantly expressed 👍👍
Creators devoting time and effort to produce the best they can, should of course be payed and compensated.
Great take, too many artist are starving today. I applaud this wonderful fulfillment that true creative brilliance can Bring! Really nice to see....
Thank you, Dan, for a beautifully articulated response. I am with you 100%, and I think the addition of the Artist segment is a beautiful thing that allows more independent samplist make a bit of a living from their work. Thank you to Christian for the whole idea of Pianobook, to the volunteers for their amazing work keeping it running, to Spitfire for supporting it, to the samplists contributing great instruments, and to you, Dan, for making this video!
Well stated. VERY well stated. I concur with your P.O.V. 100%.
Very succinctly put, Dan. There seems to be a prevalent attitude of mean-spiritedness, almost as if the avoidance of paying for something is 'getting one over' on the person who made it. It's ironic when you consider that someone might be happy to blow £50 in the pub, only to see it flowing into the sewers an hour later, but begrudge paying £30 for a sample library that represents many hours of work by its creator, is theirs to use for as long as they wish, and which will inspire music that might possibly earn them money. Money that they themselves would be only too anxious to receive.
Spot on. I bought the feathered flute primarily to support John and the spirit behind Pianobook Artists.
I think it is great that Spitfire has created a platform for hobbyists to be able to distribute a commercial product. Opening the gates for all rather than keeping them shut is a healthy thing for the community. For Jon's instrument, I did think the pricing was a little high. Starting with a price from around $19 with a pay more option like Bandcamp would've been ideal.
Hey Dan, really appreciate the insight and I completely agree. If you don’t want the paid content you don’t need to pay for it.
Meanwhile they can go download a free CS-80!
Which I plan on updating as soon as the features are made available on decent sampler. Cheers
Thanks Dan. As usual you make so much sense, and articulate your point of view really well.
A reminder that we could also potentially find great libraries through the 'search' command if people bothered to even do the bare minimum of reviewing the stuff they are downloading for free. This would actually be a far more effective method of filtering out the most broadly useful/desirable than having them handpicked according to the specific tastes of a small number of individuals.
I am new to SA and Pianobook, and basically anything MIDI, as of just last August. I must be too new to being having any difficulty wanting to pay for sample libraries. Actually, just the opposite. My first library was LABS Foghorn, then, after understanding how the player worked, added a couple more. I almost felt guilty and obligation to make a real purchase. Then I came across videos for Hammers and Aperture: The Stack, and made the determination that these were exactly what I needed, and probably will for a long time. I had pretty much stuck to the SA dedicated player stuff, then got into Decent Sampler stuff and experiencing a different type of player. Now I'm roughly getting used to the free Kontakt Player. Not sure I like it so much. SA dedicated is about right for my simple mind to grasp. Solar Mercury kinda blows my mind, though I love the sounds!!!
I saw Jon's video on how he approached the making of Feather Flute and its transition from Pianobook to Spitfire. I bought it because it's awesome, I really like Jon and his channel, I think it's wonderful, and I love supporting these artist creating things we can all use, whether they are free or purchased.
I'm hooked either way!
Thanks for your comment Matthew! I now have my own Pianobook Artist library :) www.spitfireaudio.com/dan-keen-soft-string-textures
Thank you, Dan for this video. It's quite important for everyone to understand how this community works and how people like Jon came to this point where they are now. For myself personally, pianobook community has been a space where I've built and still am building friendships, professional relationships and knolewdge. This is what matters.
I think pianobook artists is a fantastic opportunity for talented and hard working individuals who are ready for that next big step.
We should be celebrating 🥳🌈
Agree. If you spend any of your time to create something for others, the creator deserves to be compensated. If it's a penny or a dollar, it helps that person continue to create.
