Topic: WTF .. Paid membership at AUGI ??

[Mark]

On the upside, there may be a few more members joining us here, and donating for the value we have that AUGI seems to lack
through their stiffling 'moderators' and political alliance to Autodesk.

That would be awesome! We will need a new server in the very near future.

[Tyke]

For people who are heavily into programming, $100 AUGI membership to get a free Standard ADN membership is a good deal. But what about the thousands of people who only do occasional programming work? They cannot justify to pay that cost themselves and the boss will not pay for it either. So they have to do without ADN membership and the development of their skills is impeded. The guys who do have ADN membership can improve their skills. Hence the gap gets bigger between the two groups. What was that saying "The rich get richer and the poor get poorer".

In my opinion AUGI is NOT the best source of information. My experience is that here in theswamp and over at CADTutor a far better service is offered in a much friendlier atmosphere, as can be verified by the number of members that frequent both of these sites.

How about AUGI paying Mark a fee for all the information they get from here? When other sites can offer a comparable service to AUGI and for no cost, why should AUGI be able to charge? Simple, it has to do with Autodesk pricing policy!

AUGI will not be getting any money from me, even though I can afford it!!!

[StykFacE]

Ha, funny to hear everyone's comments. I used to be active at AUGI when I first got into ABS/AMEP, but this forum here actually was far more useful. I finally learned enough here to run with it, so AUGI hasn't seen me much at all in recent years.

I mainly go to AUGI for the Revit boards (S/MEP) since there aren't that many Reviteers over heres.

Dude, haven't heard of RFO? That's the #1 spot for the Revit generation IMHO. All the super Revit guru's are over there. Much like this site but Revit style.
http://www.revitforum.org/

Just need StickyFace (whatever his user name is.)

Lol@stickyface.... so the origin of my screen name.... Back in high school I played guitar and was quite good. When I turned 16 I was considered a natural that could play just about anything, and I was asked to be in a band with fellow classmates and neighborhood friends. I also had a drumset and was damn good there too.

The basis of the band was that of Korn, RATM, Deftones, etc. (those were the popular bands at the time). The guys I paired up with were ALL ABOUT KORN oh my freaking goodness. I was like "whatever, sure" and because they were such Korn followers they had to make some stupid name that made no sense to be like them. Stick and face, put together and spelled different (like the K and backwards R in Korn) and thus "StykFace" was born. I have a jpg image of the band logo somewhere on my backup hard drive... i'll have to pull it up.

The band was quite successful in our hometown. We gained popular recognition among kids ages 13-18 across three different schools in the district. We had our logo on patches, t-shirts, and other apparel that was distributed to our fans. We rented out a Veteran's Center two different times for $300, charged $3/person and put on concerts, us being the headlining band with other high school bands going onstage before us. 400+/- kids each concert, with about 100+/- parents lined up along the back wall - it was truly fun for us being sixteen or seventeen at the time. And, for the other kids, they got to go see live bands of kids their own age playing their favorite songs. Oh and $3/person, we banked too. Felt like it anyways. Kids were crowd surfing, I signed a couple titties, and that night (two separate occasions) we all felt like rock stars. I have pictures that my parents took on my hard drive too, I'll have to dig those out as well. Circa 1996 baby!

 :kewl:

[BlackBox]

For people who are heavily into programming, $100 AUGI membership to get a free Standard ADN membership is a good deal. But what about the thousands of people who only do occasional programming work? They cannot justify to pay that cost themselves and the boss will not pay for it either. So they have to do without ADN membership and the development of their skills is impeded. The guys who do have ADN membership can improve their skills. Hence the gap gets bigger between the two groups. What was that saying "The rich get richer and the poor get poorer".

As an underpaid, undervalued employee, and occasional programmer, who's boss will not pay for the membership... I can personally relate to your sentiment, yet find relating this to a matter of rich vs poor to be a stretch (with great respect for you, Tyke).

I would also simply point out that one who is an occasional programmer, often is not adept at the free documentation already available (the quality of which is not being argued)... Fact is, occasional does not equal professional, which is the term (or tier) under which AUGI has bundled the ADN membership.

As one who has occasionally dabbled in programming over the past few years, I've only joined ADN as a result of this 'benefit', and even then, I didn't pay for it... Had I not received it as an award (one of five who received this), I still would not have a membership, as I cannot justify the personal cost. I have it, so I am striving to make the most of it. That's all.

In my opinion AUGI is NOT the best source of information. My experience is that here in theswamp and over at CADTutor a far better service is offered in a much friendlier atmosphere, as can be verified by the number of members that frequent both of these sites.

I whole heartedly agree... The problem I have is that it's the only place (that and the Autodesk forum) that is recognized by my employer (based on my limited experience). I am not arguing the validity of my observation, only that this has been observed.

I know damn well that TheSwamp offers more knowledge, and often wisdom than AUGI, but it does not have the recognition that I'm sure we'd all wish TheSwamp to have. I mean where else do ADN staff go to be corrected so frequently?!

