Adobe's Alien Invasion Continues Not on all Cylinders

Where is the Weak Link? Dammit!

Just to preface this, I am trying to stay positive as hell regarding Adobe and their Alien Tactics. But it is getting a bit old... rewind.... Just to preface this, I am trying to stay positive as hell regarding Adobe and their Alien Tactics. But it is getting a bit old... rewind...

That is how the average user feels when they try to contact Adobe's support, whether it be through online chat or via telephone. In a nutshell, Adobe's customer service/support is going awry and to put it bluntly, royally sucks.

I know. I know. I promoted the positive side of the Creative Cloud in the last video, but that did not cover the "what if something goes wrong with the installation or launching of app" issue.

To be honest, I had a couple of issues with Photoshop CC initially. Then with Premiere Pro. And yes. Both of those issues were resolved fairly quickly. But the pattern continues... Now it is with Dreamweaver.

Hey! I Really Mean No Harm

Yes, we are now running at about a 25% "oops, this Sh^t ain't workin' right". I am sure that this will all be resolved soon, but in the mean time, and for those that are impatient... well. Adobe's take is very laid back and we don't give a Sh^t at this point. They lack in any sense of customer service that makes any sense. It seems they had "How to say you're sorry class 101" for all their employees. But that phrase does not a problem solve.

It is so bad, that their peeps can't even do simple telephone transfers anymore. I was on hold for about 20 minutes after being told in the chat session that this problem was beyond them and that I needed to talk to the "real" tech support people. Come again? The "real"???? what???

So as a loyalist, I called. By the way a number that is nowhere to be found on Adobe's ginormous site. Was on hold as I said... then after going through the whole verification of me being a valid CC subscriber, and having stated my case, the fellow with a strong accent told me that he will have to put me through and connect me to technical support. What? I thought this was technical support!

So he politely asked if he could put me on hold while he connects me to the proper people. I agreed. Several minutes went by. He got back on the line and said "Okay, I am going to connect you now." Remember, this was about half an hour in now...

"Thank you for calling Adobe. Our office hours are from... blah blah blah... Please call back during these hours.'

End Game

At this point I am fantasizing about having the CEO of Adobe in my office, tied to a chair and making him experience the total crap his people are doing. Yes. It's a fantasy that I am sure many have had.

But this simple fact about lousy customer service is starting to nibble away at the giant. And it is unfortunate. You see, Adobe can not use the excuse of "growing pains" at this point. They are too old and experienced for this even happen. It shouldn't period! But the money people are on this simple issue already. And by money people I mean the investment community. You know. Those guys on Wall Street.

They are publishing some not so nice headlines:

It's Time to Go Sour on This Software Company

The Motley Fool Blog Network

Sell Adobe: Potential 25% Downside

Seeking Alpha

Adobe's Candy Coated Earnings Report

The Motley Fool Blog Network

and on a more positive note and perhaps a bit optimistic. Hey! 1 out of 4 ain't bad. Right?:

Adobe Systems: A Huge Upside in Creative Cloud

The Motley Fool Blog Network

As a side note. I am still very optimistic that all will work out eventually. I remember the same issues when CS 5 came about. Troublesome installations, apps crashing etc.. But man, they better get their act together quickly. It is frustrating to say the least.

Adobe! They call it the Creative Cloud - So What Now?

This week as many may have heard, Adobe announced its shift to what they call the new and groovy Creative Cloud.

Forget about the CS Suites altogether! They will soon be history as far as Adobe is concerned. The headlines have read along these lines just to name a few:

• Is Adobe a Buy? (Financial Reporting)

• Adobe Just Killed Your Ability To Pirate Photoshop (some Blog named RW for ReWrite)

• 5 Cool Features in Adobe Creative Cloud (PC Mag)

• And my version - What the hell? Why can't Adobe explain things more clearly and remove the confusion? (Unfortunately this is not a link to any answers either.)

