So what is the problem with demanding certain clarifications when one is paying a considerable amount of money for such a license, especially when updates may be buggy or bring features that a customer prefers to avoid for the time being?
Ever heard of customer rights? The fact that software is licensed does not remove those rights from existence. It is not because you own certain IPR that you can do whatever you want vis-à-vis your customers.
I am still on Mojave on my Mac and do NOT intend to move to Catalina or Big Sur anytime soon, given their deprecation of 32-bit apps (i.e. a LOT of apps/games I still use), dumbing down of iTunes and so on. There ARE legitimate reasons for one to avoid updating.
New versions may surely bring new dependencies; but as long as these are not essential, one can easily use an older version. Heck, an older iPhone 5C still acts as a Tidal endpoint even though it is far from being the latest version.
So refrain from making such snarky comments; they are not called for here.
Just like you, I’ll voice my opinion on this forum if I want to (after all, this is not a dictatorship as previously determined in this thread). If you don’t like my opinion, feel free to move along!
1 Like
SukieInTheGraveyard
(This one time, at Bandcamp... I spent too much money!)
23
I’m struggling to see what customer rights Roon is breaking.
You can demand anything that you like, that’s up to you. After paying for a subscription, Roon is legally obliged to provide that which is detailed in T&Cs. If, subsequently, you decide that you don’t want to continue with Roon, you take your business elsewhere.
If Roon want to keep their customers then they need to provide good customer service and/or a unique product. Customer service though is very different from customer rights.
It’s in the terms of conditions that you agreed to when signing up. I suggest you read through before you sign on the dotted line. If you chose not to read it then you have nobody to blame but yourself.
It is perfectly fine for Roon to block downgrades once an update is accepted by a customer; yet it is not necessarily fine for them to simply stop a previous version from working, as this may indeed go against customer rights in many jurisdictions (unless there is a clear technological reason for such a deprecation).
Tidal on my older iPhone 5C continues to work despite being several releases behind; Mojave continues to work on my Mac; and likewise for countless other pieces of software.
Moreover, I was basically responding to the snarky comment that paying customers who are concerned about such deprecation are “entitled”. They are NOT; they are the ones keeping Roon’s business alive - so at a minimum they deserve respect for their money.
If you think contractual freedom is absolute, you should take an online course in law - a paid license does not equate an unlimited mandate for the licensor to do whatever it wants in the market.
As a software developer who went to Stanford and has worked at both Microsoft and Google, it’s both necessary and easy to support old software versions within reasonable limits. That includes Office 365 [on the Mac].
You may not like it [Moderated], but it takes a lazy company to claim as much shareware to be their own as Roon does and still charge for it. I call it the Silberman effect.
I like Roon, but am getting tired of all these damned audiophiles thinking that it has to cost a lot to be good.
Totally agreed. I say that as a Silicon Valley developer who hates the subscription model, specificically because it forces companies into supplying poor support because no one can really keep up, not even the in-house developers who write the damned code.
Roon always was a developing product, it’s never ‘done, and as such it evolves. They have clearly stated they don’t support old versions.
That’s the deal, like it or lump it.
Who knows, down the road things may evolve to supporting old versions, but I wouldn’t hold my breath.
Personally, based on experience from the very beginning, I can’t wait as every upgrade has been progress.
You’ll be telling us Dr Dre pops round to rip your mp3’s next.
12 Likes
SukieInTheGraveyard
(This one time, at Bandcamp... I spent too much money!)
34
That may well be the case, but Roon has decided not to do this and have put their decision in the T&Cs. This might not be palatable to some, but it transgresses no consumer rights and is a perfectly acceptable business model.
In my 300 years as a horse maker I can tell you that it’s really easy to maintain 3, 4 and 5 legged horses in the same stable with very little financial overhead.
You can absolutely not take the update, but things may stop working at some point in the future. It won’t happen right away. For example, you can’t really use Roon 1.0 in its fully glory anymore – the servers & services that it ran on no longer exist.
We also will not provide any support for anything but the latest version, but that doesn’t mean you can’t use it if it works for you.
There is cost associated with maintaining and supporting older versions of software, and while we have no intention to disable1.7 or earlier versions, they do degrade with time until they are “unusable”… but it does take time.
As for “customer rights”, be clear that you are buying into an ever-changing service, and not a singular version of software.
Sad to me that this thread has brought out the insulting and nasty nature of certain individuals. I always find it comical when people need to trot out their credentials before they make a statement … typically a sad attempt to impress and add weight to what is only their opinion.
For people that want to genuinely understand the overhead of maintaining multiple versions of a piece of software you need to understand the ecosystem that piece of software lives in and the rigorous testing required to ensure it correctly functions. This is relative to the fundamental cost of developing the unique piece of software you author.
One thing I didn’t know was that there was a university that offered courses in childish name calling and that is was a valued skill at major tech companies
Personally, I’ve not seen anything in the 5 emails we have received that would cause me concern with the update to Roon 1.8. If I was concerned, I would go to Settings - About - Core - Cog and turn off automatic updates. Then, sit back and see what experience other users report.
What we know for sure is you cannot downgrade to Roon 1.7 once you have upgraded to Roon 1.8. We also know Roon is not going to disable Roon 1.7, but it will probably degrade over time to the point it becomes unusable sometime in the future.
Personally, I look forward to Roon 1.8 and I’m not someone who normally likes software updates just for aesthetical reasons. I mostly just play my 2200 linked albums in Tidal and Qobuz. I’m looking forward to using Roon to a greater capability.
