2009
I had to cram so many things to store everything in there...
-David Bowie, "Five Years"
Last week was Audio Damage's fifth anniversary. In that time we've released 21 plugins (counting three different versions of Discord), dealt with the abject stupidity of Digidesign, the flighty schizophrenia of Apple, and the bovine stalwartness of Microsoft. We've made plugins for XP, Vista, OS9, OSX 10.2, 10.3, 10.4, 10.5, and soon 10.6. We've made VST2.3 and VST2.4 plugins with VSTGUI 2.3, 2.4, 3.0, and 3.5, along with RTAS for OS9 (briefly), AU for 10.2, AU for 10.3, and AU for 10.4 and onwards, in three distinctly different versions of Xcode, CodeWarrior, and two more-or-less the same versions of Visual Studio. Some time in the immediate future, we'll have to man up and make VST3 plugins, too.
To make those 21 products, I've personally made about 100 nearly complete user interfaces, and spent a sum total of what has to be many months, if not years, staring at Photoshop CS and 3D Studio Max. Adam has coded well over 200 individual DSP blocks, along with a couple dozen user interface objects and a complete parameter management system, among many other important things you don't see, but make plugins work. We've put up with documentation (or the lack thereof) that is truly awful, from companies that should know better. We've seen at least three plug-in formats that we know of either come and go, or never get out of the starting gates. I assume there are more that we don't know about.
We've thrown a few elbows in the industry, made a lot of friends, bought a bunch of ads, faced some fairly intense competition, bitched and moaned about inconsequential shit, and dealt with shit that isn't inconsequential at all. We've moved the corporation from one state to another and moved my actual ass to a different state entirely. We've put up with rampant idiocy from people that style themselves members of the creative community but are actually members of some kind of bullshit that doesn't have a name.
We've also met a metric shitload of extremely cool people, made what we think are some pretty good plug-ins, and had a lot of laughs. This business fucking rocks, no doubt about it, and you'd have a hard time getting me to go hunting for a new job. Adam and I would like to thank each and every person that has supported our little company through its birthing pains. The road is wide open from here, and here's to hoping for a 10 year anniversary post in 2014.
You'd think by now that I'd've learned to not fall for such things. :-)
--Adam
posted January 23, 2009 by studio nebula
Three? DX/DXI, VST3. What else?
posted January 23, 2009 by shamann
Happy 5th Birthday, AD! These are your cute years! In another decade or so, your voice will crack and you'll become so obsessed with girls that you won't be able to concentrate on plug-ins.
Awkward times ahead.
- c
posted January 23, 2009 by beauty pill
well at least that pyramid-headed dude gave you a link...
that was nice of him... o_O
posted January 23, 2009 by Raytrace
posted January 23, 2009 by 7point62
posted January 23, 2009 by noisegeek
This is intense, dudes. First off, I'm sorry and it was totally stupid to "brag" about using pirated versions of AD's plugins. I wrote AD an email saying this much and more. I hope we work it out.
Have all of you really purchased every piece of software that you use?
Those YACHT tracks on your hard drives you're deleting, did you BUY them? I'm a musician and I haven't bought music in years, nor have almost all of my musician friends. If you didn't buy those tracks, how is this different than my stealing of the AD plugins?
Nobody is innocent when it comes to piracy, and most of the time we don't realize that the people we hurt could be our friends in a different situation. It's rare to come to face-to-face with the people behind the software, music, and media we pirate on regular basis; I guess that's part of the problem.
Here's the thing, and it's fucked up for software developers for sure, but I see software piracy as a liberation of sorts, and that's all I was trying to promote in the interview. All of these tools exist now to level the playing field so people don't have to spend thousands of dollars on recording studios, web development, advertising, promotion, video editing, production, etc. In an ideal world, this wouldn't be about money, just the idea that everyone could start have the same shot at using awesome software and tools to realize their ideas without being limited by lack of money and resources. I've done almost literally everything on my own regarding media and music creation and I wouldn't have been able to if I'd have to pay for all of it. Obviously I'm not talking about AD's $49 plugins, but shit like $1299 editing suites, etc.
To clarify: none of the laptops I bought we're $2-$3K. The most expensive was the 12" PowerBook, and that was $1,599.
I don't have a design job, YACHT is my full-time job.
I rarely wear my asshat. RARELY.
Any other questions? Y'all are quick to become mean S.O.B.s.
posted January 23, 2009 by YACHT
5 years in any part/corner/aspect of Music is a success.
I've only found out about your work thru joining and reading blogs this last 3 months.
(an aside: I read with glee that Yacht paid for something, although he mentions it with such regret.
Till he paid for the software his computer was just a gun used in holdups against developers.
He's now part of our community that pay developers to remain in the game. He is slowly becoming a 'Man' leaving behind his boyish ways.
I watched a video last night at a gig (yes, I play music) in the set break. It had this hardcore techno with young adults bouncing and prancing in the fields wearing tie-dyed cheesecloth shirts billowing in the breezy wheat-fields of the director's mind. So beautiful, so back-to-nature, so +ve... such a manipulation, product placement, tinseltown vomit.
Somewhere Yacht aspires to dwell in his virtual talent world?
It's his regret to pay that angers me so much. And the bird signs in the pics. No face, so he's just a bunch of words.
F*ck Jona Bechtoit. May he remain in the darkness of his being, may his vibrations modulate his universe to where the sun don't shine. Fk all the non-payers like Jona out there. I pray he gets his Real Estate license like his dad really wants.)
Well done Chris, mighty, mighty.
posted January 23, 2009 by Funkish Bass
posted January 23, 2009 by sszzeepp
Thanks also for the YACHT, there's something mildly comforting about having the f@cktards of the universe identified...we know who and what to avoid well in advance.
posted January 23, 2009 by quantize