Graphisoft personnel interactions on AC-Talk

[Karl Ottenstein]

I'd like to move the discussion begun here:
http://archicad-talk.graphisoft.com/viewtopic.php?t=36142

http://archicad-talk.graphisoft.com/viewtopic.php?p=188452

concerning Graphisoft staff involvement in this forum to here, to keep the topics segregated. I'm only quoting the most recent post from that thread:

Bricklyne wrote:
My guess would be that just like Laci Neda (whom I believe was actually an architect harking back to the old days of ArchiCAD created and developed by Architects for Architects), the other two, Balazs Simonyi, Laszlo Vertesi, are likely also long gone from the firm.

What the hell happened to this place?
And more importantly what's happening to this firm?

(I would love to move the posts on that issue to a new thread, but I can only completely duplicate this thread and then one-by-one delete all OTHER posts - which would take me an hour.)

It's true that we have had direct communications from Graphisoft staff here over the years. Sporadic, but it was here; it may seem that there has not been as much lately.

That does not mean that they are not listening. They are aware of everything that happens here. Really. I cannot speak to why there is little direct comment here, but we have heard many times over the past year from the head of technical support, Gergely Kmethy, and have recently had a post from Laszlo Vertesi, the VP for Product Development:

http://archicad-talk.graphisoft.com/viewtopic.php?p=186598#186598

I understand that feeling like there is a direct personal involvement from GS staff would have a positive feeling, and you give examples of other small firms that do that. But, there are ample firms - such as Apple - who do not have employees respond at all on their forums. Or Intuit who have staff respond less often than Graphisoft staff responds here.

If GS were more present here, I cannot imagine that they would tell you definitively that they would solve any particular problem - who knows what resources it would take and what other issues would arise between the promise and the actual delivery, or slipped delivery. So, the most they might do (I would assume) if more present would be to make politically correct and safe comments to make users feel good and not promise anything with a definite time frame - in other words, just soothing, marketing-speak. To do that, they would have to hire another marketing employee which would take budget away from actual development, or else result in passing the employee costs on to us. (If they hire more marketing staff, I'd personally want them to pound the US market doing actual marketing as market penetration and increased sales revenue would lead to the answer to most of our wishes.)

Enough rambling from me...

Cheers,
Karl

PS A large number of the staff at Graphisoft still consists of people with architectural degrees. ArchiCAD is still created by architects for architects. I think it would be good if their marketing department wrote an article for their web site describing this history and how it continues even today.

[Bricklyne Clarence]

Karl wrote:
.......
Still, there are several things to keep in mind. First, no wish has received enough 'votes' to be truly meaningful IMHO. Sure, a lot have scores very close to 5, but with total votes of 20 or so out of hundreds of thousands of users. Even the Stairmaker wish, which I think everyone would agree with, only has 89 votes. Insignificant statistically, particularly since the votes are not a random sample of all users, but a self-selected sample of people with accounts on this forum....
Karl

I think I had already addressed this in another post, but it seems a bit odd to me (and an exercise in circular reasoning) to surmise or imply that part of the reason why Graphisoft don't see some of the wishes in the wishlist section as important enough to act on, is because they don't receive enough votes "to be truly meaningful" - when the fact of the matter is that most frequent users and long-time users of this forum have become justifiably convinced that the Wishlist section is a big waste of time, and so don't bother taking part of in the polls anyway.

It's like, on the one hand Graphisoft looks at the wishlist section and see wishes receiving little votes or interest from users, and then (incorrectly) conclude that they don't need to focus on those wishes, because presumably not many people are interested in them.

But on the other hand, Users look at the wishlist section and see wishes going all the way back to 2003 and concerning issues that have been in the program since as far back as ArchiCAD v.6.5 and correctly conclude that no one is paying attention to them and thus ask themselves why they should even bother taking part in those polls (which GS then bizarrely uses to justify not acting on those wishes) or participate in the wishlist section at all.

And on and on it goes in one vicious cycle that probably only concludes with the continued attrition and loss of Graphisoft's own customers as users seek other programs and solutions that better address their needs.