The big question really is; has Adobe made a suicidal or a totally genius maneuver? That is the billion dollar question. And why can PC Mag only come up with 5 cool features? Simply because they might not really (as has been for a long time) understand the reality of this situation. Who knows. I haven't read PC Mag for years now or basically ever since their reviews and articles were always swayed towards the guy advertising on the same pages of the article. I digress. 

I suppose the humorous one is the pirating one. I never had to worry about that as I always paid for full licenses. In regards to the financial reports, well, that's another story altogether. 

Back to the license thing. I really don't care what moron wrote this or why they came up with such a title. The key thing is, if that is the number one concern, then you shouldn't even be in any business that involves creating cool stuff. If you infringe on copyright by pirating software, you should be bitch slapped at the very least! 

Why? You ask? You dare ask? If this is even a question, then get out now! Go do something else as a career. Something where the mundane will run your life. 

For all of us out here creating goodies, visual eye-candy and so much more, we should never question having to pay for the right to use some software. Actually I insist on it as I would expect the same in return when someone uses some of my created goodies. Whether it is a project from After Effects, a photo, or my favorite, stock footage, I am a firm believer that this needs to be paid for! In turn, I am a firm believer that I must also pay for the rights to software that allows me to create this stuff. 

Over the years I have had many offer me "free" or pirated software of a variety of applications. I always rejected such offers for several reasons:

1. I always would respond with; "I really don't want any trojans installed on my system. These f&&cking download places always have crap like that going on."
2. I really prefer to get support from a company and not feel guilty about it. 
3. I simply hate to feel guilty about STEALING something from someone I have never even met! Yes! The conscious is kicking me into being rightful and proper on this issue. 

Now, back to Adobe and their Creative Cloud. Will it be a successful or as successful as Adobe hopes it to be? Only time will tell. There are two sides to every story. And this one has strong proponents on both sides. 

But there is one major problem that Adobe has yet to solve. They simply can't or are lost in translation. They puffed up their now crappy site with CC this, CC that and so on... but nowhere (and don't even get me started on the pretty useless faqs...) do they in simple explanation talk about the technical functionality of the system. For example, why can't they in big bold letters state that you don't have to be online 24/7 to use the products? 

Or better yet, why not explain in plain English that the so-called "Cloud" is not really a cloud, and it doesn't produce rain. Adobe! Pay attention! You really screwed up in your messaging! You seem to forget that artists, designers and producers are not all super-tech savvy nor do they full comprehend that damn "cloud" thingy. 

Go back to basics Adobe.... pretend that no one understands the concept and start from there. Spoon feed if you have to, but damn it do something. I am losing my ass on the stock market because you can't market or speak human!

We have the financial community, the stock market if you will, that is reacting in real-time to the announcement. Hence, they seem to be bullish on the whole idea. The stock is tanking slowly over the last few days since the announcement. See for yourself:

Source: Yahoo Finance - The day of this post.

We have the bloggers, the Facebookers, the.... ah who cares? They all have opinions. 

But here is what I have found to be true:

• Anyone that has been using this concept (yes, it's been available for quite some time now) really loves it. 
• Anyone that has not been using this concept is either weary, unsure, or somehow delusional in regards to its capabilities. I was one of these until I chilled and watched the replay of the MAX keynote presentation. 
• I admit, I think Adobe is on to something. Something bigger than we could have expected. After all, I was expecting Adobe CS7, not Adobe CC.
• As far as the doubters on Wall Street, you know, the guys that want fast money by investing... well, most of these people haven't a clue about creativity nor do they have a creative bone in their body. They only know that they are in the market for a fast buck. And therein lies the problem. Hell, most of them don't even know what Adobe does. They just purchased the stock because it had a nice upward line/pattern:

Source Yahoo Finance - Look at it rise!

I would venture to guess that there are many shorting this stock today. Perhaps the competition, perhaps the "sheeple" day trader, perhaps the general non-creative investor. We'll see how it comes out next month when Adobe actually throws the switch. (June 17th I believe)

In any case - before judging this new delivery of software system, perhaps it would be wise to see and understand all the potential. I was quick to jump and be negative about it initially too. But in retrospect, as this will be the only option should I wish to continue using Adobe products, I am somewhat forced to like it. Actually, there are some really cool things coming down the pike, provided Adobe comes through with them. But re-read the bold and underlined type above... it is a somewhat forced process. I hate being forced, except when it come to ice cream. 

