Ok guys, I was away whenever Simbuild closed. Why did they? What reason? I really loved the -500 and -600 they produced. The best aircraft out for FS2002 yet. They are a talented team consisting of great designers and painters.Now I havn't found a post yet that explains why or where they went. So common, Id like to know since I wasn't around when this ordeal happened.ThanksAaron..

I wasn't around either, but I heard it was becasue they got lots of emails from people complaining bout performance, and other stuff like that, and maybe bandwith problems...but I don't know what the real deal was.If they closed down becasue of the performance thing, then I must say it's not really wise of them (no offence in any way though), becasue their a/cs were absolutely outstanding, and there's no way they can let a bunch of people that don't know that with reflections off the plane looks great ruin what they've created....

I have to tell you, with Landclass Assistant, there were a few times I almost pulled the plug because users were getting obnoxious with emails. In my case, there were initial problems with XP, and I received many emails saying "Why didn't you test it with XP" or "Thanks for wasting my time--your program doesn't work". Even after working through issues with XP (which I saw no need to purchase in order to produce a freeware program), very few people took the time to offer thanks.But then I thought, what did I do it for? And the answer is found in the users like Joe Watson who work with my program, and take the time to mention it in their work. Out of the 2000+ downloads of the program, perhaps I heard from 40-50 people, and perhaps a third again took the time to be polite. I and my program are here for the users, and to **** with the nasty ones. I'm not going to pull a product because of that, and I suspect the same would be true for the Simubuild team. The fact that Simubuild's work was a team effort, and the fact that so much work went into their excellent product, I feel that team issues might have come into play. Not negative issues per se', but the types of issues that develop when you get many creative minds working together on a project--people who have careers, families and other obligations. Add to the project itself, maintaining a website, and you have a product that could have overwhelmed the resources freeware developers have.Whatever the reasons, what's done is done. If negative feedback shut Simubuild down, that is a sad indictment of some in our community. And if such feedback was enough for Simubuild to call it quits, any freeware developer needs to understand that there's a risk going public with work. I don't recommend anyone start in the freeware biz, unless you're willing to dedicate yourselves to the users that matter--the often silent ones that appreciate your product and enjoy it. We publish work for an entertainment title, and the casual user perhaps fits a profile where tact isn't yet learned. There's no getting around that, but there's always people like Joe Watson who can make one forget a half dozen nastygrams by the way they show sincere thanks.-JohnAuthor, Landclass Assistant & Autoland 2002

Hmmm..Who do you expect to answer this ??Just read this thread ..http://ftp.avsim.com/dcforum/DCForumID8/8467.htmlObviously, this includes the best "first-hand" answers you are going to get, and all the rest is gossip and hear-say. :-)Rob

I hope SBGA will still release their MU-2. I was looking forward to that plane.Bill

Hey Guys,Nah, naggers wasnt really the problem (still a part though, hehe), we really stopped caring about those guys :-). Its just that we were pushed to the limit, mentally and personally with some real big problems (way bigger than those unappreciative guys), that we are still dealing with, so with that, to take on the extra pressure of staying open, it just couldnt be done.So we closed. Maybe we'll be back once everything is done and we get a little break.Thanks again :-).And no, bandwith wasnt the problem, our SB's parent company pays for all of that stuff :=).Al Lynch Jr. - Member FSWorldonline.comhttp://www.fsworldonline.com/~imgsrv/MySignature1.jpg

"to take on the extra pressure of staying open"I had thought about creating a webpage to host my two freeware offerings there.... But I felt that, being part of a one man team, it'd just be too much to manage. Your site was superb during its short life--it was a fast download site even on my 28.8 connection. More important, your site was absent of the pop-ups and other annoyances some sites have (and need to stay afloat). Yours was a class act! Hope to see you back, and happy to see you in the forums from time to time... Enjoy a well deserved break!-John

so how come you couldn't leave the site online? :-hmmm

>so how come you couldn't leave the site online? :-hmmm ............and I said"so with that, to take on the extra pressure of staying open, it just couldnt be done."Guess you may have missed that :-).Al Lynch Jr. - Member FSWorldonline.comhttp://www.fsworldonline.com/~imgsrv/MySignature1.jpg

for all the work you put in for the community. You probably don't hear it said enough...! :-)Ignore the people who complain.Take careMike