Well said mate! This was a fantastic explanation. Expectations are an important thing to establish and I feel anyone who sees this video will understand that there's a long game transpiring. Things are ever changing and people, unfortunately, will always fear change.
wise words Dan
Hey Dan! Love your content so please excuse me for writing a comment wholly unrelated to the video at hand. If I may, could I suggest you make more content along the lines of guides for the aspiring composer? I can only speak for myself, but I look to you to improve my own craft. Since your gear review videos have done exceptionally well, I would suspect a lot of other people are also in my situation. I myself would at least love to see comparisons of sample libraries (ensembles, soloists, jazz, choirs, synths), keyboards, daws, microphones, books, educational pathways etc. so that I can use your recommendations to make a more informed decision. I know that this format can easily become cookie-cutter and stale, but I do suspect a lot of people would value your opinions. Anyways, just my $0.02.
Thanks! I'll definitely focus on more of this content!
Well said!!
Bless you. you are right on point.
"just rusty gates and chilli bottles" what a lot of people liked about pianobook.
Nothing wrong with that, at all! But I’m not gonna pay for that
I just want to say, I fully support this. The idea that everything on the internet must be free is unsustainable.
One other question: who sets the prices of the PB Artists' products?
Another great and thoughtful video, Dan! As I posted elsewhere, IMO the initial mistake which got many salty about the whole thing was to start the pricing of the first “Paid” Pianobook library so high @£99! I’m sure Mike’s Guitar library is fantastic, but for a niche library maybe it should have been around the level of £50 maximum. I have no problem with the price of Jon Meyer’s one, and as someone else mentioned here, maybe have a lower minimum price for Artist libraries with an option to pay more like Bandcamp would work? As someone who works for Spitfire, you can obviously see that the company hit a “sweet spot” with the pricing of the Originals line of libraries, and many potential buyers would compare an “actual Spitfire Library” @£29, to whatever price a Pianobook Artist is library is pitched at.
I've been enjoying your brilliant mind and impressive musical skills for ... well, almost the beginning of your channel. So, instead of paraphrasing your already excellent take on this move and the future of Pianobook, allow me to maybe point out two aspects that stand out for me after watching your video:
1. It's all (much) about networking with those who're "leading the pack" or are going to in a manner of speaking (really, it's about networking with all those present in the field).
2. It's also about the ethics of (financially) supporting the artist(s) in all walks of the creative business.
I can bet behind both (although at this point I don't get to walk my talk much, very unfortunately; but I know I have when I was able to and will resume so as soon as I'll be in a better position). The one thing, that seems to become apparent for me as a side effect from the transition(s) the music industry or really, the creative industries have seen over the past decades, is that it seems we're all doing it for ourselves first - and supporting each other where we can and when we can, something like that.
I think that is more of a plus than a "downer", really. That way, we all can much more count on getting better appreciated by those who matter to us at heart: Other artists. (But non-creatives are sill and always welcome along for the ride ;-) ).
Thanks, to you, to Christian Henson, to Spitfire Audio, Pianobook, LABS... and really everyone passionately devoting their skills to this.
Thank you. Perfectly said.
Thanks for watching!
Yeah Dan! Very well put. Cheers!
I love this explanation. It did occur to me during Christian's video and it continues during yours, that everyone who is being "rewarded" for displaying their "great generosity" and "contributing in a big way" all look like me. I hope there are plans at Pianobook to zoom out from the POV of a very specific type of person who seems to be the focus of the site.
Great video, Dan! It's amazing to me how quickly some have become 'entitled' to something that didn't even exist 5 years ago. It's ironic that they might call a Pianobook artist 'greedy'. The real greed is that person expecting the artist/craftsman to always give them something of value for absolutely nothing. I am hopeful that we as a community will dispel that greed/attitude, be happy for and supportive of the Pianobook artists... and... like you said... buy their wares if you want them, and simply don't buy if you don't want to... without whinging.
How many of these people leaving complaints would actually turn down an opportunity to be financially compensated for their art/hard work? I'll wager 0! Well said, sir!
