Version 1.0 is the new 0.9 – CNet Article

[Herb Sevush]

Good article.

“Just because everything electronic these days is a work in progress doensn’t mean everybody gets a free pass. iOS 5 shouldn’t have had battery-draining problems and Samsung’s Galaxy Nexus shouldn’t have had that volume bug, and both those problems should have been caught earlier. An IBM mainframe and your car’s antilock brakes should be held to a much higher standard, too. And if Amazon doesn’t get its Fire’s act together soon, the market will punish it, because quality and reputation still matter.”

I wonder where the X roll-out fits in?

Herb Sevush
Zebra Productions
—————————
nothin’ attached to nothin’
“Deciding the spine is the process of editing” F. Bieberkopf

[Bill Davis]

[Herb Sevush] “I wonder where the X roll-out fits in?
“

I would imagine – perfectly.

If the article’s premis is correct, (and I think the author is totally on to something here) then the only real value of any “release date” is how it effects a companies marketing efforts.

Once upon a time (like last year!) Totally finished software was what you needed for a golden master to send to the plant to press and box and put on the trucks.

With the App store, that’s all gone. When software masters live online – they can change every 5 minutes if there’s a good reason to do so.

It may seem like a slap at customers – but as the author implies – it’s probably the best way to get enough “real world” data to understand how any complex code will fare in the wild is to put it out there.

Release dates kinda become “good enough to begin public testing” dates and with remote updating in play, you can much more rapidly begin to address the world of actual (not test lab) users concerns.

You’re not actually buying “a software program” any more. You’re buying into a software ecosystem that you expect to evolve and improve over time.

And that kinda defines ALL the software I currently rely on for any serious work.

Interesting read!

“Before speaking out ask yourself whether your words are true, whether they are respectful and whether they are needed in our civil discussions.”-Justice O’Connor

[Craig Seeman]

Read Phil Bloom’s Blog on why he returned his Red Epic.
Some will complain about a $300 NLE being beta but how about an $80k camera kit.
https://philipbloom.net/2011/12/10/nomoreepic/

[Herb Sevush]

The article was written for a website specializing in consumer electronics reviews. In it the author clearly separated the world of consumer software from such items as car brakes and IBM mainframes. No one is going to confuse an NLE with lifesaving car parts, but the question remains where on the line between an iphone ap and an IBM mainframe does an NLE reside?

The requirements for a professional piece of software are much higher than for consumer items – while it’s true no one has ever died from a bad edit, people have lost a lot of money, not to say their job, making the wrong bet on some bits and bytes.

It’s always been understood that version 1 software is unstable, professionals go there at some risk. The reward is to be at the bleeding edge, the risk is to fall into the abyss; but to say that I should have the same tolerance for Beta software that helps me earn a living as I do for one that connects me to Google is a bit naive.

I agree with your point that the new distribution channel makes potential upgrades easier and the idea of a fixed release date fuzzier, I’m not at all sure that it means that I will accept and expect lower standards from the companies I do business with. In fact, with all of this so called ease of distribution, X has had precisely 1 upgrade in the last 6 months, and that after a rollout that can only be described as catastrophic. Legacy came out with dot point fixes at least as fast.

Herb Sevush
Zebra Productions
—————————
nothin’ attached to nothin’
“Deciding the spine is the process of editing” F. Bieberkopf

[Craig Seeman]

See the Phil Bloom blog link I just posted regarding Red and the release of Camera Betas.

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Craig Seeman] “Some will complain about a $300 NLE being beta but how about an $80k camera kit.”

It’s how it goes these days.

Red is pretty honest about what is turned on and what isn’t.

AJA is honest about what features are turned on and what isn’t.

The Arri Alexa had some growing pains.

The Scarlet will too, as will the C300.

MC6 is not without problems.

As we have mentioned before, developing this stuff, even with massive resources, is not easy. You simply can’t put the software/hardware through every single combination and permutation of end user and their environment. Not only that, if you delayed the product, you simply start to lose your ROI.

