Voltage Modular Feature Requests

[GusGranite]

So how are we looking? Is 2025 the year for a Voltage Modular update? It's a wonderful platform and totally worth it. It would be great to hear from the developers on what the roadmap looks like.

[woau]

No response from the developers most of the time means no updates.

Its just frustrating there isn't more transparency from cherry audio on future updates. A simple 'we have no new updates planned at the moment' or 'we are working on a update' would be fine.

But this way you basically keep people on a lease endlessly guessing whether there will be an update, to ensure theyt don't leave. To me its bad business practise and doesn't promote trust in a company

[GusGranite]

It’s so frustrating. It’s been years now. If the sole reason is that VM doesn’t make as much money as the classic synth emulations then maybe they can get creative. Open it up so some third party developers or something? Create a VM dev/beta program that rewards commits to the core application? I don’t know. It feels a bit like life support at this point. Such a shame. It really is still my favourite virtual modular platform.

[SpaceDog]

Absolutely understood. I don't want to conflate "feature" with the need to update to a major version. Minor version updates also generally get new features. I'm simply trying to be clear that we have not abandoned VM or left it to module developers. That I cannot announce a "VM 3.0" does not mean the platform is dying/dead, or that features cannot be considered in the meantime. And just because the dev team is busy does not mean this thread or VM itself is being ignored. Apologies if I caused any confusion, I had a few threads and some recent messages in mind when I was writing up that reply, but this is the thread I wanted to address the most.

Whilst we're getting all chatty about CA supporting VM, I did a trawl back and the above post is, I beieve, the last time CA interacted on this thread, which was Fri May 19, 2023. From a personal perspective, I can get exactly what I want out of VM and any niggles are probably quite personal to my way of working and/or preferences for layout, etc.

I really don't expect CA to reply regularly, or even provide detail on their product pipeline; however, I do feel that VM has been very much left to third party Devs to provide the continuing "interest". Sadly (and very much IMO), I've felt that a lot of what's been popping up is very much a rehash of what I have already. Now, it may be that it's difficult to do something really innovative and when some people do it's taken them a lot of development time that they would like to see repaid; however, CA themselves could be adding to the body of work with some quality (and innovative) modules. That alone would show some focus, never mind the now semi-mythical VM 3.0.

To throw my opinions about with wild abandon even further, whilst it's immensely useful (and potentially cathartic) to list wished-for improvements, it's ultimatey going to disappoint (IMO, of course). CA have both company and market momentum based on issuing products that satisfy a very certain type of customer itch. They are praised and rewarded for doing that, so expecting them to do otherwise is a form of madness. I'd love to be wrong, and I would admit so of course, and that amazing update could roll out really soon. We're already bought in and using it and new customers are presented with a very good product, although now it's one that sits alongside a large number of emulations that are a lot more tempting for most.

We live in a world that increasingly likes "preset machines" and instant gratification. CA have spotted that and have pulled presets out of the main issue and now charge separatately; there are also third party preset sellers. I'd imagine the vast majority of users are simply selecting presets and maybe tweaking the filter a bit. A modular is a few levels up from that and does require a bit more investment in learning. I believe the market loves nice sounding preset machines and is willing to pay for them. There are still users out there who love to dig into an emulation of an old synth and they may even have owned the original decades ago. I can get lost in finding those sounds that I heard in my youth listening to Tangerine Dream and Klaus Schulze in the late 70's onwards and, for me, that includes mining what VM can do as well.

I've wobbled on enough... My point...? Use what we have and enjoy it. In the same way as hardware is limited, embrace the niggles and shortfalls and continue to work around them. Keep a list of wishes (bugs should go to support), but don't expect CA to react, allow them the space to do what they do and if that sweeps across VM we'll get the benefit. If they don't, we always have a choice to dump our sunk costs (mine are high) and try another pasture to see if it's really that much greener. Personally, I'd love to see how they could improve VM, but I won't get annoyed with them if they focus elsewhere.