Oh! And by the way - I do think their Creative Cloud artwork is pretty cool:

The Creative Cloud Artwork - I am sure this is copyright protected by Adobe.  So respectfully I am not using it for self promotion, but purely in the journalistic sense. 

 

Why Sony Vegas will most likely never be a Mainstream continued...

A revisit and pseudo update to an ongoing software failure...

So literally just two blog posts ago I started venting about this, well, let's call it a tragedy. The tragedy - Sony Vegas Pro V12 (and prior) and possible even their consumer versions. Why even call it a tragedy? Well, when something looks so damn good to work with (their interface is awesome), get promoted to be the simple do it all, mix and match, load all things multimedia and oh, "we are Sony and can do no wrong" , and not to mention 3D which I could give a crap about, fails as miserably as this product - one just needs to vent and define it as a tragedy. This is based on first hand experience now for several years while always hoping that someday this would finally function without random crashes and bugs appearing and popping in as if they were "Murphy's" cousins. I digress.

So Sony Creative releases an update in the last couple of days. Being hopeful as most would be, I installed it. I am talking about V12 64 bit... fuggetaboutit.

This piece of software simply can have all the so called patch or fix releases it wants, but all that is happening is a simple stretching of a proverbial band-aid. As they tug on the band-aid to strongly towards one side, it opens a new wound on the other side. Useless! I wonder why heavy products such as Adobe After Effects, along with all the plug-ins can work so nicely, rarely have issues and make use of a true 64 bit process and memory while this software just seems to puke at any chance it gets?

One has to ask, was this software a bad version of a 32 bit app that has been patched to death and now the company can't retreat as they have gone too far? Do their technical support peeps all look like Van Gogh as they don't seem to hear any of the problem and bug reports. What the hell are they doing? Are they simply building a database of issues and are overwhelmed? As it still is the case, their best solution seems to be, Uninstall - Reinstall. Like that would make a difference and not an option (again) since this upgrade was just freshly installed!

Sony! Listen up! You are starting to lose it big time! You bought this company several years ago. You didn't pay much attention to it as all you seemed to think was that since you make cameras and such, you also needed to have some editing stuff. You acquired, but you didn't fund. A few years ago you felt it was necessary to finally make the "Creative Software" division more prominent so you threw a ton of money at it. But did that money actually work for you? Based on what we see out here, a big NO! This just proves that even if you are a big company with a ton of cash, simply throwing money at something doesn't necessarily mean it will be put to proper use.

This somewhat reminds me of how cheesy your remote controls for the Blue-Ray/Internet Ready boxes are. But that is yet a whole other story altogether.

You make awesome cameras. You have some cool hardware - but when it comes to software, perhaps you should consider farming that portion out. That is all. Maybe not... seems I am not a lone ranger on a quest...

See what other interesting articles one finds by simply doing a Google search using the phrase "Sony Vegas is a piece of crap".

If only the crashes had some consistency - that would be actually nice. But this P.O.S. simply has no consistency.
 

Sony Vegas Pro 11 has arrived!

 

Yes sireeee! Sony Vegas Pro 11 has finally arrived and it's a doozy! I received the upgrade codes this morning and of course, as this is what I primarily use for editing, downloaded it immediately and installed it. Here are some findings: 

Review - Sony Vegas 10 – It’s fast, it’s stable*, it’s solid*

I have now been using Sony Vegas for quite a few years. Looking back, one must wonder how we ever did the stuff we did. I am not going to get into all the details of what has changed, been added, yada yada, on this new version, but rather focus on its stability instead. Did I mention its fast? In any case, you can get a full list of all the improvements and features at Sony Creative Software (opens a new window).  I am going to focus on something else. Did I mention it is blazing fast?