A new home for SketchUp
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Noooooo, Jason!
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Sorry to hear that Jason, you've added a lot to the community. I hope SU 9 will bring you back into the fold.
-Brodie
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My employer (VTC) is skittish (understandably) about SketchUps development future at Trimble and I have been asked to begin teaching a competitors software package(s) instead...
Since none of us know what the future holds I can't blame them for taking that position... I expected as much, and said so early in this thread.
I have a limited budget for software purchases and I tend to reserve it for packages I am teaching, so it is very unlikely I will update my Pro license -- it would have to have some pretty compelling updates/new features to justify the purchase since the package I am replacing it with is many times more robust already (the excellent SketchUp plugins notwithstanding).
Best,
Jason. -
That's genuinely sad news. I also hope they reconsider as I point alot of people towards your videos.
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Yes, Jason. I wish to thank you for all the help in videos and forums! We will all continue to benefit from your work, new and old, I am sure.
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Thank-you all, I suspect they are going with a "wait and see" approach before jumping back in the SketchUp pool -- in the meantime they don't like to have me idle. But I will certainly be keeping my eye on things here and I will keep them (VTC) up-to-date with any new developments. Also thank-you for directing users to my videos -- that more than anything would convince VTC to stick with SketchUp (they follow the numbers like any business).
Obviously I have quite a bit emotionally invested in this software and community, so I do hope Trimble makes good on it's promises and the doomsayers are proven wrong.
Best,
Jason. -
@rich o brien said:
That's genuinely sad news. I also hope they reconsider as I point alot of people towards your videos.
rich,
would you tell us where those videos can be found? -
@jason_maranto said:
The expected fallout from the sale to Trimble has materialized for me -- I have been moved off SketchUp/SketchUp Pro by my employer, which means that will be one less Pro license updated for SketchUp 9.
Best,
Jason.very rash decision. how can they do that if nothing has changed?
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@edson said:
very rash decision. how can they do that if nothing has changed?
Because in the absolute a lot has changed and that is what creates the worry for some and the reaction in others.
Trimble much like Google is a business, so in that sense it's the same.
Google did what they did, so there is no more unreasonable expectancy as to what they would have been doing, we know what it is and what it was. Trimble "will do" so it's always less real in the future than in the past, besides they haven't been really very forthcoming as to what they will really do so far.
And I think most of all is the business model. Google has time and time again shown that their business model is to make something available to the community (maps, search, email, earth, etc..) and then find a way to capitalize upon it, that is their model, and so was the model with SU as well. So implicitly, we placed a certain value in that.
Trimble so far is an unknown and certainly has not proven anything in these terms. They have a very traditional business model it seems, develop their company and their brand on a "sell products" model. That doesn't mean they won't do it, and they said they would, but for them it's a bit of a paradigm shift. So we have to hope and believe in the mean time. The quicker we see concrete action and confirmation, the better.
Google is rich and a well known name, that has impact as well. Trimble as known as they may be is much less known in general, especially worldwide.All that plays a role, most particularly in any business decision, whether it should or not.
There will be an impact as we see here. We should just hope that Trimble will react strongly and show that it is progress indeed, and that we will lose no people and gain a few.
At this point they are either fine with that as they had an entirely different objective all along and are just trying to lose as little as they can in this maneuver.
Or they are genuinely motivated to move along the direction that it was, and that the team wants. Then the quicker they show it, the least we'll lose, but time is of the essence, and very quickly so I'm afraid. Worse of all, it's a vicious circle (the more we lose, the more people will move away).
Please, please react quickly and make people feel comfortable with commitments. -
@jason_maranto said:
Thank-you all, I suspect they are going with a "wait and see" approach before jumping back in the SketchUp pool -- in the meantime they don't like to have me idle. But I will certainly be keeping my eye on things here and I will keep them (VTC) up-to-date with any new developments. Also thank-you for directing users to my videos -- that more than anything would convince VTC to stick with SketchUp (they follow the numbers like any business).
They are jumping boat before it's sinking?
"The sky is falling!" -Chicken Little
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@edson said:
@rich o brien said:
That's genuinely sad news. I also hope they reconsider as I point alot of people towards your videos.
rich,
would you tell us where those videos can be found?
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Certainly don't take my situation as anything other than my situation -- my services are in demand, and I have to choose carefully the packages I support because I only have so much time. They are interested in having me do a competing package, and I have no solid information to offer them as to why they shouldn't move on from SketchUp.
Trimble hasn't proven anything yet (in regards to SketchUp), and all anybody knows for sure is they are not likely to be able to grow the software's visibility at the same rate Google was able to... so at the very least a 3D market share contraction should be expected for SketchUp -- and it may be severe if Trimble makes the wrong moves. We all know it is just as likely that SketchUp is absorbed into existing Trimble software and never updated again as anything else... all we have is a few optimistically vague statements to go by, made by people who are not actually the decision makers at Trimble. It certainly would not be the first time things went that way after a big acquisition...
I've said before, I would have been much happier with Dassualt... there's a track record there that you can make some sort of predictions based off of -- with Trimble we are all grasping at straws, and hoping. In lieu of some solid facts or a track record I have to agree with the judgement of my employers and put my energy/time into another package. There is a bit of gambling happening here, but it can't be helped with what I do...
