Is NI even paying attention to what Akai is doing?

I mean, ******!? MPC 3 is coming out and it's a full blown DAW, aside from the thousands of upgrades made to the software for the MPC's. Meanwhile, Maschine is stuck in the dark ages. All we get are fixes. NI, are you there????? Is something magical brewing or are we just going to have to put our Maschine's in the corner and welcome in the MPC's instead. Please do tell.

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kamikaze1980

not to mention mpc3 is a free update for all hardware standalone models. Disk streaming, the option to add new synths and effects. Akai is working while NI makes sample libraries because there simply isn’t enough honestly.

Studiowaves

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/34125/is-ni-even-paying-attention-to-what-akai-is-doing

What's so different about MPC-3 from any other full blown DAW.

ozon

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/34125/is-ni-even-paying-attention-to-what-akai-is-doing

If you want the MPC, get the MPC.

DunedinDragon

Akai MPC is focusing on a more specialized market segment than what NI is focusing on. Akai is more about live beat making, stems and so forth. NI is much broader in scope focusing on traditional studio and live musicians of all music styles and approaches as well as beat making and DJ'ing across various recording and live platforms. If you're concentrating on the same market segment as Akai MPC you'd probably do best using that unless there's a chance you might want to broaden your scope. Then it would likely be fairly limiting.

A brain surgeon typically doesn't shop for the same equipment as a dentist.

PK The DJ

I disagree that Maschine is stuck in the dark ages. I bought mine (a few years ago now) because of what it could do at the time - and it still does that.

I also bought an MPC a little while later. Not because it was better, but because it was different.

Whatever the product is, we have a choice. We should pick based on whether it meets our needs.

I really don't understand this current trend of people expecting constant updates to everything, or saying A needs an update because B had an update.

Cretin Dilettante

PK, I think you're misunderstanding the issue. Nobody feels entitled to updates, and the expectation that companies would update the products they release is an expectation that these companies have set for themselves. Whether we're talking video games, operating systems, firmware, etc., tech companies have decided that they're going to push unfinished products to market, make us be paid alpha/beta testers, and then slowly add things that would have made the product finished at release, after the fact. In many cases, these products would never even get finished if the userbase didn't complain, threaten, or go through with legal action. It's just an unfortunate fact that there are no consumer advocacy groups for music technology products, so there are no legal definitions for things like "standalone groovebox", which means, legally, an MPC is just as standalone as a Push 3 is just as standalone as a Maschine+…even though MPC3 will make Akai's platform the only one that, in my opinion, fulfills what should be the legal definition of a "standalone groovebox". People are demanding updates because they do not currently have the means to sue these companies into compliance, which, frankly, NI (and others) should be grateful for. These devices are way too expensive for most of us non-famous, often working class (and even poor) musicians, to be left "holding the bag", so to speak. It's especially painful that, if we're going to switch over MPC, we can't even sell the Maschine+ for anywhere close to the price we bought it at, which means we could be losing even more money just to switch to a platform that gives us the features we need.

ozon

Even if there was such an atrocity as a legal definition of a "standalone groovebox", people would still demand updates for product A if product B received an update with a new feature.

People feel entitled to everything these days. Period.

Cretin Dilettante

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/168800#Comment_168800

Do you think Apple being forced to use USB-C chargers on the Iphone is an atrocity, too?

ozon

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/168805#Comment_168805

Wildly different scope!

chk071

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/168792#Comment_168792

It's actually worse. The statement is "Software A does what software A does, and software B should do the same.". Which, yes, obviously, is a crazy statement. But, one I hear frequently in audio software forums. When a DAW gets a clip launcher, people also argue that every other DAW should have a clip launcher as well.

I don't know where that misconception of software design hails from. Probably from the layperson view, and some naivity.

Cretin Dilettante

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/168806#Comment_168806

It's not actually that different, if you think about it! Consumer protection is consumer protection, whether it's right to repair or codifying a concise legal definition for something and then forcing people to adhere to it.

Cretin Dilettante

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/168807#Comment_168807

What a very dismissive and elitist tone. I wonder if this is the internal culture of NI, if their core userbase/most active community members think like this. Do they really just think "Don't they know if they want polyrhythms, they can use reaktor blocks? We did a whole tutorial on that awhile back! What entitled fools!" "Psh! Why would they want or expect Maschine integration in our flagship Kontrol Keyboards? All of this user data we have says our customers want more soundpacks, hip hop beat tutorials, and DAW control!".

What a sad state of affairs. It's only a matter of time before someone tells Louis Rossman and this company's stock tanks.

chk071

"What a very dismissive and elitist tone. I wonder if this is the internal culture of NI, if their core userbase/most active community members think like this."

Just like everyone else here, I speak for myself, and, there's nothing "dismissive" or "elitist" about my post either.

You may want to read my signature, as you surely sound like the people I mentioned there.

DunedinDragon

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/168795#Comment_168795

I would LOVE to see you try to use this same set of arguments about your "legal right" to have your 2017 Hyundai Santa Fe be upgraded to all the features in the new 2024 Hyundai Santa Fe. Sometimes one just has to shake one's head at the naivety….

Cretin Dilettante

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/168813#Comment_168813

This is a false equivalence with a hint of condescension.

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