damnit

[focalintent]

last week I brought the upgrade to version 4.0 of Reason. Over the weekend, i went to try to install it, and, as is normal with their software packages, the upgrade comes with a partial key. You go to the website, log in to your account, which has your registration history, put in the partial key, and it gives you the full key.

Not a problem, I did this when I upgraded to Reason 2.5 and Reason 3.0 without any problems.

This time, I go to log in to their site - and it is suddenly claiming I have no versions of reason registered, anywhere. That's annoying.

So, I go digging through my license number history (I bought 2.0 used, so I have 1.0, 2.0, 2.5, and 3.0 license numbers), and working backwards, attempt to register my various versions. Oops - the website is claiming that my numbers are already registered to someone. Yet, the account that i'm logged into is the account that is attached to the email address that all of my previous registration update emails went to - there shouldn't be another account.

I use their handy support page to contact them. I provide them with all my license number history, dates of upgrades, who i brought the 2.0 license from and his dates of upgrades. Now, two days later, still no response from anyone over there. I still can't install my software, and there's no other options for live support from them.

I've been a fan of Reason for years - it's one of my favorite pieces of music software. I'm more than a little annoyed/frustrated/disappointed with them right now, though. The funny thing? I'm going through all of this bullshit hassle because I have actually paid for my software. I paid for 2.0 and did a valid license transfer from the previous owner to myself. I paid for the 2.5 and 3.0 upgrades, and now i've paid for the 4.0 upgrade.

Take a wild guess how much bullshit hassle i'd have to go through if i were willing to just track down a pirated copy online somewhere?

Gotta love companies and mechanisms that do little more than irritate and harass the honest, and do fuck and all to prevent the people who want to get the software without paying for it from getting it.

Comments

[randwolf.livejournal.com]

On the other hand, the pirated version probably comes complete with free malware, so maybe you're not so bad off.

[sol3.livejournal.com]

Oddly enough, in the music software scene, not so much. At one point, the folks cracking/releasing music software had a tendency to actually fix bugs in the apps they were cracking :) (and there was a story about 8 years ago about one music software publisher who was insulted when one particular group of music software crackers didn't touch their software - to be fair, by all accounts, it was a piece of shit :)

Not encouraging/endorsing the scene. Then again, I think the music software scene probably has a higher rate of treating the cracked version as a trial, then going on to buy the full version than most other realms where there's cracked software. Of course, again, that's based on my last major runins with it and people using it - which was ~8 years ago.

[randwolf.livejournal.com]

I think that's actually pretty common, when it's a person-to-person relationship. On the other hand, I can't imagine the corporate music industry paying without both some DRM and legal action. Strange business...

[skiptomylou.livejournal.com]

Do you make music? Reason just came up in conversation this weekend. Evan knew just what it was. I don't make music myself, and had never heard of it. DJ software, yes?

[sol3.livejournal.com]

Not quite DJ software - it's more like a virtual rack of hardware synths, drum machines, mixers, effects, etc...