Has Roon stated their intentions for what they would do if TIDAL were to go out-of-business

Mods have edited some posts to remove content that disparaged other posters and deleted some posts about those comments. Try to talk about the ideas rather than other posters.

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Have you tried Qobuz at all? I am cautiously optimistic about what the integration will bring.

As an example - album liners. Most companies that have a purchase and streaming model seem to let you have the liners if you buy an album. With Qobuz you get it on their streaming model too. If Roon has access to those it opens up a new avenue of interaction with your streamed music. They also do human curated music which still has some benefits over AI / ML curation today. Although ML does offer some interesting prospects in enriched metadata going forward.

Like I say - cautiously optimistic :slight_smile:

So there we have it. Conclusively. Is Tidal in trouble? Absolutely yes. If the integration goes well I’ll be cancelling my Tidal subscription. I’ll also be self publishing my memoirs on how I took down the Tidal empire by doing so.

No, I’m in USA where it’s not yet available. I haven’t felt a desire to use a VPN to check it out. I did sign up for an account a while back though somehow. When I log in, my profile is in French, and I can’t figure out how to change it to English :slight_smile: The UK link at the bottom of the page always takes me to the marketing page, but logging in is always in French.

It should be at least as good as TIDAL, shouldn’t it? Roon has repeatedly said they will only integrate with services if they can achieve the same experience as what we get with TIDAL. So, I guess it’s possible with Qobuz.

That would be really neat!

Yeah. I like TIDAL’s curated playlists. My breakdown of the services I use is:

  • TIDAL – integrates with Roon; CD quality; curated playlists; algorithmic suggestions are decent; library is okay but missing a lot
  • Apple Music – best library and it’s not even close; curated playlists are decent; radio is useless; not CD quality
  • Spotify – best algorithms by far; I love how it can suggest tracks to add to a playlist; library generally better than TIDAL, not as good as Apple Music; not CD quality

My dream is the Apple Music library, in CD quality, with Spotify algorithms, and Roon as the interface to it all…

Today, I use Apple Music to listen to anything and everything, Spotify to build playlists of individual songs, and Roon + TIDAL to explore deeply and listen in high quality.

Whether I switch from TIDAL to Qobuz depends entirely on how which one has the better library for me.

You make a compelling case. I subscribe to Tidal’s high res service and use it a lot. It would seem most people who would subscribe for high res would. That would not bode well for high res services.

But I wonder if there are parallels between the music streaming industry and the movie streaming industry? Netflix and Amazon Prime offer 4k content, and are actually spending a lot of money creating original content. The cost for streaming HD on Netflix family plan is half the price of Tidal High res family plan. Tidal is not creating content. The question then comes down to do people listen to music more than watching TV and the size of the user base. I also wonder how high, your high res needs to be. Much of what I listen to on Tidal is 16/96 FLAC without MQA and it sounds very good and I am typically very picky on the sound quality.

Perhaps if someone who wants that last degree of quality, they would prefer not to stream, and those people will be dCS’s target customer for sure. The parallel here is I am currently like this when it comes to Netflix. Their HD is still not as good as a physical disk. I’ll steam some shows because it is good enough, but when I want to see Black Panther, the 4k Ultra HD disk on my Oppo UHD 205 is what I went want.

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Mods have separated out this discussion into its own thread.

To my knowledge Roon have not said anything regarding their intentions if Tidal were to fold. I think it unlikely that they would publicly do so as they have an ongoing business relationship with Tidal which could be jeapordised by unwarranted speculation.

I can understand that users (like me !) would be keen to preserve their existing streaming libraries as integrated with Roon in the event that any streaming provider were to fail. Hopefully arrangements with Qobuz will result in a plurality of providers, perhaps with more to come. In that event I would hope in future that Roon could assist users to preserve their libraries (to the extent possible) when changing providers.

As to whether Roon should provide some refund to customers if Tidal should fail, I wouldn’t expect it myself. If I can be excused a metaphor I see Roon and Tidal as akin to cheese and gherkins. They go great together, but I wouldn’t expect to get a refund for my cheese simply because gherkins became unavailable.

What we all would like to see is a greater variety of gherkins.

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@PatMaddox, Roon does not say, or imply, that it will work with Tidal forever. They only say that it works with Tidal NOW. So, Tidal would in no way be violating any agreement. It’s like buying an internal combustion vehicle. You are buying it on the hopes that gasoline will be available as long as you have the vehicle. But, if gasoline suddenly became unavailable, there would not be any breach of any kind by the automaker. Unless a product or service EXPRESSLY states it is forever, it isn’t.

Now, if Roon itself eliminates capabilities that were promised as part of the license, that is a totally different scenario, totally unlike the Tidal scenario. Then Roon would be failing to hold up to their end of the license, and recourse would be totally reasonable.

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Where does it say only “NOW?”

Here’s from the Roon homepage:

“Music lovers have content from many sources, often acquired over years of collecting. Roon identifies your music, then enhances it with the latest metadata. And this isn’t just for your local files, it works for content from TIDAL too!”

I see nothing that says “NOW.”

