NexGen Sim - dead in the water

[MidFlight77 8]

23 minutes ago, HiFlyer said:

The basic fact of an internet forum is that anyone has the right to skip any thread they feel is wasting their time at any juncture they feel is appropriate.

I wasn't so much talking about time spent browsing forums, but also the time that was wasted in planning and debating and drawing up endless wish-lists etc etc, time which could have been spent on other projects/sims IMO instead of the failed Nexgen.   

Water under the bridge now.

[HiFlyer 9,361]

1 hour ago, Luke said:

He eventually did the right thing and stopped posting and started trying to actually do work (I think - you saw the forums.... did anything tangible ever get done?)

Luke

I ran away much too early to see. (My spidey senses went off)

I was in private contact with Mr Borick and told him repeatedly about a tendency to be a bit reactive, and after that, a bit unable to hold fire and be diplomatic and constructive even when under attack.

Sometimes people are deliberately trying to get your goat, and you make it very easy if you leave it running loose out in front of your mental house.

In dealing with large groups of people of all sorts, tact, diplomacy and a cool head is, I feel a necessity in somebody claiming to want to become a community leader, and I counseled taking deep, slow, breaths before posting even when obviously being provoked. This was something that was apparently quite hard. (well, it takes all kinds to make a world)

That hampered, I believed, Mr Boricks ability to get anything done, and after the retreat to the forum, there was both disorganization and an increasingly dictatorial, "Don't ask questions" atmosphere that I could not imagine being effective in a community led effort. I had mentioned this to Mr Borick and had warned of it previously. Eventually it became apparent that the path was essentially being set in concrete from the top, and that any appearance of democracy was rapidly becoming an illusion.

This was done with the explanation that the project was becoming a business, and that running a business was neither democratic nor fun.

Perhaps so, but community led efforts to my mind, are supposed to be fun, and when it ceased to be so, It was time for me to devote my time to things I found rewarding. To my naive mind, you can't ask for volunteers and then pull out a whip and expect things to work.

I decided that the very small chance the project might succeed had effectively dropped to zero.

(But I hoped I was wrong)

[HiFlyer 9,361]

7 minutes ago, MidFlight77 said:

I wasn't so much talking about time spent and wasted on forums, but rather the time that could have been spent on other projects/sims.   

I'm still not sure I see it, but it's possible.

Still, I would say the only people with a right to complain would be anyone who actually spent such time, and so far nobody has stepped forward. I will be interested if that changes, but I understand that NDA's were involved, so I won't hold my breath. 

[rhumbaflappy 113]

Perhaps Mr. Borick would release his group's research and code cumulative to this date. Offer it as a start to a freeware project? At least we'd all be ashamed of ourselves for doubting the validity of his efforts. 

[Rmmm 17]

I greatly appreciate the manner and depth of discourse shown in this latest exchange.

I don't think anyone derives happiness from seeing any project related to flight simulation fail.  

In my view, the history of NGIS as a project and Mr. Borick's management of this effort needs to be on record.    I personally applaud this community for its willingness to speak out and challenge and ask tough questions. Even if the discourse gets choppy, the end result of open and free exchange serves us all well. 

RMM

[Chock 17,769]

19 minutes ago, Rmmm said:

I don't think anyone derives happiness from seeing any project related to flight simulation fail. 

On the contrary, people absolutely can and do derive pleasure from seeing stuff fail. In fact it's often human nature to do so, because it can make someone feel better about a choice or opinion they have made or expressed.

If someone chooses to invest heavily in one flight sim in particular (in monetary terms), they can (and often do) also end up with an emotional investment in it; therefore, criticising the other sim choices they could have made reinforces the notion that the choice they did make was the 'smart' one.

Similarly, if someone says: 'that idea is sure to fail', if it then does so, they can derive satisfaction from having been 'proved right' and can say: 'well, I told you so'. You only have to look in these very forums at how partisan some people can get about a particular flight sim platform they have chosen to go with to know that is true.

Humans can be a bit crap sometimes.

[MidFlight77 8]

On 25/06/2017 at 7:27 PM, Luke said:

He eventually did the right thing and stopped posting and started trying to actually do work (I think - you saw the forums.... did anything tangible ever get done?)

