Reason Studios: Difference between revisions

Propellerhead Software was acquired by private equity firm Verdane in 2017<ref>{{Cite web |title=Reason Studios - Verdane |url=https://verdane.com/portfolio/reason-studios/ |url-status=live |access-date=23 Jun 2025 |website=[[Verdane]]}}</ref> and renamed to Reason Studios in mid-2019. After decades of sole adherence to a traditional perpetual-license and upgrade-pricing model, in January 2021 they introduced a subscription service. This is not unprecedented, and sometimes welcomed for price accessibility, but also widely resented as increasingly industry-standard practice for production software such as Adobe's Creative Cloud subscriptions. Reason does maintain availability of 'perpetual licenses' at this time, and their subscriptions do not employ contracts with early termination fees like Adobe's.

In May 2023, Reason Studios switched from a third party DRM provider (Codemeter by WIBU Systems) to an in-house solution, announcing<ref>{{Cite web |title=Upgrade At 60% Off And Say Bye To The Old Authorization System |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230601211140/https://reasonstudios.com/blog/offline/ |url-status=dead |access-date=01 Jun 2023 |website=[[Archive.org]]}}</ref> the discontinuation of offline activation with no replacement for all versions up to 11.x released in 2020. Information that remains today<ref>{{Cite web |title=Offline authorization is no longer available for Reason 11 and earlier |url=https://help.reasonstudios.com/hc/en-us/articles/13879491567378-Offline-authorization-is-no-longer-available-for-Reason-11-and-earlier |url-status=live |access-date=23 Jun 2025 |website=[[Reason Studios]]}}</ref> about the transition fails to make it clear whether versions prior to 8.x can still be activated online at all, but offline activations do remain active either in continuous installations or reinstallable if you bought a Codemeter dongle and loaded your licenses before the cutoff date in Sept 2023<ref>{{Cite web |title=Re: Offline authorization will be discontinued for R11 and earlier - This is serious |url=https://forum.reasontalk.com/viewtopic.php?p=648071#p648071 |url-status=live |access-date=23 Jun 2025 |website=[[ReasonTalk Forum]]}}</ref>. Aside from that, use cases (such as live performance) that make constant online connection unfeasible would require an upgrade. This move also breaches the rights conferred in respective EULAs to sell and/or transfer the purchased licenses. The company at least briefly offered a 60% discount for upgrades as part of the transition.

Reason's DRM system keeping tight control of all assets, and investment profit motive driving itemization and continuous monetization of features, lines up with broader industry trends that make assumptions about usage patterns and environments that frequently conflict with traditional customer needs and expectations of a product "purchased" for "perpetual" use. Because these are software tools employed to create media, access to that media you created either eventually or continuously requires payment for any time your own work is to be accessed.

While it is understandable that the continuous nature of software development necessitates a model that produces consistent income, there are several ways to accomplish that and some are more socially adaptive and customer-hostile than others. The relevant features include, among others: