At the end of the day ….

[yog]

…. all this customer miss-management and multiple development path changes after accepting pre-payment from customers may or may not have an effect on the long term future of Maxwell or Next Limit.

After all, this isn’t the first time such a thing has happened to one company or another.

 

A lot of people were put out by the poorly managed release of the pre-purchased Lightwave-8. Newtek had stated a Q4 release, but despite wild flame wars on their boards demanding information when none was forthcoming, NT choose to wait until the last working day of the year to announce a delay, but promised more information as soon as they got back in the new year. It was mid January before they showed up on the boards again, and then only to announce they had decided that despite previous promises of information, they now wouldn’t make any further statements until release, which turned out to be several months later. Surprisingly a significant number of their user base seemed quite OK with this, so much so they are repeating the procedure with the pre-paid release of LW-9, waiting until the last working day of the year to announce the Q4 release date has slipped, more information to follow in the coming year. And still a large section of their user base seems happy with this ?

 

The one that takes the biscuit though is Cebas’s release of Final Render Stage-1.

At the time I ordered Stage-1 was slated for a one month delivery date, so mistakenly I was assuming this meant that the software was just going through it’s final checks, the manual being printed, CD’s pressed, boxes being packed, etc. As it happened the final release was over 18 months later.

Not only that, but Cebas’s customer management during this period was far worse than Next Limit’s has been to date. During the entire year and a half delay Cebas’s representatives posted on the board less than half a dozen times, and then each time it was a case of “no information yet, more in the next post”. I would say though that the Cebas forum never got out of hand though ….. mainly because shed loads of people at a time were banned from the board, merely for asking for an information update, not rudely, not abusively, just asking for information. The in-joke at the time was that you could tell when Edwin (of Cebas) had visited the boards, there was no new information, but between a half dozen to a dozen people would instantly be banned.

 

Both these companies had very bad customer care reputations because of these issues, and prior to the software being released a lot of customers were VERY unhappy. But once the software was released a lot of the customers, including the unhappy ones, fell over themselves with praise for the company.

 

On this basis, if Next Limit ever does release a fairly competent version of Maxwell, I wouldn’t be surprised if a few months down the road a lot of the current bad feeling just evaporated, as unlikely as it sounds now.

If you don't believe me, head on over to Newek's forums and see where they anounce that instead of a Q4 release, there will now be an open Beta program starting in the following year (indicating that the software is still some months off). You will be hard pressed to find a less than enthusiastic post ?

[Ernest Burden III]

On this basis, if Next Limit ever does release a fairly competent version of Maxwell, I wouldn’t be surprised if a few months down the road a lot of the current bad feeling just evaporated, as unlikely as it sounds now.

 

I think you are right, as sad as I am to say it. People just want the software they thought they bought, and will overlook the very important aspect of being in a business partnership with an abusive company.

 

Now, Cebas has been very good to work with on FRstage2. It was late, but they didn't cash anyones checks until they delivered a DL link. After reading your story it suggest that a company can change their behaviour towards customers.

 

So with Nextlimit I think we all need to keep in mind this old saying:

 

"Fool me....fool me once...shame on...shame on you.

Fool me...............won't get fooled again"

George Bush, president of the United States

 

something like that.

 

The other comical situation that may apply to us is the one where you have a guy who cheats on his wife then divorces her to marry the 'other woman'. What is she thinking? Oh, it's going to be different this time! No! The one thing you know about this guy is that he's a rotten, lying rat, so you marry him?

 

We know that NL has been a rotten, lying rat. But if they will only release a working Maxwell 1.0 then we should be fully comfortable basing our businesses on this product. What is going to happen when we need a critical patch, or expect an upgrade?

[Trick]

...You will be hard pressed to find a less than enthusiastic post ?

I think a lot of users are moving on and don't want to spent any more of their precious time wasting on beta-releases and begging for stability and features. As long as I can be competitive using FormZ 3.6.8 (!!!), lightwave 7.5d and Max7.5, together with some refreshing newcomers on the horizon, I will just wait for all to deliver. Spending money on promises was a ONE time mistake My latest Modo102 purchase was the best thing in years: a really refreshing approach, both in technology AND support

[yog]

I think a lot of users are moving on and don't want to spent any more of their precious time wasting on beta-releases and begging for stability and features.

You're probably right. I've kept my peace on the NT forums regarding the pending LW-9 release, but I have been extremely surprised how people are taking the lack of communication and delays, especially when the same thing had happened during the LW-8 release.

 

Someone commented on how not many people were up in arms over Next Limit missing yet another deadline without so much as a statement, and it was pointed out that NL have missed so many of their self imposed deadlines that people no longer expect them to keep their promisses. I get the feeling that the release of LW-9 is a bit like this, i.e. people being calm because they never expected NT to keep their Q4 release date.

Then again I have been seeing a LOT of ex longtime LW'ers on other software forums over the last year or so.

 

Which raises the question,

When it comes to companies acting this badly to pre-paid customers, are they just factoring in the rate that new customers will replace the old, once the software is release ?

Like I said, a lot of older Lightwave customers seem to have left the fold, but there are certainly a lot of new users on their boards prepared to defend it to the death. And as Ernest says, he wasn't aware of the titanic struggle to get Final Render Stage-1 out the door and the masses of users that cost Cebas.

But then again, why rely on replacing old customers with new, when it seems so easy (compare with how Luxology are doing a great job keeping customers informed and happy during their delay) to not lose the old users in the first place ?

[_PopArt]

I think maxwell generated a huge amount of expectations because it seemed to be the promise (or illusion) of a huge jump in image quality, despite its slowness. Being that we are living are ferociously competitive work market, alot of people were counting on release dates with impatience, in the hopes that they could immediately dump their old render engines in the trash can and start wowing clients with the new next best thing. Render engine quality has been at a kind of impasse for some time now, and the usual GI/final gather/photon map etc etc was sarting to get a bit worn down. NL was well aware of this fact, and chose the perfect time to start hyping the 'history in the making' slogan, and successfully whipped up a *huge* amount of interest in a relatively short time.

 

Of course, in hindsight, we now know that they couldn't deliver and got victimized by this very 'hyping game,' but when (and if) the dust clears they will go selling just the same.

 

As far as strategies go, I doubt NL's got any strategy beyond the one mentioned above. As we have all witnessed first hand, marketing and communications doesnt seem to fall within their, umm, 'competence'...

[Devin Johnston]

I think that what ever mistakes NL has made (and they've made a lot of them) that as soon as Maxwell 1.0 is ready there going to have more business than they know what to do with. Right now they have about 1,000 registered clients (those with a license) on the forum; there are about 16,000 registered users who are just able to watch what is going on. I think once Maxwell is ready they will be overwhelmed with new customers, it doesn’t matter at that point what kind of hell we have all had to go through. The potential for new business significantly outweighs what current customers they might loose during the development process.

[Ernest Burden III]

I think once Maxwell is ready they will be overwhelmed with new customers, it doesn’t matter at that point what kind of hell we have all had to go through.

 

I'm not so sure about that. First of all, its a small world, especially with the 'net keeping us all connected. It's going to be too easy to find the negatives for a lot of buyers to miss, as they look into a $995/licence product. Second, NL has mentioned the number of '6000 clients'. Just how many possible customers would they have? Maxwell is a niche market application within a small field. Unless NL can make it work for animation (character, particles, ties to post FX etc.) I don't see them having a huge userbase.

 

But will they even survive long enough to get to that 'payday'?