Luke

This might help fill in some of the gaps to the puzzle

It now looks as if Stephen B. is blaming the flight-sim community for the failure of the Nexgen sim, while his second-in-command is blaming some "specific but critical greedy people".

Here's a comment on the recent Facebook announcement that NGIS reluctantly posted, after several suggestions from myself-

24 June at 09:20 -

Next Generation iNTERACTiVE Software (said):

"We looked long and hard at funding possibilities, but in the end we
still lacked support in the development area...especially in the 3D
engine. We were all set and ready to proceed until greed took a hold of
some specific but critical people. The other problem with something
like kickstarter is that we never wanted to take money out of the
community. We reached out for help and support with development
specifically to avoid taking financial assets from them and to include
them in the process".

- Michael Chapman - Vice President NGiS

https://www.facebook.com/pg/NextGenerationInteractiveSoftware/posts/
(Michael's comment, and others, is just below his main announcement.)

And below is the recent email that Stephen kindly sent me to explain his thoughts on the matter.  I dont think Stephen will mind me posting this email, as he's obviously aware of my feelings to inform the community to help piece together how the much touted Nexgen project folded.  It also gives Stephen an opportunity I reckon, to voice his thoughts at this obviously delicate time for him and the team.

6/24/17 at 10:35 PM

Rob

I'm sorry you're disappointed in my performance, but you don't know me nor do you have a clue as to what went on and the heart break after hours of negotiating and building a concept... and then learning that one of our team members was leaking our stuff to both DTG and LM.

Towards the end, when X-Plane 11 was released and P3D v4 actually came out, the entire community abandoned us for these newer releases.

But Rob, not one word from you or anybody else in the community cheering us on and standing with us. Our hype (as you call it) was centered around a community and if the community had backed us, nothing was impossible. Do I care what they are saying over on AVSIM, not really, because we did everything we could and when it was obvious that nobody cared, it wasn't worth the concessions being demanded by Diamond Visionics to keep pushing forward, we could have, but there was no support. Since we started NGiS as a community driven project and the community dumped on us from the beginning... I'm not at all ashamed of the effort that we put forth. Who knows... maybe what we were trying to do lite a fire under the big boys and the results are X-Plane 11, P3D v4, and FSW... I'm amazed how closely DTG resembles our business plan.

Again, you don't know me, so you don't have a clue as to my humbleness, or sobriety towards my efforts. What I am is disappointed, that a once powerful community who supported one another has gone the way of the rest of the world.

- Stephen Borick

----------------------------cut------------

Kudos to Stephen for baring his soul here.  But I do find it odd that he is now blaming us, the flight sim community ("the entire community abandoned us for these newer releases") when it was NGIS themselves who battened down the hatches and abandoned the community as it were, by hardly communicating at all with even their own supporters on the NGIS website and Facebook page. Their previous update being over a year ago!  and meanwhile his second in command blames 'certain greedy people' on the project.

Rob

BTW.  Interesting comment here from one of the FSDeveloper guys

"Seriously, when I look at their manifest called "Golden Opportunity" I already knew it is going to be a failure. The guy having no funds was offering virtual 100K FTE positions as a promise. He was not offering even a single share in the project. All the risks were on the developers having no "ownership" on the work done. Not even a 0.0000001%, nothing. I do know how this golden opportunity to work for virtual funds having no ownership could attract anyone..."

-WC

 

 

[Chock 17,769]

To be honest, that stuff reads like a typical response from someone who refuses to accept responsibility for their actions, or indeed inaction, instead blaming all upon anything and everything except themselves. The notion that 'the community' didn't support them is utter claptrap, and what's more, I will demonstrate that is the case; here are some quotes from NGiS people:

'I wish that all of you could be a bunch of flies on the wall (meaning you could listen in without being noticed) so that you could be a part of this astounding journey.'

So, we can't be part of this journey? Does the above read like someone wanting people to get involved? Or does it read more like a desire to remain cliquey and not involve others?

'What is happening here is nothing more and nothing less than a handful of flight simulator enthusiasts taking it upon themselves to do something to ensure the world of virtual flight simulation for years and years into the future.'

Again, does 'nothing more than a handful' read like someone wanting to involve others, wishing for the widespread support of their talents, advice and abilities, or does it read more like someone wanting to be part of a select few and to wear a big 'I'm in charge' hat?

