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Working Over the weekend…
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I just want to make clear that it’s driven by economics and not an “emotional” level of importance.
Basically profit margin is important (stating the obvious).
It’s why I think the MacPro will be redesigned for a business model that will yield higher margins based on increased turnover.
The cost of the minor revs eat a greater portion of the margin, I suspect, on a MacPro than the cost of changes they’d make on a MacBook Pro (usually only processor speed bumps).
It’s just me but words like “importance” imply an emotional decision or strategy rather than economic.
i think one of the problems, as I see it, in the language used in the forum, is whether “Pros” are “important” but I think the better question is whether “Pros” (broadcast and feature film) represent a profitable margin and what Apple might do, in anything, to make it profitable (increase margins).
Semantics maybe but I think that’s become very important in the forum discussions, to me at least.
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[Walter Soyka] “in conjunction with the other ripples they’ve made in the professional space, Apple is inviting studios to consider PCs.”
I agree with you Walter, however “inviting” may be an understatement – I’d suggest that “pushing” studios toward PCs is hardly overstating the case.
David Roth Weiss
Director/Editor/Colorist
David Weiss Productions, Inc.
Los Angeles
https://www.drwfilms.comDon’t miss my new Creative Cow Podcast: Bringing “The Whale” to the Big Screen:
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Creative COW contributing editor and a forum host of the Business & Marketing and Apple Final Cut Pro forums.
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[Walter Soyka] “I’d argue that by handicapping the Mac Pro, especially in conjunction with the other ripples they’ve made in the professional space, Apple is inviting studios to consider PCs.”
Which is a very polite way of saying “Don’t let the door hit you in the aspect ratio on the way out.”
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[Scott Cumbo] “I’m saying the 2 companies don’t compare to each other.”
They do if you’re an investor. They also do if you’re a customer and you’re thinking long term, and it’s the long term that “Pro” are having doubts about Apple. I’d present doubts about Avid as well.
As far as we editors/post houses are concerned you can compare long term viability.
Today’s Media Composer might be tomorrow’s Discreet Edit if Avid decides to make a major change to survive. Today’s Media Composer might be tomorrow’s CMX if they fold.
My guess, only a guess obviously, is that Avid can’t continue on as they have been doing and we don’t know which segment of the customer base will feel the hurt. Media Composer is not a profit generator, it’s their hardware.
They’re going to have to make a change, That’s a given. Maybe you think their changes will happen in other ways to turn them around. I’d love to hear the speculation behind that.
Another way to look at a common element. Neither FCP or Media Composer are the prime profit generators for either of their respective companies.
Both companies make their money from selling hardware although it’s very different hardware serving different markets.
FCP is supposed to sell hardware. It may be failing at that.
I’m not sure if Media Composer is supposed to sell hardware or if it’s supposed to generate a profit margin relative to R&D costs.[Scott Cumbo] “Apple can afford to forget about FCP and never notice the chump change they lost,”
They’d never notice the loss but they’d lose the vehicle for expanding hardware revenue. They misfired in the use of FCPX to generate hardware sales but they can afford to misfire and correct (or yes drop) the tool. Apple is using FCPX as a hardware growth opportunity at the moment.
[Scott Cumbo] “Avid has no hope if MC6 tanks and will gladly gather up all the loose change apple dropped.”
But that’s not true. Avid makes money selling hardware. I’m not sure if MC6 does that. I’m not sure if that’s Avid’s business model for it. MC used to sell $60,000 NLEs with proprietary boards. What does it do now for them? I don’t know. I’m not even sure if Avid knows. Pro Tools was supposed to drive an expensive hardware upgrade and they’re getting backlash on that.
Maybe MC6 at $2500 or $1500 crossgrade sells in such big numbers that it lifts them out of millions of dollars of loses year after year. I just don’t see that. MC6 is really just a small part of a very big problem Avid faces. They may well be able to lose MC as Discreet lost Edit (and Cleaner, Combustion).
i think up until very recently Avid hoped MC would drive the sales of some proprietary hardware but they’ve obviously rethought that. So is their goal to grow MC market share? Can that be a major component to lift them up? Honestly, I’m not sure of that. Honestly, I don’t see how that business model works for them. Please explain.
[Scott Cumbo] “and as a side note, neither of these companies send me a paycheck so i could care less if they both vanish. I’ll find some other software to use.”