As always, other opinons are allowed to coexist

[woau]

It’s so frustrating. It’s been years now. If the sole reason is that VM doesn’t make as much money as the classic synth emulations then maybe they can get creative. Open it up so some third party developers or something? Create a VM dev/beta program that rewards commits to the core application? I don’t know. It feels a bit like life support at this point. Such a shame. It really is still my favourite virtual modular platform.

That is the reason, and i can understand it. However, not communicating current plans is what annoys me the most. Do it out of respect of your current customers, we know you are reading this

[SpaceDog]

It’s so frustrating. It’s been years now. If the sole reason is that VM doesn’t make as much money as the classic synth emulations then maybe they can get creative. Open it up so some third party developers or something? Create a VM dev/beta program that rewards commits to the core application? I don’t know. It feels a bit like life support at this point. Such a shame. It really is still my favourite virtual modular platform.

That is the reason, and i can understand it. However, not communicating current plans is what annoys me the most. Do it out of respect of your current customers, we know you are reading this

One key point in persuasion (or maybe call it negotiation), especially when you're asking for something that so obviously goes against a policy or methodology is not to berate or lay down what the other person should be doing. I wrote a lot of opinion, and I accept that nobody has to agree with it. My hope was to provide a pathway that at least allows CA the option of route to reply. To be fair, I believe they do respect their customers. They also absolutely do not need to share their product development with us.

Some reflection would show that it's quite a tightly contested market with a need to have parallel development streams to be able to bring the right thing out at the right time. Picking the right products to develop or improve is how CA will survive. CA will likely be running very frequent prioritisation exercises, holding them up against what they think the market is doing. Why would they show their hand to the advantage of others. Bluntly, updating VM has its place. Consider the call to improve the GUI for some of the earlier intruments, or the call for improvements to those same earlier issues. Actually, VM hasn't done badly with a serious GUI overhaul and several other major improvements.

I do think we're important to them, but so is their business. And it's just that, their business is their business. Personally, I consider my business to be making the best of their instruments to make music. VM is a brilliant tool and it's working more than well enough to help me.

As always, other opinions can coexist. This is a discussion forum, after all, not a rantfest.

[woau]

It’s so frustrating. It’s been years now. If the sole reason is that VM doesn’t make as much money as the classic synth emulations then maybe they can get creative. Open it up so some third party developers or something? Create a VM dev/beta program that rewards commits to the core application? I don’t know. It feels a bit like life support at this point. Such a shame. It really is still my favourite virtual modular platform.

That is the reason, and i can understand it. However, not communicating current plans is what annoys me the most. Do it out of respect of your current customers, we know you are reading this

One key point in persuasion (or maybe call it negotiation), especially when you're asking for something that so obviously goes against a policy or methodology is not to berate or lay down what the other person should be doing. I wrote a lot of opinion, and I accept that nobody has to agree with it. My hope was to provide a pathway that at least allows CA the option of route to reply. To be fair, I believe they do respect their customers. They also absolutely do not need to share their product development with us.

Some reflection would show that it's quite a tightly contested market with a need to have parallel development streams to be able to bring the right thing out at the right time. Picking the right products to develop or improve is how CA will survive. CA will likely be running very frequent prioritisation exercises, holding them up against what they think the market is doing. Why would they show their hand to the advantage of others. Bluntly, updating VM has its place. Consider the call to improve the GUI for some of the earlier intruments, or the call for improvements to those same earlier issues. Actually, VM hasn't done badly with a serious GUI overhaul and several other major improvements.

I do think we're important to them, but so is their business. And it's just that, their business is their business. Personally, I consider my business to making the best of their instruments to make music. VM is a brilliant tool and it's working more than well enough to help me.

As always, other opinions can coexist. This is a discussion forum, after all, not a rantfest.

Nobody needs to do anything. But it is my opinion that not communicating the plans of a product with customers, especially when asked for months on months, is bad business practise and will lead to a reduce trust in a company. And i will also act accordingly.

Again, saying ' we have no current plans' is also sharing. There is no expectation other then communication