As I understand it, at its peak, NGiS numbered about 40 people who were involved at some point or another, with not all of those being anything other than those who had granted themselves important-sounding titles such as 'President', 'Vice President' etc. I'd have been more convinced if I'd seen stuff along the lines of 'Lead Programmer' or 'Senior 3D Modeling Artist' showing up a bit more in those job titles, not to mention it might have been nice to see some evidence of progress showing up. And by progress, I mean something more than grandiose claims about how it was all going to be shiny and new, but also miraculously backwardly compatible with old FS add-ons courtesy of some magic conversion utility which apparently neither Lockheed Martin or Dovetail Games, nor Microsoft for that matter, have ever able to figure out how to make, despite collectively having millions of Dollars at their disposal to entice the best minds in the programming industry.

As I say, I'll give credit to anyone who has a genuine try at something, and I'm not saying enthusiasm doesn't help, but only if it is enthusiasm for a genuine try, and not some kind of ego tripping flight of fancy.

A big difference to note, is that with both professional and amatuer creators of flight sim products who actually achieve something, rather than just talk about it or cry about 'the community not supporting them', from one man bands through to large companies, is what they all have in common: At some point they show us either a product, or some demo or video of what is coming or whatever, instead of just talking about how brilliant their creation will be when they can be arsed to get around to actually doing something other than talk. I used to work with people like that at a newspaper years ago; lots of the writers there would slag off this or that author who had just brought out a book. They'd say things like: 'I could write a better novel than that'. To which I would say: 'Well let's see it then, because if we don't see it, then no, you couldn't write a better novel than that one'. I've yet to see any of those people knock out a bestseller, and that was 20 years ago, so it's not as if they have not had time. Now I might not exactly have enjoyed the success of Stephen King, but unlike that lot, I actually did get off my arse and write some novels and get them out there. So I know bull***t when I hear it. People who achieve stuff do so by getting off their arse and doing it, not talking about it and then blaming others when nothing transpires. And if they fall when they try, I'll be the first to help to pick them up, dust them off and congratulate them for at least trying. But only if they really did try.

As I look down at the bottom of the forum webpage right now, I can see there are well over one thousand people with the Avsim forum open on their browser, well over a third of those people are registered users, the rest being guest visitors. Now Avsim is not the be all and end all of 'the flight sim community', granted it is a big part of it, but there are a ton of other flight sim websites, forums, social media, conferences and clubs too, which one might choose to call 'the flight sim community', so we are talking about a very large number of people when we cite 'the flight sim community'. The notion that en-masse, no more than a handful of these people would get behind something which showed any degree of promise, with the rest actively snubbing it, is frankly an insult to them all when they are contributing freeware, payware, offering assistance, and even just helpful encouraging words via forums and other outlets on a daily basis.

[mikea76 184]

19 hours ago, Chock said:

On the contrary, people absolutely can and do derive pleasure from seeing stuff fail. In fact it's often human nature to do so, because it can make someone feel better about a choice or opinion they have made or expressed.

If someone chooses to invest heavily in one flight sim in particular (in monetary terms), they can (and often do) also end up with an emotional investment in it; therefore, criticising the other sim choices they could have made reinforces the notion that the choice they did make was the 'smart' one.

Similarly, if someone says: 'that idea is sure to fail', if it then does so, they can derive satisfaction from having been 'proved right' and can say: 'well, I told you so'. You only have to look in these very forums at how partisan some people can get about a particular flight sim platform they have chosen to go with to know that is true.

Humans can be a bit crap sometimes.

this

[Rmmm 17]

Human nature aside, the inside story being recorded here is important.   Note that SB now has more grandiose claims..."Who knows... maybe what we were trying to do lite [sic] a fire under the big boys and the results are X-Plane 11, P3D v4, and FSW... I'm amazed how closely DTG resembles our business plan."  

Rarely does such hubris come along in life.  Simply amazing.  

No one raising alarm and challenging Stephen Borick with tough questions was responsible for the failure of NGIS.  

Placing blame on others is just more of the same poor management practice that led to this result.  

Maybe some day SB will understand that the result rests solely with him.   Waiting for someone to please now help Mr. Borick through the five stages of grief?    Anyone willing to volunteer 5 hours a week for this worthwhile, groundbreaking effort?

RMM