Autodesk University - Day 2, Part 2

Random thots:

- Thumb drives are the new CDs. (Thumb drives = USB drives = flash drives.) Last year, we got one 32MB thumbdrive from AU04. This year, we got a 64MB drive from Autodesk PR (containing all their press material) and a 128KB drive from Avatech for attending their luncheon.

- Autodesk's DWF department is splurging on marketing. They have four huge red balls in a pool, the path between the two hotels littered with large round dots (reading "Connect the dots"), giveaways of candy, and just before lunch I saw a DWF Logo mascot kind of person. I guess the 9 million DWF users doesn't include the 5,125 AU attendees?

- There seems to be a caste system. Those with happy, orange-colored badge straps are Subscription members. Those with dismal, darkblue ones have yet to capitulate to the system.

- More on the Evan Yares banning. I spoke with a Senior Autodesk Executive, who told me that (1) Evan is not media; and (2) Evan's salary is paid by Autodesk's competitors, so they consider him a competitor. Potential attendees from Bentley Systems were also blocked.

- Autodesk PR took the media to the JetBlue training facilities this morning. We got to ride in the crew simulator, which is half-an-airplane body mounted on hydraulic rams. It can simulate 20 different emergency conditions, such as the side wheels collapsing upon landing, or the oven catching on fire. (A newer model, which we didn't see, has LCD screens built into the windows to make that part of the experience more realistic.) We didn't get to ride down the emergency evacuation slide, unfortunately. Nor did they allow us into the flight simulators, of which they have five, and which all appeared to be in use. (Click image for larger view.)

Comments

[Evan Yares]

You know better than to fall for such red herrings.

>(1) Evan is not media;

Who said I was? I wasn't trying to register as media. I'm an Autodesk customer, having a number of products on subscrition as well. I had my credit card out, and was ready to pay full price, as I have for a number of years.

(2) Evan's salary is paid by Autodesk's competitors, so they consider him a competitor.

If that's the case, why have I been welcomed to attend so many times in the past?

My salary is paid by the Open Design Alliance, a non-profit industry consortium, that has as members hundreds of Autodesk's competitors, customers, and partners.

Of the sponsors at Autodesk University, Microsoft and IBM are founding members of the Alliance, and HP, Intel, and Dell are all major users of applications that rely upon our libraries.

Further, a number of other founding members of the Alliance are partners in a variety of Autodesk programs.

Now, if you'd like to add a little irony, Autodesk is acquiring Alias, which is a member of the Alliance. I've been working with Alias to smooth their acquisition by Autodesk -- just as I did with Caice and Revit.

So, guess what I'm going to do now? That's right... I'm going to continue to work with Alias to try and make things as smooth as possible.

I figure that, ultimately, I work for all the people in this world that rely upon engineering software -- whether they use it themselves or not. Ultimately, they're the ones who are going to judge whether I've done a good job. There are a lot of people who rely on Alias software, and I'm not going to screw things up for them because Autodesk's top management wants to play stupid games.

[Mike Volpe]

Evan -

Needless to say, you are invited with open arms to attend SolidWorks World in January in Las Vegas. I personally promise that we will not turn you away at the door. :)

www.solidworks.com/swworld

Hope to see you at Caesar's Palace!

Mike Volpe
Director, Marketing
SolidWorks Corp.