Really ?

[James67]

Originally Posted by Darryl Ramm

I'm not defending that, but that is just how Avid operates.

Are you honestly not even aware how ridiculous this statement of yours is?

Edit: Also it’s not about if we are able to work with the software or not. It’s about us paying Avid money. Do you like to pay money for nothing? Because I do not, but Avid penalizes quitting to pay them for nothing. That’s borderline illegal. At least it should be.

[elangab]

I agree. As a paying customer it's not my role to investigate where the product is being coded or assume they must halt production.

Of course, post sound means nothing compared to the war, so if that's the case Avid should/could just send an email regarding PT halting development for a while, and I'm sure 99% of the people will support that and understand.

They could even offer an extension to the support plan of a few months and/or donating the cost, but that would be too much to ask.

But as it is now, it's nothing but a guess.

[gnjlee]

Originally Posted by elangab

I agree. As a paying customer it's not my role to investigate where the product is being coded or assume they must halt production.

Of course, post sound means nothing compared to the war, so if that's the case Avid should/could just send an email regarding PT halting development for a while, and I'm sure 99% of the people will support that and understand.

They could even offer an extension to the support plan of a few months and/or donating the cost, but that would be too much to ask.

But as it is now, it's nothing but a guess.

Agreed. The war is horrible and we all hate it. The loss of life is unforgivable. Some other posters appear to be giving AVID a pass on its unsavory business as usual "customer service", via virtue signaling about Ukraine? That is where I have a differing opinion.

Again, my opinion is that they won't admit or offer anything as that would affect the bottom line. Virtue signaling only gives them an excuse they didn't have to pay marketing for.

[Eric Lambert]

Identifying a cause of this specific delay isn't giving Avid a pass, it's answering the ambiguous question "Really ?" What else is there to discuss about Avid's practice of releasing ho-hum updates at distant intervals that hasn't already been said 784 times before?

[gnjlee]

Originally Posted by Eric Lambert

Identifying a cause of this specific delay isn't giving Avid a pass, it's answering the ambiguous question "Really ?" What else is there to discuss about Avid's practice of releasing ho-hum updates at distant intervals that hasn't already been said 784 times before?

That is an over simplification and dismissal of what is happening here. You are a good guy Eric, I don't want to see folks resort to defeatism, even though I totally understand it in this case.

[Eric Lambert]

Originally Posted by gnjlee

That is an over simplification and dismissal of what is happening here. You are a good guy Eric, I don't want to see folks resort to defeatism, even though I totally understand it in this case.

I'm not getting into the peripheral comments, but Darryl has been critical of Avid in the past, and, I imagine, in this case, probably feeling more concern for humanitarian updates than a generally well-behaved audio app. Whatever the situation, I don't see a "pass" per se when this question gets entangled with Ukraine. It's more, "yeah, it sucks, but..." which is often read as defending Avid. As I'd said, it's highlighting the culprit, not excusing Avid. And I'm not speaking for anyone else in this case -- it just happens to be my take as well. Many of my posts over the years have flamed the company and their gross cash-grabs, but my disdain is a bit more pliable this time.

[gnjlee]

Originally Posted by Eric Lambert

I'm not getting into the peripheral comments, but Darryl has been critical of Avid in the past, and, I imagine, in this case, probably feeling more concern for humanitarian updates than a generally well-behaved audio app. Whatever the situation, I don't see a "pass" per se when this question gets entangled with Ukraine. It's more, "yeah, it sucks, but..." which is often read as defending Avid. As I'd said, it's highlighting the culprit, not excusing Avid. And I'm not speaking for anyone else in this case -- it just happens to be my take as well. Many of my posts over the years have flamed the company and their gross cash-grabs, but my disdain is a bit more pliable this time.

Well we can respectfully disagree. You can be both for Ukraine, and against AVIDs customer service / business practice all at once. I see this as a free pass for AVID gifted to them by folks that almost come across as shill-ish. If AVIDs contractors are caught up in this, that is horrible. However, considering we are forced to pay yearly dues or else, I have ZERO empathy for the company who is mostly concerned with collecting our yearly cash. Folks still have a right to be outraged. People on this board should stop scolding them for it. Had AVID exhibited better behavior over the years, I would be more forgiving.

[Eric Lambert]

Originally Posted by gnjlee

You can be both for Ukraine, and against AVIDs customer service / business practice all at once.

Yes, we actually agree.

The nuance here is what's unique: an operational limitation vs. a corporate choice. Avid being unable to release an update even if they cared about nothing else. *IF* that's what's happening, and I have no proof that it's causing a hold-up.

[Reml@P]

Originally Posted by gnjlee

Well we can respectfully disagree. You can be both for Ukraine, and against AVIDs customer service / business practice all at once. I see this as a free pass for AVID gifted to them by folks that almost come across as shill-ish.

This 100%

What a shame to see folks resorting to lame personal attacks when users question why there is no official statement from AVID at this time.

[ChrisBové]

Hi everyone,

I know this is a topic everyone is passionate about, especially a lot of perpetual license holders. As a long-time user and customer myself, I fully understand.

Please permit me to give a little context.

Software development isn’t like putting a hammer to a nail. It takes time and people -- good people. There are multiple teams of people who are tasked with many things to do, large and small. Whether our releases of Pro Tools happen at a cadence of every 5 days, every 55 days, or every 155 days makes no difference when you look at the physical quantity of bugs, features, and workflows that get added. From a software development stance, it is the exact same number of steps to create and to fix the things we need to create and fix.

In fact, the process of releasing in higher quantities actually reduces the number of things that can get fixed and added because the delivery time itself takes time and resources. (It's no different than a television producer standing over my shoulder, asking for a new set of exports that'll take the better part of the day, only to give it all a listen a few days later and ask for a whole 'nother round of changes and exports.)

Sometimes a series of bugs and features can get worked on and released in a very short amount of time because they are what you might consider low-hanging fruit. Other times, larger things get tackled, and become all-hands-on-deck for weeks in order to make brand new things happen that (we hope) our customers will love. Sometimes we even rearrange engineers and managers from one task to another, simply because the tasks themselves need more hands to get things done.

Schedules are also affected by factors we can’t control.

For a long time now, but especially after COVID hit, we’ve all been working remotely, and in multiple countries around the globe.

Plus, for those of you who don’t know, Avid has had many beloved staff members from Ukraine working as engineers and as significant contributors to our production process. These people are key to our success and involved heavily in the processes and schedules for how we are able to get things done. As you can imagine, we are getting constant updates on their safety. Their contributions to all of our apps – from Pro Tools to Sibelius to Media Composer to name a few – has been a real inspiration.

The statement we put out a little over a month ago:
avid.com/press-center/an-open-letter-of-support-for-ukraine

We have incredibly hard working people here at Avid. I'm on my tenth straight 16-hour day. I just watched the Media Composer team pull a straight two-week sprint with no breaks getting version 2022.4 out the door, and it is loaded with new stuff people have been wanting for a long time. Same with Sibelius. Same with Pro Tools. I've been in months and months of Pro Tools development meetings, watching an intense amount of development getting done. These people have one completely solid goal in mind -- your workflows. Every single one of them is a Pro Tools user. They eat and sleep the app, and are completely and actively working towards getting as COMPLETE as possible of a release out to you, rather than a FAST release.

All of that effort – very shortly now – is going to hit the streets. Everyone is going to see the results of what we’ve been working on. Very... very... soon.

That’s all I can say for now. Please stay tuned.