While I started out at AUGI first as a result of the office culture at my place of work, I found that I did more mentoring there, and at CADTutor (generally speaking), yet still wanted to continue learning for myself... Ultimately, I found TheSwamp. This is truly a place where I can come, and humbly learn from others which I look up to, and greatly respect. I am never just given the answer, yet all of the guidance and direction I need is available (again, generally speaking), and I am fortunate enough to have such an environment here to grow.

AUGI will not be getting any money from me, even though I can afford it!!!

I do not agree with the new model either, personally... I accepted an offer to become a moderator there, in part, to avoid the scenario altogether. *shrug*

[Keith™]

Well, if I were still doing alot of AutoCAD work, I would certainly pay the $100 for the membership just so I could get the ADN.

At $100 it is a bargain for the ADN, even if it were as an occasional programmer .. the reason? Well, I have found that writing code to make AutoCAD do what I want, when I want greatly improves my productivity by combining mundane and repetitive tasks.

In fact, an ex-coworker asked me why the owner of the company let me do pretty much whatever I wanted to do .. come to work late, take long lunches, free reign on the internet etc. ... and I told him it was because I maintain my level of production (I did about 40% of the workload in an office of five people). That level of production was made possible through strategic improvements to the tools at my disposal .. mainly because I developed them .. and I shared them with the rest of the office.

So, the ADN would be valuable in that aspect, mainly as a reference source.

Incidently, I choose to participate in TheSwamp exclusively. I only read the other forums.

My personal perception is that despite TheSwamp being a wonderful treasure trove of knowledge (and the best), it does not hold a monopoly on being the only or even the best place for all CAD and programming information. In fact, I would go as far as saying that losing other forums (yes even AUGI) would cause harm to the CAD (and programming) community as a whole.

Ok, let the flaming begin!

[dgorsman]

Putting all your eggheads in one basket is certainly not ideal.  And AUGI does a reasonable job of handling a lot of the little, ground-level questions which, asked here, would almost certainly pull on the patience of the regular posters.  A place for everything, and everything in its place.

[Keith™]

Putting all your eggheads in one basket is certainly not ideal.  And AUGI does a reasonable job of handling a lot of the little, ground-level questions which, asked here, would almost certainly pull on the patience of the regular posters.  A place for everything, and everything in its place.

I dunno ... I think that the vast majority of the folks here would answer even the most mundane questions, but sadly, some would go on about how they should RTFM and do a simple web search when they could either a)ignore the question (it happens alot) or b)simply provide a reasoned answer

Over the last couple of years, I have noticed a remarkable change in the demographics of TheSwamp ... and quite honestly, I don't like it ... it is starting to feel like VBDesign shortly before Randall and Marie shut it down. At least we still have folks (I'd name some, but I'd leave someone out) who still don't mind providing a helping hand to their fellow humans.

[hendie]

... it is starting to feel like VBDesign shortly before Randall and Marie shut it down.

For me, it started a long time back... in fact for a while I believe it got even worse here
- that's why I stopped posting

normal programming can now resume (no pun intended)

[Keith™]

ok, see, so I ain't THAT crazy

[JohnK]

I don't know about the VBDesign feeling but I did notice a major attitude shift [i.e. pissing matches and a competitive feeling] a while back. I may be generally gruff, short, and "angry" but I always have a smile on my face and only intend to help or be funny.

[Keith™]

I am more talking about the elitist attitude that some people display, and I can deal with the majority of pissing matches when it isn't related to helping someone who comes to us for help.

The way I see it, if you don't like the politics/religion/etc stay out of those threads, but please, don't bring that to the table when someone merely wants to ask a question

and if you can't or won't answer the question without denigrating the OP, then STFU and move along, they can get abuse anywhere, it doesn't have to be here too.

[JNieman]

Yea, I can agree with what se7en and keith say but...

I know I'm 'new' since I've only been coming here for like 5 years or so, but there were always 1 or 2 people who couldn't do anything but preach about the superiority of their ways.  Sometimes it changed faces, but there's always been some of those types around, I think.

What I find different is that I don't see threads I'm qualified to answer or respond to in CAD forums much at all any more.  That's interesting, to me.  Hadn't much considered it before now, though.

[JohnK]

That `elitist attitude' is what I felt too. [e.g. People deleting/editing their posts so they wouldn't "be wrong". `Being wrong' is part of the learning/teaching process.] I always treated these threads as a "discussion" not a "first correct answer" type of thing.

...preach about the superiority of their ways.  Sometimes it changed faces, but there's always been some of those types around, I think.

Well, to be fair, that is all you will ever get because its all relative. No one can speak for all/your/his/her cases.

[Keith™]

What I find different is that I don't see threads I'm qualified to answer or respond to in CAD forums much at all any more.  That's interesting, to me.  Hadn't much considered it before now, though.

I don't see too many that I am willing to jump in and offer assistance because I just don't care to get involved in a flame war over something silly like what naming convention someone uses or how they should have used a single setq with multiple vars instead of having one for each variable.

In the end it doesn't matter enough to worry about it and quite honestly is silly and petty to argue over.

[JNieman]

I meant "preach" in the "pissing contest" extent, not just "here's what I do because I think it's best" and leaving it at that.  I meant the goal of going after dissenting or differing comments with anything more than curiosity.