Buy it. Don’t buy it. Rant about it. Don’t rant about it. Enjoy it. Don’t enjoy it. It’s your choice. It’s not your choice. Nah…it’s DEFINITELY YOUR CHOICE. Nice vid 👍
Well said! I'm all for opportunities and I think it's great that samplists will get more rewards for their hard work. As long as the majority of the content remains free, I don't think there is a problem. It looks like there will be about one premium library each month and probably dozens of new free stuff. I guess some people might be worried that the best samplists will only release premium libraries from now on, but as you said, it's not like the same person is going to be the featured Artist every month. I only thought that it might be cool if these libraries would run in the Spitfire player instead of Kontakt. That way there wouldn't need to be an expensive Kontakt fee and it might be possible to make these libraries even more affordable and even more people might be able to buy them, since a lot of the users on Pianobook seem to be young aspiring composers without a lot of money. Maybe something similar to Spitfire Originals? At least with the guitar it was a pretty big jump from 0 to 99. But I know that it's probably a lot easier for people to work with the Kontakt scripting and I can imagine that it would be quiet difficult to move them over to the Spitfire player. Anyway, I'm fine with the way it is now, it was just a thought. I love Pianobook and I'm excited for the future! Btw I also really like Phoebe Bridgers.
Well quite. And for what it's worth £39 is a snip for a library of the quality of Feathered Flute. However the thing that really amazed me about that video is that you'd never encountered some huckster selling knock-off merch outside a gig before - you'd have to fight your way through them on the way out in my day!
I'm struggling to find any library with over 1000 downloads...therefore the community seems relatively small which makes the decision seems strange to me. Monetizing pianobook goes against what I personally thought it was all about (I was wrong I guess). Sure i totally support donations or pay what you can. But I would've thought there were many other options available if you wanted to commercialize your libraries.
excellent thoughts - love the merch analogy
I preferred its original concept , rusty bin lids , and other obscure samples .That was the whole idea of it ,for fun and free . Now it's just another paid for sample site . Although people can still post free samples , now money is introduced , you will gradually see far less free samples .
funny - since they went commercial, there are mostly boring sample sets to be found on this former creative palce...
Good luck with it all. You are much more comfortable with the idea of a transactional and elitist community in which aspiring professionals can seek to prove themselves, and aspiring customers can learn what they want to buy. There is nothing at all wrong with that (given the background conditions of life) and you put it very eloquently. I do agree that this merely brings to the surface the measure of self-interest that is mixed with Christian's genuinely goodhearted gift of Pianobook. It's not something I would have wanted to mention had you not done so, as I am very grateful to Christian for all he has done and continues to do to help aspiring professionals, and even amateurs. This version of Pianobook is not for me; but it is great for those that it is for.
It shouldn't be surprising if, when something changes, that there are those who have no use for the new direction; you shouldn't feel bad about it, or feel as if you are being judged. I don't know what being 'salty' means; does it mean being upset, or having different values and expressing them? I looked it up, but you can't trust brief definitions to capture the nuances. I didn't get the impression that you were trying to belittle those with different views as disgruntled losers! I'm merely personally sad that something that looked so wonderful to me is gone; and it has become something that may be wonderful for other people instead, but has no place in my own life unless I want to use it to benefit myself; I am not an aspiring customer or patron of the arts.
So, for those for whom these recent changes look to be positive and valuable - in whatever way, not necessarily in any of the ways I've considered here, or that Dan Keen has discussed - I wish you all the very best. There are other places I can share my work with others in a mutually appreciative and non-commercial context.
Thank you for your feedback. It’s interesting for me, not to add fuel to a burning fire. If I may, why does the move to commercialise a very small number of products make the whole site “not for you” anymore? Pianobook is the same in every other regard, and continues to be free despite these few endorsements
@@DanKeenMusic I disagree that everything else remains the same. A community, a project or activity is not a set of discrete modules with no interaction between them. For me, though, it was ratings and tipping that were the big problems. I waited to see how it would develop, and then there was this next step. In your video, you capture many things about what is good about this newly transparent and pervasive transactional and elitist ethos. But for me, Pianobook was never about free libraries, it was about the art and sharing the joy of it. Yes, it was a good place for aspiring professionals; but it wasn't a place in which people became (semi-) professional. Being transactional (just having a tip jar does that) and elitist (the 'best' libraries, rather than cool, fun, intriguing, etc. - I'm not knocking elitism as such, even though it gets used as a negative by some), it is something that only appeals to me in limited respects: self-interested ones. And that's not what I'm looking for. For those who find this no barrier to fun, friendship and who are happy to spend their social time in an an environment where the pinnacle of success is making money off of the community, then this is great. No-one needs to obsess over these things; but some of us find it spoils the whole.