Sounds like wishful thinking in an attempt to argue your position.

I also have to say I think the car and gas analogy seems like an awfully weak analogy to try and justify what I find to be a tenuous position that Roon isn’t marketing Tidal/streaming as a key feature of its project. C’mon man!

There is always the possibility that Tidal could decide it doesn’t want to integrate with anybody and stops providing the metadata feed to Roon. Who are you going to ask for a refund from then?

You clearly know and understand that Roon could, at any time, lose access to Tidal. Tidal could go out of business tomorrow. Anyone should be able to figure out that Tidal is its own company that Roon has no real control over other than what any contract between the two. That contract has no way to keep Tidal in business should they decide to close their doors.

What makes this even more clear is that you sign up for your Tidal account with Tidal. You agree to their terms and give them your credit card information. So you must know these are two separate companies.

Finally, if you read the Roon Labs Terms & Conditions under the “Other Services” section, you would have read this:

4.7 In addition, the Services and Third Party Materials that may be accessed from, displayed on or linked to from the Roon Software may not be available in all languages or in all countries or regions and we make no representation that such Services and Materials are appropriate or available for use in any particular location. Where you choose to use or access the Services and Third Party Materials, you do so at your own initiative and are responsible for compliance with any applicable laws, including but not limited to applicable local laws. We and our licensors reserve the right to change, suspend, remove, or disable access to any Services at any time without notice. In no event will we be liable for the removal of or disabling of access to any such Services. We may also impose limits on the use of or access to certain Services, in any case and without notice or liability.

The bolded text was done by me for emphasis.

There is nothing to make right.

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If Tidals fate is a concern, go annual until alternatives to Tidal are in place. I think others will follow if Qobuz comes in from the cold, perhaps with keener pricing or alternative catalogs. But there is considerable upheaval still to come in streaming, much of which is impossible to predict (including the fate of Tidal). The landscape will change but as long as Roon has alternative streaming partners we should be largely protected from those changes.

Concur with that advice Slim

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Too controlling, low quality but great library

It doesn’t need to say “now”. They do not say “it even works with Tidal, and will continue to do so forever’. The fact they only say “it even works with Tidal”, and nothing more, in and of itself, just by the wording, means “now” (or at the time of licensing). The wording is present tense, not future tense. As long as Roon does nothing to eliminate promised functionality, they are upholding what they promise, and not libel for instances like Tidel going out of business. Roon upheld their end by providing a program that works with Tidal at the time of licensing. There is no implication that there would be recourse if Tidal folds.

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I got the lifetime license about two months ago, as I expect Roon to be in business for more than 4.5 years in the future. It’s a gamble, albeit an educated gamble, based of everything I have read about Roon, and it’s history. I hope Qobuz launches in the US soon. As they currently seem to be a better option for ME, I would subscribe to them if pricing is reasonable. I did Tidal for 2-3 months back about three years ago, and was not happy with them. BUT, when Qobuz launches stateside, I will follow any changes in Tidal, Spotify, etc., and will gladly switch if anyone develops into a better option for me. The Streaming industry is in it’s infancy, and I expect to see many changes in the next 10-15 years, maybe a lot of termoil, and I will keep a close eye on all I can.

I think that if this is such a concern then it’s a good idea to start building a library of music you own. You do this slowly and over a lifetime.
Keep streaming and exploring also whilst you can, it’s such an amazing opportunity that was never available in my younger days. How quickly we take it all for granted…
Streaming is here to stay though IMHO.

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In my opinion an untended Roon, should Roon go out of business, would not be useful very long. Probably no third party metadata any longer, at least no updates, etc. If it was a version that was highly editable so that all of the service and content part of Roon could be manually replaced by the user, that would be a bit better.

That’s not the same as Tidal going under, but there is a potential domino effect. Integration with other streaming services is thus a good hedge for Roon.

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I think this horse is dead.

No…NO… it twitched! Beat it again!

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I find it curious how strongly people feel here about a question that evidently has nothing to do with them, and that they clearly have no knowledge about.

I’ve seen two answers to the stated question:

This one of course is broad CYA legalese that most any service uses to limit their liability, but doesn’t necessarily reflect their actual customer service policy.

The yearly-to-lifetime license upgrade is a simple example of a customer service policy that goes beyond the terms of the license. Nowhere in the license does it state that the remainder of the current year’s subscription can be credited toward a lifetime upgrade, yet it’s a policy Roon has chosen to implement.

The question was, “Has Roon stated their intentions for what they would do if TIDAL were to go out-of-business, with respect to license holders?” and so far the answer is “no, not beyond the terms and conditions which state they can disable any service at any time for any reason.”

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You find it ‘curious’ eh? Look, Pat. If TIDAL goes under, you get no refund or compensation. If ROON goes under, you get no refund or compensation. It may be better that that, but it won’t be worse. I find it curious that people can’t understand this.

And when you find anyone who has knowledge about what will happen in the future, let me know.

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I think it quite safe to say that no monies will be refunded to people by Roon Labs if access to Tidal, for whatever reason, is lost.

Please move on…