Hi Maurice, What it comes down to is that what you are doing now, answering questions giving us ideas of your intentions, is what we could have benefited from *before*. You (Autodesk, not you personally) seems able to communicate to us and be forthcoming with information over the past week or two. This does not seem to be against SEC laws (I would hope). Why would I and others who are so angry and have no reason to do so, give constant feedback that we appreciate the communication we have been seeing since this announcement *and *wish it was like this before, if it WAS like this before? Answer is: because it *wasn't* like this before.
Look, I know this must not be fun in the least, and in that way, I sympathize with you all at Autodesk. I also realize that you cannot change the past. But acknowledging the past can sometimes be enough. It seems to be revisionist history is more the norm. Saying you are communicating with us now, doesn't make us all think you were doing so before. Is there an SEC law against apologizing and admitting massive insensitivity? Why would many of us be saying this, if we honestly felt there had been honest communication before? I don't think you (nor anyone at Autodesk) *tried *to piss off customers, and I wasn't trying to imply that when I mentioned Singapore. If you had all been honest with us about the lack of effort that would be put into Softimage, you would have (as Adam said earlier) likely seen a rally of support for your efforts now. If transparency (to the extent allowed by SEC law) had been the norm, we wouldn't be this pissed off. In many ways, the lack of honesty about what the change to a Singapore based team was about (keeping Softimage going at a lower cost to Autodesk) was dishonest not because of what was said, but because of what WASN'T said. Even when asked point-blank. I asked many times, publically, in Betas and in person, if moving the team to Singapore meant Autodesk wasn't going to be putting much into Softimage from now on, and I was met with constant silence. You said that you never stated that you were planning to increase investment in Softimage. Of course not, because had you, you would have had to due to SEC laws. But you also DIDN'T say that you planned to basically just maintain it with the majority of the focus going towards Maya. You may say that you wouldn't have been able to say that, that SEC rules prevent you from saying that. But you are saying it now, and so did Marc! This is what I am talking about. I am not talking about knowing about upcoming features, I know that you cannot comment on those publicly. I have known that for all the years I have been an Autodesk customer. I am talking about a lack of communication on par with, ironically, the amount we are now getting from Autodesk. You can't possibly expect us to believe that you couldn't be this open before, but you can now, yet SEC rules prevented you from revealing plans, because I am not talking about future plans, I am talking about the state at which Autodesk designated for Softimage a year and a half ago. It wasn't a FUTURE event, it had happened! You could have talked about it with no worries about violating SEC laws! Honesty at that point could have really made a huge amount of difference, and gone a long way towards building respect and faith in Autodesk, not destroying it. Instead, as always, it was vague. Being vague about the future is one thing, being vague about the present is another. At that point it isn't being vague, it is being deceitful. And to put my money where my mouth is, I didn't mean to imply that you had said Softimage was being put on Life Support. That was MY term, not meant to be implied that YOU said it that way. Perry On Thu, Mar 20, 2014 at 5:06 PM, Maurice Patel <maurice.pa...@autodesk.com>wrote: > Hi Perry, > > The article was a transcript of a verbal discussion so things are a bit > rambling and maybe not always as clear as I intended. However I don't > recall ever mentioning that we put Softimage on life support. What we were > trying to do was see if we could keep developing it more efficiently. Yes > we were not planning on increasing investment in it and we never stated > that we were. However we were trying to find solutions to continue > development. > > I understand your frustration, but what we are doing now is exactly what > you are asking for: telling you our plans (just as we have done in the > past); which is that we have decided, now, to do no more than maintain > Softimage for the next two years. And we are telling everyone that that is > our intent. Sure we could have made that decision earlier - and then we a > would have told you earlier - but when we spun up development in Singapore > it was because we were looking for alternatives to continue developing > Softimage not for ways to piss off Softimage customers. > > It is not true that we do not care about keeping customers productive and > minimizing disruption to their pipelines and business. Every year we spend > significant resources maintaining legacy capabilities for just that reason. > A lot of people ask why there are 6 ways to do the same thing in Maya - > well because we continue to support the ability to open previous projects > and integrate into existing pipelines to the best of our ability. It is > incorrect to think that Autodesk invests millions of dollars into the M&E > business to do exactly this because we do not care about our customers - > though it is quite understandable that at this point in time you feel we do > not care about Softimage customers. > > For all our products, Autodesk never states publicly what its plans are > because we cannot (other than in very general high level terms). We cannot > talk publicly about specific future product releases or features and > inevitably those are the only questions people want answered when they talk > about a product's future. We can only guarantee what the status of a > software is at the present moment. We can talk about goals - such as our > goal to integrate artist-friendly aspects of Softimage into Maya but not > talk about exactly what or when. Not because we don't want to - it would > make all our lives a whole lot easier. We don't enjoy being vague > > However if we broke the rules we would go out of business very quickly. We > would have to defer all our revenue which means not being able to pay our > employees, suppliers and partners. To do so would be completely > irresponsible and impact hundreds of thousands of customers in M&E, > millions if Autodesk did this across its industries. This is a very real > challenge because the feedback from all our customers is consistently - how > can we trust you when you do not? But you cannot ask us to break rules > which were put in place for good measure - to stop companies selling > vaporware to both customers and investors. Sure if you are a privately held > company you can say what you want but not if you are publicly traded. Now > we can all have our opinion of whether public trading as a means of > securing investment is good or bad for society, but none of us can change > the fact that Autodesk is publicly traded and therefore accountable to the > SEC. This is a huge challenge. We have acquired products in the past from > small start-ups where they had promised all kinds of future features. We > have then had to defer all revenue on those products until we could > actually build everything they promised which can take years. Years of > development with no revenue. And we have done it because we felt it was the > right and responsible thing to do. So these things are not trivial. > > Finally, my comment on the 2-year mark was not meant as an insult. First > we are here listening to feedback, dialoguing and responding. Changes in > our plans reflect this so it is incorrect to assume that we don't care and > are not trying - just because we cannot give you everything you are asking > for. Secondly we actually are not experts at discontinuing products so we > make mistakes - and then we try to fix them. Fixing things is not a bad > thing. Third the reason we had a problem is because we created a special > offering for Softimage users that was non-standard. From day one customers > always had the option to continue to use their license in perpetuity. They > even had an option to transition to Maya or 3ds Max and continue to use > both licenses in perpetuity. Were we had a SNAFU was what happened on the > licensing side if you stayed on subscription. There were some incorrect > assumptions on our end and we fixed them. > > Maurice > > Maurice Patel > Autodesk : Tél: 514 954-7134 > > From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto: > softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Perry Harovas > Sent: Thursday, March 20, 2014 2:53 PM > To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com > Subject: Re: new Q&A with AD > > Regarding the new article/interview with Maurice: > > Maurice, I do appreciate you answering some of our questions. > One thing that really has us (Softimage users) angry about is that your > company had plans in September of 2012 (and most likely earlier) to not > invest further in Softimage and to keep it going on a maintenance level, to > not significantly invest in Softimage. Your company must have known this > would anger people, and while yes, we were told that the team was moving to > Singapore, we were NEVER told that it was because the investment in > Softimage was going to be diminished and it was going to basically be done > to keep it on life support. Had we known that, we could have made the (to > us, very logical) assumption that Softimage was going to be EOL'd at some > point. I asked on the forums, I asked in beta programs if Softimage was not > a real priority to Autodesk, and got no replies. > > This, among other things, really shows a very deep lack of respect for > your Softimage customers, who were paying subscription or support fees to > (ultimately) fund the development of Maya. How does that