I'd be willing to bet you that a vast majority of new wishes in the wishlist section are posted by new users to the program who haven't been here long enough to know that it's probably a wasted effort on their part to post those wishes there and hence the reason you'll find a great deal of duplication of existing wishes and low user participation in the polls themselves.

At the end of the day, you summed it just about right at the end of your post when you indicated that all of this is probably just a big waste of time on our part as well, as GS will still go off and do what they deem to be fit for their program and their company anyway.
And while I also understand that this forum is primarily supposed to be aimed towards User-to-user interaction rather than user-to-developer, I would have thought that given their recent efforts (especially here in North America) to try to increase their visibility to end-users and their marketing presence rather than having to rely on resellers, that this forum would be a good first (And easy and cheap) step in doing so.

It just seems difficult to me to see how long such a strategy can persist before it begins to really hurt them seriously in the long-term as they lose more and more customers due to their perceived apathy and lack of interest.

[Karl Ottenstein]

NCornia wrote:
I think the major take away here is that the wishlist section is a landfill. Why not archive it and start it anew with a more concise format that is more useful? I agree that it is naïve to think Graphisoft constantly has there ear to the forum.

I think that is an incorrect take away, and I'm not sure why you think that Graphisoft has not always had their ear on this forum?

The wishlist posts are (supposed to be) focused on one particular topic. Graphisoft has their own master wishlist (bigger than the sum of the wishlist here) and various people there read what is posted to each wish, and most topics here.

Various graphisoft staff, particularly management, are constantly reading what is said in this forum. It is unrealistic to expect acknowledgements of everything posted here.

Cheers,
Karl

[Anonymous]

I wonder how many people would vote on a wish list that would ask for a given person to stop trolling this forum. And how many votes would be needed to have my wish granted.

[Karl Ottenstein]

Bricklyne wrote:
I think I had already addressed this in another post, but it seems a bit odd to me (and an exercise in circular reasoning) to surmise or imply that part of the reason why Graphisoft don't see some of the wishes in the wishlist section as important enough to act on, is because they don't receive enough votes "to be truly meaningful" - when the fact of the matter is that most frequent users and long-time users of this forum have become justifiably convinced that the Wishlist section is a big waste of time, and so don't bother taking part of in the polls anyway.

You missed my point: not only are the votes statistically meaningless, even when the wishlist began - before anyone might have gotten cynical - no wishes got very many votes. But the greater point in my post is that the feature set of archicad is not a democracy - but nonetheless, Graphisoft reads each wish and considers the comments there in juggling all of their priorities.

It's like, on the one hand Graphisoft looks at the wishlist section and see wishes receiving little votes or interest from users, and then (incorrectly) conclude that they don't need to focus on those wishes, because presumably not many people are interested in them.

You are assuming that Graphisoft takes the votes on the wishlist section as some means to guide future development. Not necessarily a true assumption. As a user-to-user forum, those votes let other users know what each other thinks about a wish and we can discuss it. Nobody ever said it was a place to vote for what would be in the next version.

thus ask themselves why they should even bother taking part in those polls (which GS then bizarrely uses to justify not acting on those wishes) or participate in the wishlist section at all.

Where has GS justified not acting on a significant wish due to votes in the wishlist forums?

At the end of the day, you summed it just about right at the end of your post when you indicated that all of this is probably just a big waste of time on our part as well, as GS will still go off and do what they deem to be fit for their program and their company anyway.

Like Nicholas, you've twisted my words into an incorrect conclusion. Yes, GS will do what they deem fit - but it is not because we are ignored or that these forums are a waste of time. First and foremost, these are user-to-user forums for helping each other. In the process, some questions lead to issues that could improve the product. In all cases, Graphisoft is reading - and taking all of our comments into account. What more could we ask for than to be listened to?

Listening does not mean doing what we say.

Sure, if someone needs some feature(s) badly, doesn't feel like GS is coming up with them, and someone else does - they will jump ship. Or buy 3rd party add-ons such as ArchiStair. That's the free market.

It just seems difficult to me to see how long such a strategy can persist before it begins to really hurt them seriously in the long-term as they lose more and more customers due to their perceived apathy and lack of interest.