I don't know if that helps you understand or not. I'm certainly not trying to persuade you of anything! Just share an explanation of why I and others will end finding somewhere else to share our work and interests.
That does make sense. Thanks for your reply
@@DanKeenMusic Thanks Dan, keep up all the lovely music and education, it's much appreciated!
Thinking about future PB Artists, do you think it will be possible to become one without submitting high quality videos, too...?
Absolutely. There are amazing contributors without UA-cam channels. I think it just helps to get noticed at the start, and that influx of attention probably spurred us on to keep contributing
You've defined the reasoning behind monetization well. At first, one may be thinking; Oh no...something so cool, for free, couldn't last in the world of capitalization 🙁 There's always some corporation wanting to cash in on a good thing. However, the reality is; some of these libraries *are* stellar. And, composers will probably use them in work that they are being paid for. And, yes, there are considerable basic website maintenance costs, that someone, somewhere will be covering. $40 for a library that you love, is not too much. If this had come out with a bigger price tag, then I'd see the justification in push back. My only one wish is for there to be a trial version of a library. I've bought quite a few sounds, from other sources, only to find out it does not satisfy my personal taste and needs when I get it into my own environment. Other than that, if the price point stays affordable, this is a fair offering for quality inspirational sounds in our musical world of creativity. Thanks for putting the conscientious time and effort into explaining your view points.
I haven't really kept up to date recently on what is happening in PianoBook. However, based on this video what pops into my head is this. PianoBook now has a ratings system, tipping system and possibly more. Releasing a new "League" for paid libraries absolutely makes sense. My only question is how is someone/contributor recognized for the new Artists "league"? I use the word league as I fall back to Football analogies "Premier League as opposed to Division1". Up till now PianoBook has only had Division1, but some exceptional contributors can be classed in Premier League status and Artisits affords them of that accolade, respect and compensation. Maybe I need to watch Christian's video now...
Just thank you and do not listen to anyone. I will continue support Pianobook as composer with my music
Agree with your sentiment man! I was just happy for Jon and confused why anyone would be salty ? Come on! It reminds me of what you said in an earlier video... I think it was "We don't have to be in competition with each other... There's enough parts of the cake for all of us!" (I'm paraphrasing).
Love it! Thanks for your support
@@DanKeenMusic Of course! Love to support fellow samplists and musicians who also want to see others succeed :)
the thing is... not only Jon was born out of \ with pianobook. Bunker samples also had some love from Christian and yet they are not selling their stuff there, but Jon has his own store.
Pianobook became loot audio but with better marketing, which is sad but not suprising. A lot of composers won't get a job and only 1% will, so now we are at square 1, selling our own stuff to other composers. Honestly i am a bit sad :\
I see opportunity for everyone in many different factions at Pianobook: those learning to make their first instrument for Kontakt, those writing demos for libraries, producers lending a hand in sculpting sounds within the community, etc etc. In this world of saturation, I think it only makes sense that everyone diversifies a little, and composers often know exactly what they want out of samples and are well-placed to create them for others to enjoy
@@DanKeenMusic understandable, yet the library, at least now, sells on spitfire audio website, not on Jon's website. Saying that, all reasons why pianobook is not sustainable for Christian to pull off on his own is understandable and we all should diversify a little so why not make it pianobooks bank? sell it so we can support community- no problems. But when something has a price, you have expectations, there is a reason why people buying box factory and write trailer tracks with it and not with free 1 note stretched drums from pianobook (no hate there). Kinda seems "scummy". Christian has a great client base at spitfire, so i don't see any reason why anyone thought that pianobook wouldn't be a success too, especially at the price of 0!
