Hello Reaper
I've been getting great reviews for my 'Optimal Reaper', and have been surprised at what good guitar effects I have been able to build using Reaper plug-ins. At least as good as any I could produce using Amplitude and BIA FX.
I could do much better with your help. I could 'design' interfaces that are REALLY intuitive, without being unecessarily 'showy'. Most of the presets that the most popular guitar effects software comes with are unusable to my ears. I have to spend hours just 'weeding out' the totally useless presets, and then trying to make the ones that show potential reach that potential. But apart from a few simple 'clean' sounds, and the obvious 'delays' and 'choruses', and 'distortion', I always ended up far from my sonic objective.
With Reaper I can really apply 'evolutionary hit and miss', based on some reasonable expectations about what effect changing a paramater might / should have, and some willingness, like evolution itself, to ruthlessly binge and purge, with my own ego the only victim i.e admitting 'this sounds crap' and moving on. Trying something new. Over and over. Doing 'random' stuff. Just to see / hear how it sounds.
Like with all my guides, I write for myself, as a reference. So I devote time and energy and endure frustration I probably wouldn't invest if it were 'just a job'. Already I've 'donated' years of unpaid labor to your product. Making it accessible. More attractive. More user-friendly. I will never earn even minimum wage for the hours I've put into 'Optimal Reaper' alone. Let alone ALL my guides. So it is not about money.
If YOU don't profit from anything I do, I don't expect you to reward ME.
But if you would work WITH me, in 'constructing' a few user interfaces, offering adjustments of the paramaters I need to adjust, I could take Reaper to the next level, on computers and smart phones. Replacing the current 'competition' with ease.
I know what frustrates users. I get frustrated. I can write great copy. I never 'pretend' I've explained something. I am ruthless on my own work. Though I need proof reading as any writer does. And I have to leave most of my books 'unfinished', as any honest, and competent, writer will admit. After all, the final 'copy' is 'written' by the reader, in their own mind.
First suggestion. Don't have linear sliders on everything. Often the adjustment range is very small, compared to the lenght of the slider, and thus to make these tiny adjustments, on a typical laptop, let alone smart phone or tablet, is very frustrating. IF there IS a slider, people will go to it first. They won't enter in values. And when that slider is NOT user friendly, and the changes a small movement makes are massive, and NOT 'musical', and produce a mess, most people just conclude 'This is not really something I can use musically'. If you replace SOME sliders with NON-linear sliders, and limit them to the 'musical' range of modulation, people will get a GREAT IMMEDIATE SUCCESS, and ASSOCIATE your product with SATISFACTION. Not FRUSTRATION. I initially gave up on the Reaper plug-ins. It was only when I came back to Reaper, after realising I was not happy with the alternatives (Amplitude, BIAS FX) either, and pushed through the initial frustrations and dissappointments, and really 'experimented', that I realised, in both senses of that term, he potential of the Reaper Plug-ins. Starting with my 'Mashing Muffins Green Russian Muff Klone'. And these are merely the 'fruits' of a few DAYS of hard work. I will continue to 'tweak' what I've already worked on, and then move onto vocal effects, when I begin recording my vocal tracks. And so on.
Consider what a 'professional' would charge for a few DAYS of their time. And that these plug-in effects are now FREELY AVAILABLE TO ANYONE. When considering my request for a free lifetime REAPER license.
I hope you won't treat YOUR customers, like Thomann.de, offer '100% satisfaction' and then blame the CUSTOMER when THEY are NOT satisfied, and 'blacklist' them. Blaming the victim. Like all religions blaming THEIR victims, when their 'pie in the sky' utopian visions are NOT realised as their 'theory' predicts, because IT is flawed. And simply DENYING these flaws. And 'ex-communicating' any 'whistle-blowers'.
What I mean is, you've produced a wonderful product. But it would benefit from the input of a 'Most stupid user' like myself (Dummster anzunehmender Benutzer in German). A NON-technical user. Someone who knows what Audio Engineering is all about, but who is working with the cheapest gear, the crappiest laptop, in the simplest 'home studio' and 'composing' and 'song writing' environment. This is YOUR 'niche'. YOUR 'Unique Selling Point'. I believe.
And as far as I can see, there is NO LIMIT to how far anyone can go with Reaper. Professional Studio users who have grown up with my 'Optimal Reaper' could be expected to evolve into REAPER based studio producers. In fact I find that what is GREAT about Reaper, in terms of flexibility, and scalability of platform (you can use Reaper on the humblest of computers, as I do, or the fastest super computers), more than outweigh any of the 'tricks and gizmos' offered by Pro Tools and others.
And if you would work with me, I could work out USER FRIENDLY and ACCESSIBLE alternatives to all the current 'high end boutique' audio tools on the market.
The problem with software is always the user interface. Designing it, like a home, from the END USER'S point of view. From the perspective of HOW USERS MIGHT POTENTIALLY BENEFIT FROM IT AND USE IT, rather than the technical specifications, and 'genius users / technically gifted / programmers' point of view.
Anyway, I appreciate the few minutes of YOUR time I took up. I haven't DEMANDED anything of you at all. Just asked you to consider, in return for all the benefits YOUR company is likely to reap from MY work, working with me on making YOUR product even better, and granting me a free lifetime REAPER license. So that I can stop using 'borrowed' software. And so I can finally record, mix, and master my coming album on REAPER.
Can you imagine the marketing potential of a succesful album written, recorded, mixed, and mastered, using YOUR product, from scratch? From composition to finaly product? All the potential for developing learning materials from that PROCESS. All with the REAPER brand ALL over it?