If we talk about apathy and lack of interest, I could say the same thing for Adobe, Apple, Intuit, Microsoft and many others - they've never been interested in anything I've said, and don't participate much on their user forums. I don't see that as a reason that any of those firms lose customers. Yet, why would I assume that they are un-interested and apathetic? I know product managers at some of those companies and know that they, like Graphisoft, read everything.

What exactly would you prefer to see happen, and explain a valid business model / reasoning for it?

Cheers,
Karl

[Anonymous]

If you are reading Graphisoft...

I have echo the wish list forums need serious revamping. One aspect I hope you take in real consideration is when the users of your software go there and see the state of affairs in the section where it's a direct feedback, it's... disheartening.

I've had several ideas but I know, "Why bother?"

Either remove them or make use of them. But as it stands, IMO, it takes away from Archicad, not adds to it.

[NCornia]

Karl wrote:

Like Nicholas, you've twisted my words into an incorrect conclusion. Yes, GS will do what they deem fit - but it is not because we are ignored or that these forums are a waste of time. First and foremost, these are user-to-user forums for helping each other. In the process, some questions lead to issues that could improve the product. In all cases, Graphisoft is reading - and taking all of our comments into account. What more could we ask for than to be listened to?

Sorry, must be a miscommunication. Thought I was on the same page as you. My main intention is to make something positive happen out of this discussion. I agree the main purpose of the forums is the user interaction. I love it, great community. I just think the wishlist needs to make a fresh start.

[Anonymous]

I think the ultimate question should be: does Graphisoft actually want our thoughts and ideas about how we want the software to work, or should we trust that anything we think of has probably been thought of already by the clever developers, and has been placed in Graphisoft’s priority list to be implemented as and when the long term plan dictates? If it is the latter, then we are just wasting our virtual breath by creating new wish topics.

But if our comments are a useful source of inspiration, then perhaps there is a better method of submitting our ideas. Maybe every week or so Graphisoft could ask for our thoughts and ideas about a single specific topic, but instead of posting our comments publicly for all to see, we could Privately Mail the poll organiser or the post should go to some 'hidden' forum that could only be read by GS and the moderators.

By focusing on one subject at a time they are more likely to get better quality and more up-to-date ideas, and by keeping the ideas private they get a more accurate gauge of people true thoughts without any bias or collusion (or off-topic natter) that could occur if it was discussed openly beforehand. It also allows GS to keep the ideas private from the competitors.

The questions asked would have to be reasonably broad, but should provide a more useful guide of direction and priority than the wishlist forum does at the moment. Some examples of questions could be –

• - What functionality would you like complex profiles to have?
  - How often would you use freeform geometry on a day-to-day basis, and what things might you want to construct?
  - What are the limitations of the window objects currently, and what features would you add?
  - How would you improve the schedules?
  - What is the worst implemented tool in ArchiCAD currently, and why?!
  - And so on....

And while talking about GS participation on the forum, don't forget Zsolt Táskai's valuable contributions in the GDL/library part forum!

[Bricklyne Clarence]

Karl wrote:
........

.....

What exactly would you prefer to see happen, and explain a valid business model / reasoning for it?

Cheers,
Karl

Well, for a start they could do what they were doing a few short 6 years ago, as I highighted in that Wishlist thread with Laci Neda interacting with users.

That's the reason I brought that thread up, which is to show that it's not exactly an unheard of for GS developers to actually get on these boards to interact with users in a more meaningful way than just making announcements of hotfixes and other matters that don't exactly facilitate any feedback from the users and vice versa.

I'm not saying that they should get on here and basically lay out all their cards on the table and explain their plans for their next 10 versions. I can understand the reason they would not want to do that and even support that
I'm not even suggesting that they should be coming here to make promises they can't keep to needlessly get users expectations up over features in future versions. Again, I understand what would be their apprehension in doing that since there are recent examples of other software developers who did that and ended up with a fiasco on their hands.

As other software forums and developers have shown, it's not unheard of that a developer will hear out their users, and if necessary basically tell them that there are certain things they basically don't plan on doing with their software's development which the users may have been asking for.
I don't really think that anyone who asks for specific features and issues, expects that they'll get absolutely everything they ask for, and probably not even most of them.

