First off I want to thank Blog Nauseam for keeping me updated on Autodesk happenings. I went there Saturday to catch up since it has been a while. When you are no longer a customer of Autodesk you tend to live in your own little secure perpetual license world. It is one where whatever treachery or Anagnost anti-customer stupidity vomiting forth from them has no effect on your life anymore.
Now you were wise enough not to fall for the subs idea weren’t you? Well let us hope so because in ways that can’t be denied anymore Autodesk has shown with Artcam what they think of you. CNC Zone is a group of machining related forums and is an indicator of market use and interest in various software. In a world where hard data is impossible to come by one looks for indicators as to what is going on. There is an Artcam subheading and then an Autodesk one with HSM Inventor Cam and Fusion360 all in one. Today as is pretty typical Artcam has more readers than brand A’s stuff. http://www.cnczone.com/forums/
Remember well the push by Autodesk to sell more perpetual seats to users before they cut them off. You were advised to buy more to cover future needs if you liked perpetual. Of course it was not long before the ugly side started showing up. Then come the announcements by Anagnost to investor firms that perpetual will be phased out. Then comes the new pricing structure which has by historical industry standards huge price increases to punish you for being stupid enough to want to control your life by keeping perpetual seats. That thing they just had sold many of you on by the way.
It has been my belief that Autodesk intends to axe a bunch of programs and roll them over into Fusion360 where possible. Now I had presumed this would have been Inventor and HSM and Inventor Cam primarily. With a $285,000,000.00 price tag for the acquisition of Delcam and it’s customer base I figured they would be safe from the Fusion360 have to work online garbage. If you care to remember this is precisely what Autodesk said about Delcam to. We are not going to touch them and they will continue as an autonomous entity except they are now owned by Autodesk. I guess this is why the end or perpetual seats for Delcam happened about a year later than Inventor HSM and Autodesk etal.
Once again Autodesk was proven to be a pack of liars and grasping for ways to turn into the next Adobe. You see this was the important thing. Please institutional investors but not the investors in the products called customers. Funny how that worked out to as tone deaf and blind dear Andrew Anagnost figures he can do what he wants to customers and they won’t be offended and leave but rather will eagerly stand in the cotton fields and ask him how can they give even more to him for less in return.
Today with the advent of the end of Artcam all you subscription suckers better wake up and find the exit. You see since you were stupid, I do use that term deliberately by the way because putting your companies future into insecure hands is, well it is stupid. When subscriptions end they do just that. You do not work any more. Autodesk has stated that 11-1-18 will be the end for Artcam support. You have a subscription for Artcam and trusted Autodesk with your future you are now a part of Autodesks new wave perpetual licensing paradigm. Namely Perpetually Screwed. They sold you on up front savings and what your getting is the perpetual axe.
Delcam has a bunch of minor niche market programs like Dental Cam and Shoe Cam and who knows what else. I bet these have smaller markets by far than Artcam so all you Delcam users of anything other than the biggest Delcam products be prepared for the ram.
Here comes the 11th down quarter for Autodesk followed by the 12th and at some point in time even the idiots fueling the stock market hyper over valuation will wake up and discover this nice Autodesk lady they have been sleeping with is in truth an axe murderer and terminally ill to boot.
People I don’t care WHAT Autodesk product you are using. If you do not have enough sense to get away from them while you can do so in an orderly way you are just plain silly. Autodesk is telling you every way they can they are going to screw over all who stay BY THEIR ACTIONS.
The words that come out of serial liars mouths are not the things you want your future to be dependent upon.
For you CAD guys look into Bricscad for Autocad replacement. For 3D design check out Solid Edge and both of these companies want you as customers by the traditional standards of willing seller willing buyer.
Machined Audio Horn Lens 