Again sorry, that's just my opinion.
@@yurabronsky I think it does make sense to host libraries through Spitfire as they already have the infrastructure to look after files and issue licenses etc, but I can see what you're saying. I think there's definitely a marked difference between Pianobook and Pianobook Artist libraries. I'd hope that any product with a price tag has a feature set and tech support to go with it
Dan for CEO of Spitfire! 👀
People expect creative stuff online to be free - bottom line. It goes back to the days of Napster. No one buys music anymore - sad but true. And now we have creatives bemoaning the fact they have to pay - again sad.
I see nothing wrong with a paid tier on PB.
Amen to the 'You don't have to buy anything"! It's the internet some people don't have anything better to do than complain. I do get that the spirit of it has changed a bit. But things change, that small community is sort of a victim of its own sucess. Must just be akin to the "sore losers" of the Spitfire Scoring competition. There is a bit of luck involved in everything we do folks. Enjoy your luck and stop raining on others luck.
It’s not about complaining it’s about awareness….It’s also not about luck ….. it’s about making music from the heart, if your intention is to make money out of it ….. forget it …. when your creativity is standing out your own authenticity is standing out, not a marketing machine
@@remcovanvelzen8680 My luck comment was more aimed at all the sore losers of Spitfire Scoring competition, particularly the West World competition. It's a subjective contest. Winning probably has as much to do with who the 1st person on the review team is to watch your piece and see if it's worth forwarding on and what their mood is that day as it does with the amount of skill, talent and uniqueness of your piece. There is definitely plain old luck involved. It's probably at least 50% of the reason why person A beats out person B in such contests.
The same is true in who "makes it" as a composer. Pick any big name or even B list composer. I bet you luck, or just happening to be in the right place at the right time has as much to do with their success as any other talent, skill or personal trait. I'm not a media composer, but I doubt that part of the industy is any different than what I do when I say, the vast majority of my success can be summed up because I was in the right place at the right time and because I knew someone or they knew me and passed my name along. Sure skill, talent and hard work play a big part too, especially after the door is opened for me. But pure old luck plays just as important a role.
If someone is unhappy that some folks are making a few bucks off their hard work, what else would you call it other than complaining and sour grapes? The folks chosen put in the hard work, but were also lucky as well, they were able to jump on something when Pianobook was small and just getting started and a global pandemic probably gave them more free time to do so. Jumping in now to try and be one of the select few is probably a much more difficult climb. So again.. luck of being 1st in line and being in the right spot at the right time.
I doubt when Pianobook was started they had much idea of just how successful it would be. Again, luck played a part. It could have just as easily become a tiny, forgotten about web site with a handful of folks exchanging some free samples. A global pandemic came along and gave a lot of folks free time, probably boosting that web site up a lot and doing so fairly quickly. What would you suggest they do? There is real labor and expense involved in maintaining that site as it grows exponentially. Should they limit the number of submissions? Throw away old uploads when they run out of server space? Those things have to be paid for somehow. So either you start charging folks to use it, or pass a hat or maybe you sell a few things, bring in some money and it can at least help pay for itself. That's why I said Pianobook is in a small way a victim of its own sucess. All the ways you could keep it this small little self run community would require excluding folks some how. Or you have to charge something. Or you have to get a few people with deep pockets to just pay for it out of the kindness of their hearts. So what do you suggest?
Sorry... it's complaining.
@@rbingraham Thank you for your honest and detailed reply, Imho the music industry has to change drastically right now ….. my idea is to setup a platform where (unknown) musical talent can expose there talents on a NFT based principle. It will be rewarded and rated by the listening and viewing people, completely independent. That is a fair chance for everyone and a possible step up to some major labels with future contractpossibilitues …. The most honest and reliable way to express your music. When you stand out you will be rewarded accordingly based on your own authenticity. That is my vision about the new music industry. Not a marketing machine or a network. Just general worldwide independently ratings. Fair, honest and complete transparency.