And yes, I would limit THOSE products to MUSIC. And keep politics and philosophy OUT of THAT.
I would like to work with someone taking my 'Optimal Reaper' configuration to the next level, graphically. There are other user interfaces that are prettier, but they don't have the functionality. I just need a few different 'finishes' / 'patina's e.g a 'brushed aluminimum' patina, a few 'pots', 'buttons that light up', and 'Optimal Reaper' would make Pro-Tools look 'cheap and nasty' in comparison.
If you worked with me, I could 'stream-line' the interface and tools, to match MY target users. You can keep your own set up. And integrate anything we produce together into it, as you please. But I want to work with you to offer a 'Guitarists Reaper' and a 'Vocalists Reaper' and a 'Home Studio Reaper' and a 'Smart Phone Mobile Reaper', set up to be as 'plug and play' and 'user friendly' and 'accessible' to the person who 'Has this guitar riff / vocal line phrasing / drum pattern' they 'want to get down immediately'. without waiting to load everything. Without having to look for tracks, presets, fiddle too much. Most 'useable' effects have a quite limited RANGE of values. And the controls should reflect this. And allow immediate access to THE MOST USEABLE PARAMATERS WITHIN THE MOST USEABLE RANGE OF VALUES.
Anyway, I hope you will take a look at my new 'Optimal Reaper' Configuration. I have just returned to music, after devoting years to 'political' and 'philosophical' issues that demanded my attention. So I am really just beginning. Which is EXACTLY where you need to 'catch' me. At the start. The best 'teachers' are those still learning themselves. Once we HAVE learnt, we forget most of what we learned, because we can now 'do', and anyone who CAN is usually unwilling to 'go back' to 'trying to work out HOW I do this / LEARNED HOW to do this'. It is backbreaking work. Nauseating. I go through it, as it is on my path, now. Once the path has been travelled, and the heights attained, it is almost impossible to 'retrace your steps'. And there is almost no amount of money you can offer someone to even TRY to do it.
when I consider what I WOULD have earned, over the last 30 years, in ANY minimum wage job, compared to what I've ACTUALLY earned, I quickly see why there are almost NO people doing what I do. And those doing so as Employees will NEVER put in the MASSIVE energy and focus required to do the job 'optimally'. They 'do their job'. And their 'peers' praise them. All in the same boat. But you could not put a financial figure on the personal costs involved in really 'doing the job right'.
You created REAPER out of passion. As a natural and logical development of your own interests.
I can take it to the next level (sadly I can't program myself) with that SAME sort of passion and interest.
IF you will help me. Work with me.
Of course I am working for YOU, at no cost. I have been. For years already. And soon YOU will reap the harvest that I have sown, with my 'Optimal Reaper' guide, Configuration, and now a new library of guitar effects, and soon vocal effects, drum effects, bass guitar effects, and so on.
For I chose to work with Reaper. To attempt to realise my OWN dreams. And as a generous person, I want to SHARE the fruits of my personal harvest, so that anyone, anywhere, with the most limited budget, time, and training, can reap the harvest of THEIR musical inspiration.
I think I sent you an early unedited version of my 'Optimal Reaper DAW Guide' that contained 'subject matter' not strictly related to music. It pained me to have to remove all that. But I made the exception for THIS guide. So that YOU might consider working with me.
If you decide NOT to, then I will have sacrificed a lot. My readers will have LOST a lot. And NO-ONE will have benefitted, from that 'self-censorship'. The most powerful censorship of all. For it can pretend the lie 'There IS no censorship', and thus no 'alternative' to 'seek out'.
Anyway, thanks for all your years of hard work in building the Reaper DAW. It is a great product. And I'm proving what can be done with it.
I would love to produce instructional videos to go with my Guide. But I find that the KEY element is clear, precise, COPY. Written instructions that can be re-read without the frustrating rewinding of videos, searching for 'that bit where he was talking about that thingy'. My videos would work from the same principle of user friendliness and accessibility. With one module broken down into many smaller videos, so you can 'quickly go back to a particular thing', and watch just THAT bit, over and over. Not spend hours editing a video to be able to use it.
Anyway, I could go on, but you haven't responded to any of my emails since I sent you the 'unedited' first version of the 'Optimal Reaper Guide'. And as a philosopher and truth seeker, I tend to 'offend' everyone. You can't call yourself an authentic 'philospher' until you've been run out of several cities, been threatened with death, ex-communicated, banished, demonised, and at least faced some form of 'crucifixion'. Most, like David Hume, avoid this by leaving their most 'important' works to be published ONLY AFTER they are dead, and can't be tortured, imprisoned, and cruelly murdered!
All the best
If you ever find that I have contributed to your bottom line, through my independent efforts, feel free to make a voluntary 'donation' to my TROONATNOOR project.
Again, I ask for a free lifetime license for Reaper. I have to use 'borrowed' copies to work with. I have earned around 1000 dollars from 30 years of hard work, from 26 titles. I live on a few dollars a day. I have done my entire life. I live in all sorts of poverty. But I won't live in a poverty of truth. In a 'riches' of lies. I'd rather leave this world than contribute to the evil in it, by any action or omission of my own.
So all the best
Like all philosophers, I have to focus on the seeds that I am sowing, rather than any harvest I can expect to reap, myself, during THIS life.
Markus Heinrich Rehbach
The Holistic Philosopher. The Philosopher-Prophet of The Protocols.