I will post my opinion, with all due respect to @acunha and everyone else here. I have already posted not only opinions (this is a forum after all) but also ideas, outlined action plans, and proposed ways to mitigate the impending collapse of MOD as per Gianfranco’s public request on this particular thread and elsewhere.
And my opinion is: charging for upgrades is a very bad idea. Here are my reasons:
A. Whereas I understand the effort and investment that goes into upgrading a software, OS or firmware, in the case of the latter there is an inherent dependency that cannot be circumvented. You absolutely depends on the manufacturer’s actions towards their hardware. You can choose not to upgrade from, say, Ableton Live 10 to 11, because you can always look at Bitwig, Logic Pro, etc etc etc. With hardware there is no such option. Even if the core OS is open source, there’s the hardware layer that is not, so one cannot step in and provide an “alternate” OS/firmware.
B. In the case of software, your computer can accept other options and circumventions (like Mandolane’s MIDI fix MacOS’s lack of direct audio/midi routing many years ago). That ensured the continued operation and optimised workflow in the case of a major fumble by the parent company. Other additions, such as dedicated audio routing plugins/software are not essential, but make user’s life very easy. But if your hardware has a control issue, even if a plugin can offer a fix or relief, it ultimately has a problem that needs to be addressed or improved upon. (The DuoX for instance has a persistent crosstalk between channels that is a major problem.) So that brings the uncomfortable decision as to what will be charged and what won’t. Special features and content can be sold separately, but functionality is a different thing. An IR is a good example: you buy them separately for a specific and personal goal. But the LEDs indicating sound level in the MOD are a much needed functionality that allows you to properly gauge the signal coming in, and to charge for that doesn’t seem fair. You MUST separate what is understandable as an extra charge/investment, and what is a due improvement in your device – especially if it costs a considerable sum of money, like the Duo X.
C. The general dislike for paid upgrades has many roots that I won’t dwell into here. Suffices to say that Adobe has a leverage of extreme dependency on part of their users and a longstanding piracy issue due (allegedly) to the cost of their software that made sense – along with massive adoption – to migrate to a subscription model. Other examples given previously are software only; and other companies with hardware like Peloton have gone public, have massive investments, and build their “upgrades” along with a lot of added value and content for a product that has massive adoption. Mod devices hardly have a market share, let alone leverage for one such move.
D. @ssj71 anticipated me here with his take on people having multiple versions of a firmware:
Well, that was already happening with MOD: improvements made for the Dwarf came a lot later than for the Duo and Duo X. If the owner of a much more expensive unit watches the new features and improvements of the lesser unit, making them pay for what users who spent less money got for free is a big no-no.
E. Back when firmware lived on EEPROM chips, even a free upgrade was costly because you had to reprogram the chip or buy a new one from the manufacturer. Many times, upgrades were mainly bugfixes (as it happened with Digitech units so frequently), so the choice of not upgrading meant keeping one’s device somewhat faulty. When flash technology kicked in and an update was possible through USB, that eased the life of users and manufacturers alike. You may argue here that the “upgrade” is different than a bugfix “update” and that the mere fixing of problems could be made free and the big upgrades be paid, but that brings the issue of having different tiers of customers, with the ‘paying’ ones getting more attention from support than others. Also, unless you bring all bugfixes to all users at no cost, you can’t argue with a customer that the problem will be fixed “if you update to our latest version”. It is a nightmare in logistics, trust me. (Yes, the word here is logistics. You are producing different chunks of code to be delivered independently for different users. Apple can do that, pushing bugfixes for OS 10.9 up to OS 12. A small company just cannot.)
F. Worse yet, if there’s a new plugin on the block, that people want BUT they must upgrade to use it, you’ll incur in a situation where users are rightfully frustrated because you’re pushing an add-on that has an added cost for them.
Summarising, charging for curated content, premium assets, special features, this is all valid and acceptable – I would easily pay for pedalboards that take me where I want or close to without having to fiddle indefinitely with the device. Truth be told, some of the pedalboards I use the most were derived from sharead pedalboards from other users – @rogeriocouto and @Beilby are two that come to mind. What’s more, even some features can be paid options, such as guitar synth. Not all users want or need it, so that plugin and the functionality it brings can be an add-on. The same goes for some midi features. Other than paid premium plugins, you can map specific features that can be detached from the current ModOS offering, ship units without them and have them be add-ons. I’d have no problem paying again for Guitar Synth – though I think it still needs a threshold control.
Lastly, let’s not forget this:
Mod has shipped products to the market without a minimally acceptable instructions manual. Please don’t tell me the wiki was a manual. It’s a format that’s uninviting even for reference, let alone to be the source of information. And it was lacking as it was. So, to go and charge more for what once was free and not deliver the basics of a finished product may put you in a very bad spot.
These are my opinions and anyone may disagree.
– we want to develop our own products but lack the $$$. So we do client work and then use the money to develop our own stuff. I am not saying that this is the way for moddevices… but despite the supply chain troubles (which hit us hard), we were able to keep the boat afloat and things start looking better. But yeah. Product development is hard. Really hard.