As an example, I'll just take the Stair tool - which is probably the tool that gets the most requests for improvements on this forum and elsewhere.
What would be so difficult in having one of the developers getting on one of the threads and letting users know if they plan on improving it any time soon or not, and if they do, then what the extent of improvements could be that they should probably expect? I ask this because for something like the Stair tool, not only does it affect the basic design toolset available to designers and architects, it also affects things like the budgets that people have to work with and decisions that have to be made in considering whether to spend the money on third party plugins and addons to fill in the gap to do what ArchiCAD can't do on its own, and for how long. If there are no plans on developing or improving something like that any time in the near future, then it would considerably affect the decision a lot of people make with regards to upgrades, subscriptions and possibly even future use of the program.

And that's just one tool, out of the many issues that need addressing and which they could ease a lot of uncertainty by simply COMMUNICATING.
I could also reference the lack of a GDL programming alternative for creating custom parametric objects and how a lot of offices have to hire either employees who are GDL profecient, or a GDL expert to build them a custom library of objects they may need.

These are basic decisions that affect the budgets of a lot of offices (and more so for smaller offices than the large coorporate types that GS often seems so interested in satisfying).


In other words, what would be so difficult if they had a point man - possibly someone from their marketing department (this is, after all, a PR and marketing task) - who showed up on these boards once a week or even every other week if possible to address issues, solicit information and basically just keep the users somewhat in the loop, if not all the way?

Karl wrote:
........

If we talk about apathy and lack of interest, I could say the same thing for Adobe, Apple, Intuit, Microsoft and many others - they've never been interested in anything I've said, and don't participate much on their user forums. I don't see that as a reason that any of those firms lose customers. Yet, why would I assume that they are un-interested and apathetic? I know product managers at some of those companies and know that they, like Graphisoft, read everything.

You reference other firms that don't do this sort of thing (Adobe, Apple, intuit, Microsoft) which is on the one hand is not entirely accurate since they have their own means of customer and user feedback interaction (like Apple for example has their Genius bar system where you can speak directly to a technical expert) and on the other hand is not really a valid comparison (in the sense that it's not valid to compare Graphisoft to Industry behemoths like Microsoft and Apple who are in no danger of ever losing their customer-base regardless of how much they may mistreat them, since there are no viable alternatives for them to turn to if they don't like what they are getting).

But more than that it's also more than just the knowledge that they are actually listening to their users, but also the perception that they are doing or at least they are seen to be doing something about what their users want exactly. I've seen Microsoft place a great emphasis on this in their marketing for Windows 7 when they tried to make it seem as if Windows 7 was largely the result of things that users had specifically asked for (whether or not it actually was, that's a whole other question - but that was the thrust of their marketing campaign and clearly very important to their PR department that they were seen to be doing so).
Would GS ever be able to make a valid marketing campaign of any of their last 3 versions with that same claim?

[Anonymous]

Funny, I just pulled up this forum to see if there was a way to provide cover fills for beams, and I come across this post about GS's involvement, or apparent lack of. IMO, GS is very involved in this forum. I've had multiple people from GS reply to my limited number of posts. I've even got a call from someone at GS North America after I posted a problem on this forum. How's that for service!?

The only thing I can complain about is the wish list. There are things that should be easy enough to do (like the cover fills) that would save a lot of time and frustration. I do wish they would fix some of these things, but fully believe there is no problem when it comes to GS and this forum...

[rob2218]

GS has had very good involvement in these forums discussion. Especially the "Archiplus" contract.
I've never been exposed to a better support system than what they have here...as well as the Archiplus program.

We are a custom residential design firm in Washington, D.C. and we use the support system ALL the time and find it very beneficial, thanks GS. you guys are doing a good job.

I'm looking forward to seeing Archicad 15 in action. Hopefully your stairs got a make over.

Just one last comment I'd like to point out. I thought Graphisoft was going to make a big marketing push in the U.S. sector??? What happened? Can someone explain that to me? Besides the ever so popular "Oh..the economy tanked".....I'd really like to know when GS is moving their headquarters in the building next to Autodesk in California?