Audiobus: Use your music apps together.

What is Audiobus? — Audiobus is an award-winning music app for iPhone and iPad which lets you use your other music apps together. Chain effects on your favourite synth, run the output of apps or Audio Units into an app like GarageBand or Loopy, or select a different audio interface output for each app. Route MIDI between apps — drive a synth from a MIDI sequencer, or add an arpeggiator to your MIDI keyboard — or sync with your external MIDI gear. And control your entire setup from a MIDI controller.

Download on the App Store

Audiobus is the app that makes the rest of your setup better.

Breakout discussion of pricing/business models from Loopy Pro thread

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Comments

  • HmtxHmtx

    I think the model and price is mostly good. A few thoughts:

    • many users will probably approach it like @0tolerance4silence is suggesting. They would rather pay for an upgrade instead of pay for the possibility of upgrades. So after the year is up I think you will have a lot of people who will gladly drop off the list and then wait to sign up for another year when they see a new development that they want to have.
    • you’ll also have fanboys like me who just love the app, believe in you, and will pay each year happily no matter what features show up. BUT what if in a specific year by some circumstance you end up unable to make any improvements. You might have some unhappy customers.
    • definitions - I think the most important part of this is how you present the pricing to customers. It will be critical to find a way to not call this a subscription IAP. (because it’s not). It is a demo unlock. Or a feature unlock. And then the app is fully functional for as long as the buyer has an iTunes account. That’s the same as any non-IAP app purchase. So it would be misleading to think of this as an IAP subscription.
    • recurring upgrade subscriptions. I think you could wait on this decision, since you plan to give full access for the first year to anyone who pays to unlock the demo. So it’s more a question of what to do after year one or for version 2.0. So when the time comes… I don’t like the time- limited upgrade subscription idea. I would rather pay for major version upgrades. If there were a way to do this inside AppStore’s IAP limitations, wouldn’t that be better for you and for users? Or maybe Could you offer both? a “full version 2” IAP that gets all the version 2 features after they’ve been implemented. Then a “developers release 2.x “ subscription that will get each new 2.x feature as it comes out. I think some of us would pay extra to get the developer’s subscription.
  • MidiVanHalenMidiVanHalen

    As long as I can purchase and download from desktop into iTunes 12.6.3 to then load onto my never online ipads, I'll pay top dollar for a great app. Otherwise I'll have to let the ship sail.

  • HannesHannes

    @0tolerance4silence said:

    @Hannes said:
    What I like is that the user can decide whether he wants to pay for the new features or not and can regardless of it be certain, that he can work with the app in the future!

    Interesting, I see this model to be the opposite of what you described…
    1) you are not paying for features but continued development (it may include features you don’t necessarily need) - just like subscription
    2) you are paying for ‘promised features’ (to be developed in the following year), rather than delivered ones - just like subscription

    Maybe I’m misunderstanding the whole thing :D

    I understood it the way you did.
    The point I wanted to emphasise was, that you can be more certain that loopy pro will work after e.g. iOS updates compared to other apps, where the developer stops development after release to work on new apps. And this is true also for users who are not willing to pay for future features.

  • ChimmyChungaFaceChimmyChungaFace

    If an iOS update breaks the version you're on, which is a very real possibility, then you're forced to update.

    That's the only drawback I see. It's a shame Apple can't update their operating systems better, but that's where we are.

  • orandorand

    @ChimmyChungaFace said:
    If an iOS update breaks the version you're on, which is a very real possibility, then you're forced to update.

    That's the only drawback I see. It's a shame Apple can't update their operating systems better, but that's where we are.

    I don’t see any drawback with this scenario. The app will be updated to deal with any iOS breaking changes, and you’ll get those fixes for free, for the lifetime of the app. No additional IAP needed.

  • ChimmyChungaFaceChimmyChungaFace
    edited December 2021

    @orand said:

    @ChimmyChungaFace said:
    If an iOS update breaks the version you're on, which is a very real possibility, then you're forced to update.

    That's the only drawback I see. It's a shame Apple can't update their operating systems better, but that's where we are.

    I don’t see any drawback with this scenario. The app will be updated to deal with any iOS breaking changes, and you’ll get those fixes for free, for the lifetime of the app. No additional IAP needed.

    Maybe I'm missing something here, but if you're on say version 1.1 and the 12 months are up, then an iOS update breaks it and a new 1.2 update to the app will be needed to fix it and you're out of luck.

    Unless they changed the way updates work, so that they have simultaneous versions running. So in the same scenario a 1.1.1 version could fix the expired versions, with say a 2.1 update also released.

    I don't know haven't been following it very closely, just saw the in app purchases.

    Not a huge deal either way. The price is ultimately relatively small, especially if you use it a lot. Though if other apps start doing the same thing, it will start to add up.

  • wimwim

    @ChimmyChungaFace said:
    If an iOS update breaks the version you're on, which is a very real possibility, then you're forced to update.

    That's the only drawback I see. It's a shame Apple can't update their operating systems better, but that's where we are.

    If that happens, fixes are included for the existing app you have at no charge. Upgrade pricing is only for new features. I don’t know how this is managed under the hood, but that’s how Michael has determined it will work. I’m sure he has researched it carefully.

    There’s another app, Working Copy, that has operated like this for some time.

  • ChimmyChungaFaceChimmyChungaFace

    @wim said:

    @ChimmyChungaFace said:
    If an iOS update breaks the version you're on, which is a very real possibility, then you're forced to update.

    That's the only drawback I see. It's a shame Apple can't update their operating systems better, but that's where we are.

    If that happens, fixes are included for the existing app you have at no charge. Upgrade pricing is only for new features. I don’t know how this is managed under the hood, but that’s how Michael has determined it will work. I’m sure he has researched it carefully.

    There’s another app, Working Copy, that has operated like this for some time.

    Good to know. Thanks for clearing that up.

    And with that, I think the model is more than fair, and better than releasing another separate app altogether. Smart development by Apple to do it this way, much cleaner.

  • ervinervin
    edited December 2021

    @Hannes said:

    @0tolerance4silence said:

    @Hannes said:
    What I like is that the user can decide whether he wants to pay for the new features or not and can regardless of it be certain, that he can work with the app in the future!

    Interesting, I see this model to be the opposite of what you described…
    1) you are not paying for features but continued development (it may include features you don’t necessarily need) - just like subscription
    2) you are paying for ‘promised features’ (to be developed in the following year), rather than delivered ones - just like subscription

    Maybe I’m misunderstanding the whole thing :D

    I understood it the way you did.
    The point I wanted to emphasise was, that you can be more certain that loopy pro will work after e.g. iOS updates compared to other apps, where the developer stops development after release to work on new apps. And this is true also for users who are not willing to pay for future features.

    You both seem to assume that the user pays for future (promised) features - which is certainly an option but not the only one. In Michael's system, it's perfectly possible to wait until you have enough new existing stuff to justify an upgrade - and that's when you pay again. The fact that you always get a year's worth of promises with it as well is just a bonus in that case.

    Same system, just different interpretations. I hope I'm not misunderstanding things because that's what I'm actually planning to do. :)

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