Julian, I’m hardly the best person to answer that. Besides I think Maurice may have already responded to suggestions of selling Softimage. It might seem like simple and easy thing to do, but unfortunately things don’t always work like that.
On 16/03/2014 08:47, "Julian Johnson" <[email protected]> wrote: >On 15/03/2014 17:44, Graham Bell wrote: >> I¹ve absolutely no doubt, but in all the time I¹ve demoed Softimage, >>even >> pre-AD, there was never anyone who didn¹t like the software, tech or >> couldn¹t see the potential benefits. However despite this, it wasn¹t >>easy >> for people to simply adopt. >> We could easily lead the horse to water, but never make it drink. > >Graham, as everyone at Autodesk seems convinced there is no market for >Softimage what harm could there be in selling it? If the might of >Autodesk's marketing resources had no impact then it stands to reason >that no one else is going to be able to make a success of it. I mean >you've tried your best, right? It's just not possible to market >Softimage. Avid tried and failed, you tried and failed. It stands >absolutely no chance of ever becoming a competitor to Maya or Max as >it's too hard to adopt. Why not, therefore, sell it on to an interested >third party who could solely cater for the niche Softimage audience? >Don't we all win that way? We have an interested 'owner' - you can focus >your resources on Maya and Max and walk away with a lump sum for >'innovative' R&D and you still have no competition. You no longer have >an alienated and hostile Softimage customer base. > >Better still, as soon as Maya becomes a more attractive option we then >have the choice to adopt or not. Given the myriad improvements listed by >Chris that adoption in a few years time should be a no-brainer for us, >shouldn't it? We can once more re-enter the Autodesk fold willingly and >migrate to the better product. If you, Chris and Maurice genuinely >believe in 'new' Maya and Autodesk's own marketing abilities it should >be relatively easy to sell it to Softimage customers in a few years >time. I'm sure we're going to be blown away by the new innovations that >Maurice talked about. With the current roadmap and user input Maya will >undoubtedly be a better product than Softimage is now. I know you >wouldn't be asking us to transition to an inferior product - that just >wouldn't make business sense. No billion dollar business would treat >their customers that way. > >Fundamentally, it seems as though if the initial decision to buy XSI was >motivated by a desire to move the product forward and market it in >earnest (with a genuine business case that demonstrated either more >sales or additional revenue - and why else would you have bought XSI?) >then there has been a colossal failure in that business plan by >Autodesk. The burden of that failure has been placed solely on the >customers to whom, surely, Autodesk has some level of responsibility. > >And yet, that burden of responsibility doesn't seem to have been >reflected in the manner in which Softimage is currently being EOL'd. I >can't think of a more brutal scenario - immediate cessation of >development; no prior warning; no safe-harbour alternative option; no >pre-planning or understanding of the essential migratable features in >Softimage; no in-place transition training; no concept of recompense for >your failure; and no willingness to negotiate or ameliorate the terms of >the EOL in any substantial way. > >Julian
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