sound like a good > thing to do to your customers? > > If we were told what Autodesk's real plans were for Softimage, we would > have been to blame for not seeing the future (because it would have been > laid out for us already). Being a public company does not mean you cannot > give your customers an idea of your intentions. I am NOT referring to EOL > for Softimage, because if we take yo at your word that it wasn't the plan > for that product until end of 2013, then it wouldn't be on anyone's radar > as a plan. What I am talking about is that Autodesk assumed that it could > tell a half-truth (or essentially not tell the entire story) to keep > customers placated with regards to the future of Softimage. > > This not only speaks of the apparent view by Autodesk that it's customers > are stupid, but also seems to point out that Autodesk is not able to see > that those same customers would be angry when/if Softimage failed to > survive on 'Life Support'. > > It seems obvious to me, and should have to Autodesk, that basically > maintaining Softimage would not be enough, and would be a self-realized > death sentence for the software, especially when the ROI was calculated. > If customers got angry and stopped paying subscription and froze their > version of it because of a lack of innovation, one would think that someone > with a reasonable amount of business experience could see that the > situation was only going to get worse with the clear lack of innovation and > advancement continuing with regards to Softimage. > This would HAVE to lead to an EOL decision. Autodesk is a corporation, > decisions are made based on money. We should have seen that, but Autodesk > should have, too. > > Our biggest mistake, as Softimage users (besides trusting Autodesk to know > things like this) was to not go with our gut feeling that Softimage's days > were numbered. We all knew it in our bones in 2008, but we really knew it > when the team was reassigned and a new team offshore was contracted. > > However, had we known the plan to minimally invest in Softimage a year and > a half ago, we would have been that much further along the path to learning > new software to run our businesses. Yes, some of that software would have > been other DCC apps not in the Autodesk sphere. It was just rudely assumed > that we would want to make the switch to May or Max. Perhaps most of us > would have if we knew ahead of time. Now, all that has happened is Autodesk > has alienated and angered formally loyal customers and been given a > non-choice of either Max or Maya. > > We even had to argue to be able to use the software past the 2 year mark, > so commenting as you do in the article that we can always keep using > Softimage is an insult, since that WASN'T always an option, until we argued > for it. > > Had we been given an honest roadmap of the plans to minimally invest in > Softimage, we would have more control over our own futures. We could have > controlled the client perception of why we were using a new software > application, but now we are in a defensive position and are forced to make > excuses for why we are A) either still using EOL software, or B) changing > to another DCC. > > In either of those cases, Autodesk just passed the buck to us and hung us > out to dry. > > Does this sound, to anyone, like a good way to treat valued customers? > Does this sound to anyone like a company to put your faith in for the > future? > > > On Thu, Mar 20, 2014 at 2:02 PM, Cristobal Infante <cgc...@gmail.com > <mailto:cgc...@gmail.com>> wrote: > more innovation from autodesk: > > > http://techcrunch.com/2014/03/19/autodesk-buys-creative-market-jumping-into-maker-marketplace/ > > On 20 March 2014 17:54, Doeke Wartena <clankil...@gmail.com<mailto: > clankil...@gmail.com>> wrote: > 17 years? Softimage is from 1988 if i'm correct. > > 2014-03-20 18:43 GMT+01:00 Jordi Bares <jordiba...@gmail.com<mailto: > jordiba...@gmail.com>>: > > When you think they just threw 17 years worth of work of so many talented > people... > > very sad > > Jordi Bares > jordiba...@gmail.com<mailto:jordiba...@gmail.com> > > On 20 Mar 2014, at 17:35, "rs3d" <r...@sapo.pt<mailto:r...@sapo.pt>> > wrote: > > > > I don't know if this article was posted here before,it's been hard to keep > up with the sheer number of posts on the list nowadays... > anyways...Q&A with AD: > > > http://www.creativebloq.com/3d/autodesk-answers-your-questions-demise-softimage-31411069 > > later, > Rui > > www.ruisantos3d.com<http://www.ruisantos3d.com> > > > > ...ping? > > ________________________________ > [http://static.avast.com/emails/avast-mail-stamp.png]< > http://www.avast.com/> > > > Este email está liivre de vírus e malware porque a proteção avast! > Antivirus<http://www.avast.com/> está ativa. > > > > > > > > -- > > > > > > Perry Harovas > Animation and Visual Effects > > http://www.TheAfterImage.com<http://www.theafterimage.com/> > -- Perry Harovas Animation and Visual Effects http://www.TheAfterImage.com <http://www.theafterimage.com/>