@@remcovanvelzen8680 OK, that sounds interesting. But I think that is a very different animal to what Pianobook is and what it's trying to do. I seem to remember them talking about a doing something for those creating demos using the sample from Pianobook but that never seemed to happen and if I remember correctly, they looked into it and decided it was just too much to deal with and not really the main focus of Pianobook. Anway a site promoting new music just feels like a very different goal to me and maybe some of the grumblings about Pianobook's newest ways of working are based in a similar goal, but from what I've read it's a lot of misplaced grumbling that isn't taking into account the necessities and complexities of running such a site.
I read most of the criticism and think, "well if you could do better, then go ahead and do it, build your own site".
I honestly don't get why people are mad
A couple of comments.
First, I think you're probably wildly overstating the likely income for all but maybe the top three or four PB "Artist" libraries. This has implications for what the consequences of this income will be.
Second, "you don't have to buy it if you don't want to". I don't think that anyone has said that "we're being compelled to buy" was a problem. As you yourself somewhat poetically described at the start of this video, PB was a "community" with a certain ethos, and what's upsetting is not that anyone will be forced to pay for stuff, it's more that the ethos of the community is being changed without actually consulting that community.
Third, your description of "what finished means" might well be applicable to sample libraries. Be assured that it's not true of releasing software (including, and especially, audio software).
Fourth, you sound very confident about what the future evolution of PB (and specifically, PB "Artist") is going to be. This seems odd, since the evolution to get to where PB is now seems to me to have been quite unpredictable. More importantly, it has absolutely not been subject to any direct control by the PB community itself. I love Chris and what Spitfire does (even if its hard for me to use what they do due the system requirements that they focus on). I think they have considerable artistic and aesthetic sincerity and credibility. But I don't think that anyone outside of CH and Spitfire is in a position to speak confidently about what the future path of PB will be - and quite likely, not even CH *right now*. Right now, it seems pretty unlikely that PB will ever require a paid subscription style membership. But last year, PB "Artist" would have seems about as unlikely. I'm not making any specific prediction, more just noting that it seems a little unwise to be so confident about where PB is going and where it will end up.
Finally, I would not focus much on the cost of running PB as a service. I haven't checked what hosting service it runs on, but the costs are likely less than you're imagining. Not zero, to be sure. Several hosting companies offer unlimited storage and unlimited storage for almost absurdly low rates (granted, their effective bandwidth is likely not so great). Paying web developers is a much more significant expense - as a comparison, we recently finished a reimplementation of ardour.org, and that cost us roughly 12 years of hosting costs (there will no doubt be more such reimplementations before that 12 years is up too).
I think something worth thinking about is the fact that so many music platforms (be it distribution of music, streaming, tutorials, sample packs, libraries, etc) have and will continue to drift towards monetizing their platforms in various ways. To support the websites, to support the userbase, or to support those who created the platform. It's kind of inevitable, and doesn't stop at music. Years ago SoundCloud introduced premium features, and now they provide mastering, distribution, and royalties. Netflix is introducing additional fees for "extra houses". Things change, and we as users change. The thing I really respect about what Christian and the PianoBook team are doing here is nothing is changing if we don't want it to. There will still be free libraries, curated for us to download and use (or add to a growing folder of "I'm sure I'll use this one day" sounds). And Spitfire will continue to release $300 libraries that we can only hope to need one day to justify the cost. And sitting in the middle will be those $30 libraries that we can look at and think "yes this is worth buying", or we can look for other alternatives. Bit of a ramble and a waffle, but at the end of the day we just have to roll with the changes and either it'll be fine, or things will keep changing and we'll just have to deal.
Thanks for the video Dan
Haters gonna hate. F**k’em all! Keep up the good work folks! I would pay for library if I like it. And it’s awesome that people have such support from SA!
Dear Dan Keene, it's almost pitifully pathetic to see how you might want to save the image of spitfire, Christian and pianobook …. but really you have the perception of reality not very high. Bottom line it's all about the money…. and Christian Henson wants to profile himself as sample guru marketing supreme….. and eventually just cash in…..just doing more and more….. If people don't see that by now……it's really horrific to see how he's self-glorifying trying to get to a higher level every time…it's really disgusting…. so I understand all those fair criticisms, well don't try to correct that..... but you are probably the apple of his eye 🥴😤 I think you still have a lot to learn in this life ..... 🙏 One lesson ; don't idolize a music marketing guru, and cobbler stick to your last…. do not commercialize pianobook, do so on your own label without any interest or reference to pianobook, your own authenticity is what counts!
