Moin,
at the Moment i have no valuable Upgrade on my CLZ Musik. since a few month.
Now i can’t start the Program.
Is this OK ore do i have to upgrade?
I hope you can understand my question.
Thank you
martin
Hi @martin1
You do not have to upgrade, when I check your account you are still completely okay and you can still use the software.
You can download your software on https://my.clz.com
We have indeed stopped the development of the legacy Collector desktop software. There will not be any feature updates anymore, but we may still do maintenance/compatibility updates when absolutely necessary.
Our complete focus is on the CLZ Web web-based software and of course the CLZ mobile apps. For use on your computer, the CLZ Web software is the way to go and we are recommending all desktop users to switch to the web-based software ASAP.
CLZ Music Web is easier to use and easier to manage, while still giving you all features and customization options.
Also, CLZ Music Web is what all our development and support is focused on.
If you switch to CLZ Music Web with our Trade-In offer, we will trade-in your remaining Music Collector subscription days and will transfer them to CLZ Music Web, plus we will add 4 extra months for free.
Full details about the advantages of CLZ Music Web, and our Trade-In Offer can be found here:
Let me know if you are interested or have any questions about switching to CLZ Music Web.
That’s not exactly correct. There are a few features in the desktop software that do not exist in the web platform, as described in this post…
I have not renewed my service plan for some years, and I am curerntly using 22.0 build 3. Since then, the most recent version has been 23.1 build 1, and no newer versions have been released.
Do I understand correctly that Music Collector Destop is essentially discontinued? I was wondering whether it’s worth renewing my service plan. If it’s discontinued, then it’s apparently not.
If you stopped development (which is sad news), are there maybe plans to open the source code for others to catch it up? Because the demand for the desktop software is clearly still there.
That is correct.
we have stopped the development of the old Collector desktop software quite a while ago. There will no more updates for that software.
Since early 2023, our complete focus has been on the CLZ Web web-based software (for computers) and the CLZ mobile apps (for phones and tablets).
Existing desktop subscribers can still renew their subscriptions, but we have stopped selling the desktop software to new users.
We recommend all users of the Music Collector desktop software to switch over to the CLZ Music Web web-based software ASAP and stop using the old installed software.
CLZ Music Web is currently the best solution for use on your computer. It is easier to use and easier to manage, while still giving you all features and customization options.
To motivate you to finally make the switch, we have created a “Trade-In” offer. If you switch to CLZ Music Web now, we will trade-in your remaining Music Collector subscription days (if any) and will transfer them to CLZ Music Web, plus we will add 4 extra months for free.
Getting updates for the software has always only been a small part of the subscription fees. Most of the fees are for:
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access to our CLZ Core databases
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using our CLZ Cloud services for backups, syncing between devices
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hosting costs for our 40+ servers and our developers work to keep it all up-and-running and secure
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7 days a week customer support
I understand that, if you’re grandfathered in, that most of the above is accessible for you anyway, even without paying for the subscription. So basically, it is up to you.
If you stopped development (which is sad news), are there maybe plans to open the source code for others to catch it up?
That will never happen, sorry. There is too much business critical knowledge in that source code that we will never make public.
Because the demand for the desktop software is clearly still there.
Sure, there is some demand still, but only a fraction of what it was in the past.
Thanks for the detailed reply. I remember considering the cloud version of the product several years ago, but, if I remember correctly, one of the things that stopped me was the absence of some important (for me) features like custom tags or something. As of now, has CLZ Music Web reached feature parity with the desktop version?
No, there are features that are only available in the desktop version, such as CD scanning, etc. There are several data fields available in the desktop version that don’t get synced to the app. I don’t know if they show up in the cloud service; I don’t use that actively.
It stinks that the desktop program has been abandoned and that there is no similar software (that I could find) for Windows.
I would rather own my own data whenever possible. If the desktop software can be abandoned, so can the apps and cloud service!
Hm, what are custom tags exactly? Tags is a field in the Web version, and you can use it and add as many tags as you like.
Custom Fields (create your own fields) is coming to Web soon (we’re testing it right now in-house).
But that should tell you something, right? Why do you think no similar software exists anymore?
Of course, we can do everything we want.
But why would we? We deliberately abandoned the desktop software, so that we could fully focus on mobile and web-based, as these are way more popular nowadays. And that decision have proven the right one.
So don’t worry, there are no plans whatsoever to abandon the mobile apps and web-based software!
I understand the decision. Thanks for letting me vent a little though. 
Yes I meant those.
To elaborate on that, one possible case is evident. As a Russian citizen I faced almost immediate termination of European and US services following the escalation of the Russo-Ukraine war in 2022. Frankly, I don’t know if you stopped your services to Russian customers as well (I did not check and try to renew back then), but probably you did.
Currently I’m residing in another country, so that’s not an immediate problem for me, but anyway this experience shows that in the current state of international affairs any market may be subject to abrupt cloud service termination by foreign providers, whether dictated by governmental regulations or by public opinion pressing on business owners.
So yes, I join Greg in his argument that what’s on your PC is on your PC, period, and what’s in the cloud, you don’t have reasonable control over that, and it may vanish in a moment. It’s not the matter of the service fees spent in vain, of course, but rather the matter of enormous time and effort spent by any of us on organizing our collections.
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Excellent points, @Anton. I imagine many people don’t think about the points you raised and they are critical reasons why on premises databases are so important. Sure, there may come a time when access to CLZ Core is not available, but you could still use Music Collector (Desktop) without it. The same isn’t true for the web and mobile versions as they require a cloud database.
For the Mobile Version this isn’t quite right as the Collection is on your Mobile Device.
You can open and look at your collection when you are offline.
What seems not to be possible is adding new entries, when offline.
Maybe that is one point for the ideas list @CLZ_AJ
@Arcane, how would adding entries offline work on the mobile app?
Where would you “find” the item you want to add?
We did not. If you have an internet connection and can access servers in the US, it should all work. We did not block anything from our side.
Also, let’s keep politics out of this forum.
You would not “find” it. But as in the Web App it could be possible to create an Entry completely manually without any Online Source.
Guys,
It’s clear, you don’t like cloud-based software, you prefer local desktop software.
And that is fine.
However, there is nothing you can say that will convince us to work on the desktop software again. The decision to focus on Web and Mobile was made years ago, and for solid reasons. Also, this move has proven very successful. So we won’t change this.
So basically, you have two options:
- Keep using the the Collector desktop software. If you are grandfathered in, then you are in luck, you can even keep using it for free.
- Switch to a competitor who does still make and maintain desktop software. I do not know of any, but maybe there is a small developer still doing this.
I think there is no need for further discussion. I have heard it all before, all the arguments, there is nothing new here.
That is of course possible, in all our editions, desktop, Web and mobile. All of them have an Add Manually option.
Yes. My bad and Apologies @CLZ_Alwin
I checked this earlier and simply pressed the + Button on the Main Screen and with this there is no possibillity to add an entry manually.
But of course there is an “Add Album Manually” in the Menu.
I’m still having trouble understanding this, how can you open the Web app if you have no internet?
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