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We are not evil. There are bloggers who like to make names for themselves by depicting us as evil, but we are just regular people who come to work every day just like you. So when one of our products, like Autodesk Design Review 2008, asks you to participate in our Customer Improvement Program (CIP), we're not trying to collect data from you to learn what competitive products you have. We don't care what porn sites you've visited. :-) We're not trying to steal your credit card information. All we want to do is gather data on how you use our products, so that we can make them better. |
When you invoke Autodesk Design Review without a DWF file, it looks like:
OK, the Autodesk logo is in black. Yes this conjures images of Darth Vader. That's just our new look. The Autodesk web site will soon get a makeover and reflect this imagery. I guess black is the new black. But I digress...
From the Autodesk Design Review start page, you can invoke the CIP feature.
Once invoked, you will see a dialog that looks like:
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If you elect to participate, Autodesk Design Review will "phone home" with information about your usage of Autodesk Design Review. When Autodesk Design Review sends data back to Autodesk, it includes items like:
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A random 100k sample of the collected data is sent once every 24 hours. As of now, there is no way for users lookup the data before it is being sent. The data is encoded as it is emitted. This is done simply to reduce size for transmission. Individually the information is of little value; however, when combined with data from like-minded users who want to help us improve our products, it provides usage patterns that tell us things like what commands are the most popular.
DWF is designed to go beyond the paper. With your assistance, we can hone in on ways to go even further. So please consider participating. Fear not. We are not evil.
Thanks for clearing that up...It is always nice to know what is in the data that is sent back...
Granted your use of the word "like" when describing what is sent is a little unassuring...Maybe if Autodesk decided to have a page that tells users what is exactly shown in the reports it would be easier to swallow, but the word "like" states that "this is only part of it, and this is the only part that you need to know."
I have no problem submitting what I do with AutoCAD or any other program that I use...But there are those out there that see this an an invasion of privacy (look at what happened to Microsoft and Office a while back)...It just makes people a little uneasy...
However, I want to congratulate Autodesk in making it optional and not mandatory...It makes me happy as a user to know...
Posted by: Ray Mendoza | February 22, 2007 at 03:44 PM
You haven't got a clue, have you? Why do you suppose customers react with so much suspicion to such a frankly benign request for information? Because it's Autodesk who's asking, that's why. Autodesk, who regularly "retires" products and introduces file format incompatibilities to coerce customers to upgrade, because they know their tailfin upgrades otherwise offer little inherent value for the price. Autodesk, accused with no little justification by its competitors of pursuing a strategy of monopoly instead of competing on quality alone. I've got news for you: outside your protected, fairy-tale Shangri-La up there in San Rafael, a lot of people think it's Autodesk's fondest wish to impose, enforce, and collect a giant CAD tax on anyone who even thinks of using CAD on a PC, without ever having to develop another line of code, ever. IMHO your company has a huge public relations problem of which it is blissfully unaware - or, more likely, arrogantly dismissive. You yourself, personally, likely are not evil, but to claim that the company for which you work is not evil is, I think, grossly at odds with public perception.
Does that clear it up for you?
PS - I see these comments are subject to "approval." I bet you'll delete this one, but I dare you not to just to prove me wrong. If you allow it to be posted, congratulations in advance.
Posted by: Michael Evans | February 22, 2007 at 04:32 PM
Dear Michael:
1. I have got a clue. That's exactly why I entitled the article as I did. Otherwise it could have been entitled: Autodesk Design Review 2008 Customer Improvement Program Overview to be consistent with the other Autodesk Design Review articles I have posted. I recognize the problem. I am trying to show that it is unfounded.
2. We retire products to keep our support costs down. Imagine what the cost of our products would be if we still were issuing patches for AutoCAD R12. We offer our products on subscription to make annual costs predictable.
3. We introduce file format changes based on functionality. Believe me, ask anyone in QA if they like file format changes. It doubles their work. They get to test the new format and the old "Save As" format as well. No one likes file format changes.
4. Thank you for recognizing that I personally am not evil, but the company is a collection of people just like me.
5. I have the "approval" process on this blog to prevent spam. I get comments where people try to sell Viagra. I post all non-spam comments unedited.
Thank you for your comments. This is a blog after all. That's why comments are enabled. The point of my post is that we're not collecting any data that I would be embarrassed for someone to find out that we were collecting. So users can participate in our CIP process if they would like to obtain better software from us.
Posted by: Scott Sheppard | February 22, 2007 at 05:04 PM
Scott,
Thanks for the reply - just for the record, let me clarify. By "retire," I was referring more to revocation of the purchaser's ability to obtain upgrades at upgrade pricing, instead of having to buy an entirely new license. (The only Autodesk support resource I really ever use is the Knowledge Base, which still has articles pertaining to R12.) Of course, it's understood that the upgrade pricing is scaled to the number of releases being skipped, so that at some point it should reach the cost of a new license, but abruptly cutting users off after 4 or 5 releases seems draconian - compare this with Bentley's policy. I can tell you that when I informed my boss a few years ago that we would need to upgrade our R14 licenses to R2002 or else the ability to upgrade would be revoked, he was appalled - his response was "But this is America!" - his comment, not mine.
Nevertheless, I infer from your reply that you are more involved in product development than in marketing or customer relations, so my comments probably aren't too effective.
Thanks again,
Michael Evans
Posted by: Michael Evans | February 23, 2007 at 12:54 PM
Just downloaded dwf, I can't open a file, what am I doing wrong?
Posted by: Denny Fisher | July 11, 2007 at 06:46 PM