The “known issues” blurb has never been more important. Setting expectations is paramount.

[David Lawrence]

[Herb Sevush] “The article was written for a website specializing in consumer electronics reviews. In it the author clearly separated the world of consumer software from such items as car brakes and IBM mainframes. No one is going to confuse an NLE with lifesaving car parts, but the question remains where on the line between an iphone ap and an IBM mainframe does an NLE reside?”

Good points, Herb. One way to answer that question is to look at what markets the NLE serves. Though it didn’t start that way, FCP legacy evolved into an enterprise-class ecosystem capable of supporting the needs of Fortune 500 level companies. Expecting users like this to be beta-testers for mission critical software isn’t a winning strategy for keeping them as customers.

The rules for the consumer space and the enterprise space are very different.

_______________________
David Lawrence
art~media~design~research
propaganda.com
publicmattersgroup.com
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[Neil Patience]

I always think it is pretty interesting how we have all become accepting that computer software and to a degree some tech hardware is sold to us basically not working entirely properly with a promise that “it will be fixed in the next release”
I cant think of any other product that we buy where we would consider this acceptable.
To pick up on Herbs car brakes anaology, imagine of we went to buy a car and the salesman said “Yes I know that looks like a sunroof – but it doesnt yet open – it will in the next release, just bring it back in 3 months and we will make it work”
or
“Yes this car runs on a new concept fuel. You cant actually get it anywhere yet but in the next year every gas station will probably be able to supply it – sorry its not compatible with the “legacy” fuel that every one else sells”
We would all just laugh and leave – yet somehow over the years computer companies have got us to accept the “jam tomorow” model.

How did that happen and is there any other product you would buy on the same basis ?

best wishes
Neil
http://www.patience.tv

[Herb Sevush]

[Craig Seeman] “Some will complain about a $300 NLE being beta but how about an $80k camera kit.”

Three points:

1 – Red officially calls the Epic a Beta product, (in contrast to you-know-who)

2 – They didn’t kill off a successful line to offer the Epic,

and

3 – They gave him back his money, including the cost of third party accessories.

So it cost him nothing, and he continues working with the cameras he already owns, and the eco system that supports them.

Herb Sevush
Zebra Productions
—————————
nothin’ attached to nothin’
“Deciding the spine is the process of editing” F. Bieberkopf

[Bill Davis]

[Herb Sevush] “In fact, with all of this so called ease of distribution, X has had precisely 1 upgrade in the last 6 months, and that after a rollout that can only be described as catastrophic.”

It was only ever “catastrophic” among an inside group of people who relentlessly began tearing down aspects of the software they had NO CLUE about. Go back and read all the early threads about how X didn’t do “insert function” only to have people respond that, well, yes, actually X did that function perfectly well, just not in the same way it had been done in legacy.

The big lesson I learned from the X rollout, was to shut up, think before I posted. And try to see what the “intent” of the changes were before I exposed my (admittedly vast) ignorance to the world.

I can say this with confidence, since in the first week here on this forum, none of us had any really clear idea about what the new software was trying to do differently.

I remember taking a self imposed “holiday” from the discussion in the early days, precisely because I was resorting to guesses and opinions that were based on my “impressions” of the software, rather than how it actually worked. As I started to build expertise in operating it, I finally started to understand it’s design, and found that while it hurt to lose my 12 years of operational expertise in Legacy, there was a LOT to like about the new software.

Then when I had to travel and edit on my laptop for some work in Southern California and X helped me be amazingly productive while away from the studio – it started to slowly reveal that it was a new tool that could have a very important place in how my business was evolving.

In fact, the very article this thread is based on is sticking with me.

It talks about software as a constant work in progress – and how rather than yesterday’s start-build-finish model of a program, it’s more a “start – get to useful status – then revise and refine for a much longer lifespan” model.

And that’s *fascinating* to me.

“Before speaking out ask yourself whether your words are true, whether they are respectful and whether they are needed in our civil discussions.”-Justice O’Connor