I must say, I do have to agree with the essence of what chris_3594 is saying: In the early days of VSL, users like us wanted to believe that a system like this could work, and were willing to spend $6,000 to see it happen. We liked everything that VSL stood for--intelligence, community, artistry--and we put our money where our mouths were. It's terrifically disappointing to see that VSL would essentially leave us out in the cold with the discontinuation of GS.
It should be clear to VSL by now that most users simply can't afford to upgrade every time VSL revises the architecture of their products (which is surprisingly frequent, given the breadth and depth of this software) and that what they bought 5 years ago would be more than just a piece of clever coding, but an ongoing relationship with VSL for their compositional tools.
We were the VSL evangelists, so let's all start acting like it.
Of course, it's not the fault of VSL that Tascam killed GS, but with the kind of monetary investment that VSL users must undertake, "upgrade paths" just don't cut it. After all, we're talking about a comprehensive sample modeling system here, not a loop CD. Our investment must be respected.
My proposed solutions?
1. Offer those original GS users an alternate format of the product they originally bought. Halion, Kontakt, ESX... I know nothing of these formats or of their host applications, but at least those users will be in a position to keep using their library in a format that hasn't been killed. (Don't want to go to the expense of pressing new DVDs of old software? Then make it a series of downloadable torrents. We have the technology.)
2. Offer those original GS users a means to convert their libraries to a usable/universal format. I know this isn't a very realistic scenario, but an unusable $6,000 sample library wasn't a realistic scenario either, yet here we are faced with it.
3. Offer a substantially more lenient upgrade path for original GS users. Trust me, I'm not paying another $6,000 (let alone $15,000) for what is evidently no longer a sure bet. We invested in VSL, and I think VSL could stand to invest in its users.
We scratch your back, you scratch ours.
Emlyn