Bagpipe Music Writer v. Bagpipe Player

What Information I’ve Been Able To Find Online

It’s old news that Doug Wickstrom, programmer for Robert MacNeill’s BMW Gold, made his version of the program (Bagpipe Player) free because he felt cheated by MacNeill, but I’ve never had enough to go on to assess the merits of his case. Having only such not-very-enlightening statements as “Wickstrom’s not a nice person” or “he’s an a**hole” to go on, I took a neutral stance and went on using Bagpipe Player.

Now I’ve learned a bit more. An email from Andrew Lenz, moderator of the bobdunsire.com bagpiping forum, to one “Traktori” at the PD-Forum, is most instructive (forum is in German, translated by Google, but this passage is original English):

      I've asked questions about Bagpipe Music Writer and Bagpipe Player of a number of people over the course of a number or years including close friends of Robert MacNeil and a couple of individuals involved in the various stages of testing and development, as well as individuals who have spoken to Doug Wickstrom after BMW was completed.
      BMW was and has been a legitimate program for years. Robert MacNeil wrote the first BMW program for DOS. Doug Wickstrom (not a musician) was hired as a programming consultant by Robert MacNeil to write a new version of Windows for BMW since he felt a programmer with Windows experience would speed the process. MacNeil paid thousands of dollars up front and thus provided Wickstrom with whatever was needed: MacNeil's original DOS code, software development, music consultants, testers, designers, other resources. Nonetheless, Wickstrom was a problem almost every step of the way.
      After a lot of excuses, Wickstrom finally completed the BMW Gold program (over two years late) then decided the original agreement was no longer good enough and decided he wanted more --- that is, part ownership of MacNeil's established business and more money. MacNeil wanted to stick with the original contract that Wickstrom agreed to, that is, the stated payment and not ownership. Left with little choice, MacNeil did pay Wickstrom more money (and received a copy of the program in exchange) but then Wickstrom attempted to blackmail MacNeil into accepting his desires for even more money, threatening that he'd give the program away for free to "kill" his business. MacNeil refused to give up part of his family's business to Wickstrom, so Wickstrom put the program up on the Internet for free --- later he changed the name to bagpipe player. It's interesting to note that Bagpipe Music Writer Gold has both Robert MacNeil and Doug Wickstrom listed as copyright owners. But that did not keep Wickstrom from unilaterally giving the software away without the other listed copyright holder's consent.
      MacNeil's lawyer said that it was a pretty clear case, BUT it would have cost more in legal costs than could be made up-selling BMW was so MacNeil reluctantly had to decide against suing. At first mining under BMW sales was enough, but later Wickstrom started accepting money for the program. BMW Gold was just meant to be the first step of MacNeil's efforts to produce in application that would be all the things pipers and drummers have been wanting in a program but that dream has been damaged probably beyond repair.
      Robert MacNeil has been a highly respected member of the piping community for a long time as a member of the Simon Fraser University Pipe Band and a successful pipe music composer. He was then president of BC Pipers as well as chairman of ANAPBA in 2003. MacNeil continues to be very involved with BC Pipers even after 20 years of volunteering. I personally met Rob MacNeil in early 2011th I found him to be very mild-mannered, humble, and good-natured. I can not imagine anyone bilking him out of anything.
      Wickstrom will say that months of his time writing the program went uncompensated and that he was treated unfairly by MacNeil. But that's not even close to real story. The late Bob Dunsire is listed as one of the early testers of the software. Bob was on the "inside" of the whole ordeal. Bob came down on the side of MacNeil. BDF Moderator Ken MacKenzie as beta tester and so unquestionably came down on the side of MacNeil.

A thread by Bob Dunsire himself appears on his eponymous forum here.

Now you know as much as I do about this matter, and, I hope, understand why my attitude has changed.

— Scott Leslie

Back to Scott Leslie’s Pipe Repertoire Page