- last edited on by
Laszlo Nagy
It is indeed much clearer. But bullet points 1 and 19 are still marketing nonsens and an insult. Every customer with an SSA is still paying a monthly fee. It is not our problem that GS is unable to maintain and support Archicad with the money they earn.
I couldn't agree more.
I have a lot more to say about this than I have the time now, and I might circle back later but I'll just leave this....
It is absolutely not on customers that they find themselves facing this "sustainable revenue" versus "competitive edge" shortfall that's forcing them onto this model.
They've spent years frittering away license fees revenue that they were getting by delivering increasingly diluted version releases with less new features, more bugs and instability and more half-baked "new" features (when they actually bothered to have any), that didn't fully or properly work until 2 or 3 versions later and a whole host of hotfixes, and now most recently, the sort of tools and "new features" that leave long-time customers especially, scratching their heads wondering what product we're even using, given who they seem like they want to be marketing to.
Didn't we already get point #19 years ago when they made the decision to shift to a yearly release - to everyone's consternation - with them promising more features and frequent updates, but only to end up with a more and more diluted product,......exactly like everyone feared would happen?
And now here we are again, and we're right back to the same promise of more features and updates with this susbscription model.
Fool me once......and all that.
But at least their marketing department is really earning their keep and putting those "limited" resources they have to good use, because we all know how good those guys are at spinning a yarn and selling a marketing point. So someone's earning their money over there.
And the end result of that is they've eroded away a large portion of their loyal customer-base who formed that revenue base they were reliant on.
Suddenly, they realize that the Wishlist section needs to be addressed wtih this latest drive for a "spring-cleaning" of that section?
Really?
What about the last 20+ years? What's so different from these last couple of decades when they just kept ignoring it over and over again along with all our concerns and requests for the program?
As a simple example - and bear in mind the Wish in question here is not the important thing. I'm just trying to illustrate a point.
Back in 2017, I believe, I made the one and only request to the Wishlist section (since I'd long deemed it to be a waste of time that they just ignore and have there to make people believe they're actually doing anything when they're not) by requesting to have ArchiCAD be capable of using dual monitors or dual screens. The following year I got a notification that someone had posted to that thread asking for the same wish. Same thing the year after and then again the one after that. I stopped following it in 2021 or so, I believe. My point had been made.
We're now in 2024 and every single one of their rivals' competitor programs is not only dual-monitor capable, but also has the option of using a Dark mode - another one of those often requested, but routinely and religiously ignored wishes. These are just illustrative examples of workflow/functionality wishes to improve our work experience, and not necessarily even the sort of pivotal wishes that denote the programs overall stability and majorshortfalls (of which they're plenty).
But the point is, when your competitors are not standing still like you are, and are instead addressing in their products the very things you're blatantly ignoring in yours, what exactly do you think is going to happen next???????!?!?!
Again, substitute "dual-monitor capability" for any oft-requested wish or request - it's just a stand-in for this example - and it will be virtually the same.
It's also worth noting that when you spend years ignoring your customers and going out of your way to avoid interacting with them (outside curated "Key Client Conferences" and meet-ups in Cabo or Cancun), this is where you also inevitably end up where you can't even communicate in clear language and terms your shift to a new licensing model, and explain why you're doing it or how it will happen,.....or at least, in a way that normal human beings communicate in.
(*...and to think I was going to keep this short.
Oh well.....)
And just to add on a little bit to this as well as to expound further on this whole "Wishlist Section cleanup", and Graphisoft's approach to addressing wishes and delivering new tools, all while expecting users to switch to a subscription model to faiclitate them a more sustainable revenue stream,.....you have playing out right before our very eyes in real time in another thread, why people don't trust them to do anything right nowadays.
In the new MEP Tool thread, which has been a catalog of comedic fumblingand errors on their part and also fascinating to watch from a far (not being an MEP tool user myself), - remember, this is not one of those tools that I would say, majority of people consistently and persistenly requested and asked for, nor for them to spend development resources on, but they did it any way, and this is what they've spent a better part of the past few versions working on while neglecting other areas - they're only now discovering that the new version 27 Tool, which is a revamp of the old MEP tool, lacks some major functionality in how people design ducts (splaying ducts to run on one side rather than centrally), and which they're informed will not be available until version 28.
Bear in mind already, that version 27 MEP tool being a total revamp is completely incompatible with version 26 and below (which had this functionality, by the way).
So any project started with it will not be manipulateable with lower versions (that apparently have more functionality and stability).
This is how they handle a tool that wasn't even that highly requested, so how would they, or why should they be expected to handle the more comprehensive architectural focused tool revamps and new feature developments we've actually been asking for?
Releasing half-baked and not-quite-ready tools is nothing new with them these days (.....even though,.....why release it at all if it's not even ready? ).
The total incompatibility with lower versions is a new twist that begs new questions of how that will work with their Subscription-based model if you have to upgrade to a new version because they assure you it's better more stable and whatnot, only to find you're confronted with tools that weren't ready to be used and are now hampering your projects as you either have to migrate back down or not upgrade at all until they're ready.
Again,.....we're just supposed to take them at their word that all these problems and sorts of issues will just disappar once we switch to subscription and they already have our money and there's nothing we can do about it?
Do you see where we're coming from, Graphisoft?
Thread and posts in questions.
Do yourself a favour and laugh or cry as appropriate:-
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