Funding for Devs

djpuzzle

@deltaVaudio said:
@analog_matt , @brambos and @Chris_Randall so cool of you to share your sales data. Since we are sharing, I just checked and I'm on 5988 units since releasing at the end of June which I'm very happy with.

I've gradually raised the price from £3 to £6 since then after implementing the missing features (AUv3 support, MIDI and state saving/presets). The minimum viable product approach seems to be a good strategy for an unknown indie dev such as myself. I've observed the most significant boost in sales happen when:
1. an influential artist posts on insta using the app
2. app is featured by youtubers such as @thesoundtestroom , @jakoB_haQ and @djpuzzle (so thank you guys!)

Android version is currently in beta so that should be interesting (could go either way). VST is also in final stages, no idea what is in store for me there. But whatever happens from here on, it's been one of the toughest, most rewarding and damn exciting things I've ever done in my life. I still get a kick from seeing people post in social media using my app! It's worth it for that alone!

Your app was a top seller on my site from 2018 one of the top 5. I will dig up the states from my affiliate account and share but I can say we sold hundreds.

dendy

@WillieNegus said:

@AndyPlankton
@WillieNegus Maybe Android is the ‘reach’ needed ?

However, for an indie dev that opportunity may not be ideal as supporting complex apps on that splintered platform is expensive. How many test devices do you need, which version of Android is installed on how many different devices and a host of other concerns at the core of why Android App Store is still lagging so far behind. I imagine funding or bodies are needed although Caustic did it and Stagelight is looking to take it further.

Plus piracy ! On android it is enormous compared to almost no piracy on iOS. Also very important argument against Android.

kobamoto

@MrSmileZ said:

mpc live never crashed once, and I have one from the first cursed batch, like comparing oranges from Jupiter to apples from mars.

agreed would never buy a sampler based on the library.. there are some good things coming, disk streaming is one of them.

Oh wow I’ve had 2 complete crashes that had to be restarted due to unresponsive screen etc, I’ve had some sketchy behavior with the headphone output just recently, plenty of weird little hangs here and there when sequencing where there were stuck notes...so I would consider you fortunate so far. Not to mention the update before last which was almost a nightmare.

Do you have inside knowledge? If so, is sidechain coming? Multitimbral midi in?

it's not inside knowledge but akai says those things are on the way.

many people have had issues with their machines, I know of several that had to return a machine more than once so there were definitely issues.. to be fair some people were so unfamiliar with how an mpc works that they thought somethings were bugs that weren't like the current way multitimbrality works but there are definitely real kinks that they are working out... I've always just been lucky I guess owning many mpcs and never having any problems with any of them. I wish I could say the same for the iOS impc apps

kobamoto

I wouldn't sleep on the mpc lives features though.. if you look in the manual there are plenty of things it can do that bm3s sequencer can't, midi merge, and track explode for example. I actually got mine for less than $950 new and I don't know anyone who spent 1300 on one they might have got you on that one... but more importantly an iPad, a midi controller for the iPad, and bm3 won't feel even close to the same feeling as an Mpc live. the live with a pair of headphones is just a very engaging and intimate experience compared to imho the convoluted nature of bm3, each of them put me in two different moods and I have to be in two different moods to use each of them.

MrSmileZ

i have read the entire mpclive manual, watched the entire tutorial series, and ive read the entire mpclive bible. I have also watched about every tutorial there is on youtube. The engine of the mpclive Is not as powerful as the engine of bm3. Its no contest there...modulation alone will expose this. Bm3 will also “explode tracks” it’ll export each and every pad as a stem. Midi IN multitimbrality doesnt work period. Which is quite comical for a Midi Production Center.

All midi in just goes to the current selected track...super terrible. I honestly cant believe this was put out with that issue. Unless you are going to play 1 patch with 32 similtaneous controllers the two midi ins are totally nonfunctional.

I paid around 1300.00 because I bought it new, I also purchased an internal ssd hard drive and a hard case.

The mpclive has a few problems that needs to be worked out. Beatmaker3 has a few issues that need to be worked out. Beatmaker 3 is cheaper than the mpclive and it is also more powerful stand alone...in many ways..modulation, layers, streaming, pitch/timestretch, number of audio tracks, midi in flexibility, and au plugs...

I havent changed my opinion, but i enjoyed our talk. Have a good one

kobamoto

@MrSmileZ said:
i have read the entire mpclive manual, watched the entire tutorial series, and ive read the entire mpclive bible. I have also watched about every tutorial there is on youtube. The engine of the mpclive Is not as powerful as the engine of bm3. Its no contest there...modulation alone will expose this. Bm3 will also “explode tracks” it’ll export each and every pad as a stem. Midi IN multitimbrality doesnt work period. Which is quite comical for a Midi Production Center.

track stem export which just about everybody does is not the same thing as track explode, track explode is a sequencer based feature that explodes the notes on one sequence into many tracks within that sequence, kind of the reverse of midi track merge, it's a great feature for something simple like recording or taking a sampled drum break and putting each element on it's own sep track with the click of a button like the ableton drum rack slices to individual midi tracks , all the way to some more creative uses..

the midi in multitimbrality isn't a bug, the reason they released it this way is that it's been this way for all of the mpcs from the get go.... how many decades has that been?... I wouldn't personally describe the success of that method as comical as it's been working perfectly all of this time.. the thought behind it is that it was a focused workstation for one person so multitimbrality works but only records for 1 track at a time, and plays back as many tracks as you want simultaneously on playback.... where I agree with you is that I wish that you could record more than one track at a time so we could be jamming together with others and do it all at once, luckily akai have listened and that feature is being implemented in a near future update.

anyways no worries man I'm not trying to change your mind about anything, like you I own and use both as I see fit, right now I'm currently using elektron and ableton more than the mpc or bm3, I'm just talking beat machines here .

I wish bm3 had the pad freeze feature of the mpc as I think it would be incredible for sound design on the go if you could bring up kits on the iPad and run them through all kinds of FX and then stack and print those Fx right to the samples, right on their pads, on a per pad basis. If it could do that I'd be using bm3 to build kits for all of my hardware

pauly

@deltaVaudio said:
I've gradually raised the price from £3 to £6 since then after implementing the missing features (AUv3 support, MIDI and state saving/presets). The minimum viable product approach seems to be a good strategy for an unknown indie dev such as myself.

The threat of a price hike is what made me actually buy. I've actually been on the beta pretty well constantly since before launch.

@SevenSystems said:
@brambos I guess the cure for the "Updates don't bring sales" problem is: use updates only for critical fixes, and instead keep working on new features in the backyard for a year or two, and then just release a new app "2.0". And hope people aren't pissed

I think that's totally legit. The only time I feel ripped off is when the old version stops working, as in the 32 to 64 bit change.

I'm not sure about having to repurchase IAPs though, although I tend to avoid apps with locked functionality and never buy sound packs.