Best,
Jason. -
Jason, this must be a bit difficult for you to change on to another program. I feel for you. I think your boss is right though, to take that direction. Trimble bought Sketchup for a reason. I'm sure they wouldn't invest in a product and not apply its use to their product. But then again, I could be wrong. Logic tells me that they will use it for their purposes (whatever they may be as I don't know). My heart wishes they will just improve it and keep it alive for all of us.
I have a friend who is in the process of taking exams to be a Google Certified Sketchup Instructor. Does this have any merit anymore? Or did he just waste his time and money? I sure hope he didn't. That would be sad.
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Just noticed the 'Moving onward, moving in' post in the SketchUpdate Blog. http://sketchupdate.blogspot.ie/2012/06/moving-onward-moving-in.html
Looks like John and Susan are happy looking. Don't know about Brad .... but would you with all those broken PCs awaiting repair
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@og1 said:
Jason, this must be a bit difficult for you to change on to another program. I feel for you. I think your boss is right though, to take that direction. Trimble bought Sketchup for a reason. I'm sure they wouldn't invest in a product and not apply its use to their product. But then again, I could be wrong. Logic tells me that they will use it for their purposes (whatever they may be as I don't know). My heart wishes they will just improve it and keep it alive for all of us.
I have a friend who is in the process of taking exams to be a Google Certified Sketchup Instructor. Does this have any merit anymore? Or did he just waste his time and money? I sure hope he didn't. That would be sad.
This backs up what I posted before. Better help push to get HTML5 canvas established and developed. Here is a step forward I just found.
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@mike lucey said:
Just noticed the 'Moving onward, moving in' post in the SketchUpdate Blog. http://sketchupdate.blogspot.ie/2012/06/moving-onward-moving-in.html
Looks like John and Susan are happy looking. Don't know about Brad .... but would you with all those broken PCs awaiting repair
Thanks for the link Mike. Sounds like they're very positive over there.
Geez thomthom - you read through all that and you're angling for the socks!!
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@michaelv said:
@edson said:
very rash decision. how can they do that if nothing has changed?
Because in the absolute a lot has changed and that is what creates the worry for some and the reaction in others.
Trimble much like Google is a business, so in that sense it's the same.
Google did what they did, so there is no more unreasonable expectancy as to what they would have been doing, we know what it is and what it was. Trimble "will do" so it's always less real in the future than in the past, besides they haven't been really very forthcoming as to what they will really do so far.
And I think most of all is the business model. Google has time and time again shown that their business model is to make something available to the community (maps, search, email, earth, etc..) and then find a way to capitalize upon it, that is their model, and so was the model with SU as well. So implicitly, we placed a certain value in that.
Trimble so far is an unknown and certainly has not proven anything in these terms. They have a very traditional business model it seems, develop their company and their brand on a "sell products" model. That doesn't mean they won't do it, and they said they would, but for them it's a bit of a paradigm shift. So we have to hope and believe in the mean time. The quicker we see concrete action and confirmation, the better.
Google is rich and a well known name, that has impact as well. Trimble as known as they may be is much less known in general, especially worldwide.All that plays a role, most particularly in any business decision, whether it should or not.
There will be an impact as we see here. We should just hope that Trimble will react strongly and show that it is progress indeed, and that we will lose no people and gain a few.
At this point they are either fine with that as they had an entirely different objective all along and are just trying to lose as little as they can in this maneuver.
Or they are genuinely motivated to move along the direction that it was, and that the team wants. Then the quicker they show it, the least we'll lose, but time is of the essence, and very quickly so I'm afraid. Worse of all, it's a vicious circle (the more we lose, the more people will move away).
Please, please react quickly and make people feel comfortable with commitments.I so enjoyed this comment
. Well balanced and tuned in. -
@andybot said:
Geez thomthom - you read through all that and you're angling for the socks!!
I'm an opportunist!
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Turns out I have been living under a rock and this one totally missed me by until yesterday evening.
Whilst I share the cautious optimism shared by the far more experienced users on the forum, I cannot understate the psychological impact of the move for many casual and professional users across many industries.
- The Trimble website, is horrible and reminds me of lots of proprietary software pages that don't have the same polish as AutoDesk, or for that matter, the relatively friendly Google Sketchup website.
- Trimble's corporate video is uninspiring and sends out the wrong message to the millions of users who already use SU.
I won't comment on feature development or further 3rd party integration, but the simple fact of the matter is, that SU's user base exploded because of Google's rather straight forward front end and friendliness and is integral to it's appeal.
I hope someone from Trimble is listening, because they won't have many opportunities to make a good first impression to the vast majority of SU users, myself included, who have never even heard of them.
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@mike lucey said:
Just noticed the 'Moving onward, moving in' post in the SketchUpdate Blog. http://sketchupdate.blogspot.ie/2012/06/moving-onward-moving-in.html
Looks like John and Susan are happy looking. Don't know about Brad .... but would you with all those broken PCs awaiting repair
Looks like John traded that executive corner office for Susan, smart move
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