But as people involved in our own business we look for cost effective solutions that help our own margins. I’ve been through enough linear and non linear systems to know that I’ll adapt without much issue . . . as long as the capital investment gives me a good margin.
Let’s forget about company names for a second (although they’ll be obvious).
I like Brand X and I think they’ll improve NLE X because they want to sell more of hardware X.
I can easily use Brand Y (and did) but I don’t know what Brand Y’s motive is to improve NLE Y and I’m not likely to buy Brand Y’s hardware.Brand X could certainly decide that NLE X is a failure at selling hardware and kill it.
Brand Y could certainly decide that NLE Y isn’t worth sustaining since it doesn’t have a viable business objective for them any longer.My personal opinion but I think X has a goal I can understand and is motivated. Y doesn’t show a clear motive for me and I am unsure about it.
Additionally X presents a lows cost option with better margins for my business than Y. If lots of others feel the same, that doesn’t make things look good for Y.
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[Craig Seeman] “i think one of the problems, as I see it, in the language used in the forum, is whether “Pros” are “important” but I think the better question is whether “Pros” (broadcast and feature film) represent a profitable margin and what Apple might do, in anything, to make it profitable (increase margins).”
From Apple’s POV, that should certainly be the position; but why should it be so from my POV? I wasn’t under the impression that this forum existed primarily to feed the needs of Apple.
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[Aindreas Gallagher] “”editing country club set””
When one writes to tweak and get a reaction, it’s gratifying to see exactly that…
“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
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[Chris Harlan] “From Apple’s POV, that should certainly be the position; but why should it be so from my POV? I wasn’t under the impression that this forum existed primarily to feed the needs of Apple.”
What I or any of us want can’t viable exist outside of the business market in which companies, whether Apple, Avid, Adobe exist and make business decisions in.
None of us get what we want unless it’s profitable to some other entity. I think the two are inseparable. There has to be an economically sustainable balance.
If selling to “Pros” (broadcast/feature film) isn’t profitable then something will change. Importance to the developers is guided by their profit margins. Our product choices are guided by their response to those margins and the surrounding market conditions.
Our own business decision on hardware and software purchases are tied to those decisions and conditions. Basically “importance” even if we don’t like it, is determined by the market.
I can certainly have an emotional decision regarding what’s importance but that may not be the best business decision.
I’m just trying to define importance as a business, rather than emotional term.
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“Apple is inviting studios to consider APCs”
Too true… anecdotally, I’ve just learned that two of the biggest post houses and one of the larger PR agencies in my town (Seattle) are swithing back to Avid because of FCPX. I don’t know if they’re also switching to Windows 7… but I imagine the door is open in all three cases.
Shawn
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[Walter Soyka] “Apple is inviting studios to consider PCs.”
Since when did this market segment require an “invitation?”
Isn’t this precisely the market segment where budget considerations play under different rules than the “rest of us?”
The couple of movie sets I’ve been invited to were places where if you had to pay 50% of the purchase cost of something in order to bring it on set as a prop – and then subsequently drop it back off with the original owner – that was a smart deal. The requirement to look at overall “costs” against the total scale of the operation made an otherwise foolish economic deal very, very smart in it’s particular context.
I just read Rami Katrib’s article up top here – and in his business model I think he’s making eminently sensible decisions. With his clients he could care less about squeezing out nickels and dimes, they just want the work down properly and as bullet-proof as possible.
I actually remember sitting down talking to Rami back at a conference when he was just starting out to help Walter Murch build the “home studio” workflow that he used for Cold Mountain, and I remember his enthusiasm for the brand new possibilities of digital editing via the early FCP.
I suspect he would agree that his choice of FCP way back then was a huge driver in his subsequent success.
But it’s also sensible that he’s sustained that success over these years by understanding that people succeed not by defending the way things have “always” been done, but by seeing how they’re changing and trying to get ahead of the curve as it applies to ones’ particular circumstances.
For shops like his, at the nexus of Hollywood episodic TV work, broadening the toolset from all Mac to Mac, HP and whatever has been very smart. With those budgets you do whatever it takes.
But I suspect that having been at the table, listening to him talk as a brash young 20 something year old, I suspect that there’s a new kid out there just like young Rami, who sees precisely the same potential in FCP-X.
We shall see.
“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
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[Shawn Miller] “I don’t know if they’re also switching to Windows 7”
There’s actually someone in Seattle not using Windows?
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