You're correct, but I'm not sure it's for the reason you think. It's definitely about money. Did you know that AWS, what most corporations use for hosting websites and storing data, can cost well over $5000 a month just for the service itself, and that doesn't necessarily include storage of data. Is Christian just supposed to pay that out of pocket? It would be extremely unreasonable to demand he continues to do that. So what other option is there? Well, since it started as his own side project, he could just give up and shut down pianobook. He was under no obligation to keep it going. To make him the villain in this story is rather strange in that he had already given and given. And while I have no idea of the internal workings of Spitfire, I can imagine that if he shifted the cost away from himself and onto Spitfire, he had every right and it was an extremely reasonable move. Such a move would allow Pianobook to continue to thrive and offer "free" content to everyone. Of course, nothing is ever free. It may cost you and me nothing to download the samples, but each download and each gigabyte was paid for by Christian, or Spitfire, or somebody other than you, and me.
And I think it's probably best to reserve our judgments about people until we've gotten to know them. To color Dan's defense as pitiful or to say he has much to learn without having met him and coming to conclusions about him from just a video... It's just unreasonable. When I read comments like this, my impression, which I believe many would share is this: "Gosh, that was strange. I hope that person is ok."
@@CordaroRodriguez I am totally fine, but thank you for your concerns….. I am just mirroring reality …..
@@remcovanvelzen8680 oh, thank goodness! Well, whatever magic mirror on the wall you're using is fit for the Queen.
@@CordaroRodriguez keep on dreaming, seems to me you’re not from planet earth…. far from reality, I rest my case ……with this sort of infected wannabe’s, idolizing marketing machines and demonizing fair criticism is not worth a single word or discussion anymore, good luck !
Any critics of pianobook going commercial should provide an alternative. Pianobook is not forced on anyone, and the truth is nothing is ever free. It takes a lot of time to sift through the free samples to pick out the ones that are more likely to be high quality. That time is money.
If I may add, this challenge of picking the good from the bad also applies to paid sample products, which unfortunately rarely have a return policy, as all sales are final. Pianobook artist is a good idea to develop an ever increasing collection of budget friendly samples, using the infrastructure of Spitfire as a vending platform. It makes a lot of sense. Because it takes a lot of effort to build that kind of infrastructure, of sales-product support-downloads-optional disk-packs-script management, versioning, etc, etc, just to support one or two sample packs. It also means the sample author does not have to become a sample business, but still has the opportunity to contribute one or two outstanding samples to the world, and be rewarded for it.
Each of us has different levels of productivity. A certain level of prolific output will lead to setting up a business like Spitfire, but only few people will reach that level, and it will take lots of collaboration to achieve that as Spitfire has done. Some will only make two or three outstanding sample packs in their lifetime, but selling these few packs still benefits from the kind of infrastructure of Spitfire, which lends a lot of credibility to that product.
I think Pianobook artist is a fantastic idea, that opens up access to curated products for lots of end users and many sample creators, who no longer have to be forced to create a whole business which may not be their forte - leaving Spitfire to handle that side of things.
I for one get a bit jaded after downloading 4 or 5 samples from pianobook for free, and can't really use any of them long term - nice fun exercise, but my business is composing music, not wasting my time being a perpetual beta tester for uncurated samples.
Time is money, there is no free lunch. Piano book artist is a happy medium to variety, a minimum assured quality of product, and a service delivery that has been well honed and will continue to be improved by Spitfire Audio.
20220729-Fr.1720, 😎 Thank you for sharing your worries in such a a well voiced manner!
I am actually excited for this. As someone who isn’t the best sample maker, I do have the most demos and hope something is also in the works for demo makers. 🥹🤣