[Devin Johnston]

Good point but I think that time heals all wounds, and if Maxwell ever surfaces as a full application with all its features and people start seeing what it's capable of in a production environment, there going to want it no matter what has happened in the past. This does however depend on what the other rendering engines do. If Vray or Final Render are able to deliver a product that produces images as simply as Maxwell, with the same quality and the speed of their current products then Maxwell will take a significant hit.

[_PopArt]

I'm not so sure about that. First of all, its a small world, especially with the 'net keeping us all connected. It's going to be too easy to find the negatives for a lot of buyers to miss, as they look into a $995/licence product. Second, NL has mentioned the number of '6000 clients'. Just how many possible customers would they have? Maxwell is a niche market application within a small field. Unless NL can make it work for animation (character, particles, ties to post FX etc.) I don't see them having a huge userbase.

But will they even survive long enough to get to that 'payday'?

 

True. Nl stated somewhere that they have 6000 customers, and only 3 requests for refunds. Well, we know from the Nl forum/polls etc that the 3 refunds requests bit is a *total invention*. So why should we believe the 6000 customers part?

[jayadams]

If I remember right, The Greatest American Hero had a sidekick by the name of 'Maxwell'.

 

Jay.

[Devin Johnston]

I don't know I haven't seen the show since I was 10, I have rented the first season from Net Flix and it should be arriving any day, so I'll be an expert in no time.

[Ernest Burden III]

Good point but I think that time heals all wounds, and if Maxwell ever surfaces as a full application with all its features and people start seeing what it's capable of in a production environment, there going to want it no matter what has happened in the past.

 

Time wounds all heels

 

If Maxwell1.0 is great then it may pick up new clients, though my point was they've already gotten most of the easy to reach fruit off the tree. The way they've treated us just makes the remaining fruit harder to reach.

 

The other point is that MWR1.0 may have flaws, or it may not work well with new hardware, drivers, OS updates, etc. In the event of a critical fault that makes Maxwell not functional, how scary is it going to be to have promised clients MWR images while waiting for NextLimit to deliver a patch or upgrade? 'You will have it soon and be so amazed' isn't going to give us or our clients much confidence.

[Trick]

Funny how each time all comes back to Maxwell. I have it since the beginning and love it for its specs. Each new release offered less then the initial alfa: they became more useable but each time features have magically disappeared. I really hope for NL's sake that there is no slightly smarter developer that makes this renderer work in one assembly instead of losing time by letting work more people on different offsprings. A hybrid MLT, PT, GI and Radiosity renderer with a little support would beat them in a second: eyes are everywhere. It reminds me of Lightscape that I bought for $3500, which by the time it became really enjoyable (because of faster hardware) it suddenly was downpriced to $795 and even absorbed by the Autodesk machine not much later...

[yog]

I think it is a very dangerous game Next Limit are playing, as they have a far narrower margin of error than the other renderers mentioned.

 

Maxwell is never going to have a broad based appeal, instead just appealing to those that can charge high ammounts for exceptional quality stills, which at the momment is more or less just the architectural market. It's the technology pure and simple that makes this the case. Maxwell will never be a general renderer whilst it's competitors produce merely "very good" renders in a slim fraction of the time. Even then we know that both Final Render and Vray are producing physically correct sky technologies, and Vray has had progressice path rendering for some time.

 

It looks to me that either through miss calculation, or unforseen development problems, Next Limit have played their cards too early. After creating such hype and demand in the market place, they have now allowed others to catch up, and with possibly the iminent release of Vray 1.5, overtake them. This is certainly not a good time to antaganise your existing user base, especially when you are going to need them to spread the good word on why Maxwell is still better than the other physically correct renderers that have just appeared on the market.

 

I still stand by what I said earlier about convincing some of the existing users it was well worth the wait when the final version is released (and fixed), and I do think that through good advertising they can pull in a not insignificant number of new users who are either unaware of the current shambles or seduced by Maxwell's excellent gallery section, but they certainly wont for a couple years obtain the sales they might have hoped for if they had managed the situation in anything like a sensible and honest manner.