Totally agree with the OP.

Some of these developers price gouged us pretty good when P3D became viable for all of us "students". Most of them did not even try to smooth it over by putting the lipstick on the pig. And what did we get? The same product from FSX just ported over AND butthead comments from the devs when the community would ask why on price or lack of additional functionality. Did this happen every time? No, but it happens often enough.

Perhaps from a developer standpoint, we do come off as the mewling masses. At the end of the day, the masses are the folks who purchase... or not. Our real issue is that the FS market is so small, there's no real competition. Want a really good Airbus/Boeing? Have to deal with company XXX no matter what they said or did. Want a good XXXX scenery? Gotta deal with XXX company. They have no insensitive  to modifying their behavior or hiring someone who studied a semester in PR.

We're in sort of a tough position in our sim world. The adage "vote with your wallet" is certainly true. But if you want that plane, or that scenery you have to take the BS and hope that a competent company shows up to give us a choice. 

 

12 minutes ago, SKEWR said:

We're in sort of a tough position in our sim world. The adage "vote with your wallet" is certainly true. But if you want that plane, or that scenery you have to take the BS and hope that a competent company shows up to give us a choice. 

 

I believe you have hit the consumers' hypocrisy and, perhaps, their emotional flaw on the head. 

Technical support is one of the highest, if not the highest, ongoing cost for developers. You buy the product, you buy their support. 

As I mentioned, some companies put themselves out in public and take the market corrections directly. This will, over time, make them better as community members. 

Edited November 3, 20187 yr by Henry Street

PS: How many participants in this thread bought from the Halloween Flash sale?

Not me. I spent my alottment for the month on the A2A Bonanza! And lovin it!

19 minutes ago, Henry Street said:

I believe you have hit the consumers' hypocrisy and, perhaps, their emotional flaw on the head. 

Technical support is one of the highest, if not the highest, ongoing cost for developers. You buy the product, you buy their support. 

As I mentioned, some companies put themselves out in public and take the market corrections directly. This will, over time, make them better as community members. 

Yes indeed, tech support is hard and some customers shoot themselves in the foot by sending off rude support requests to devs, which sets the mood for their replies.  "The customer is always right" does not apply for customers who cross the line, as my supervisors taught me in the retail, hotel and customer software support industry.  My supervisors always backed me up when customers crossed the line and let me be direct, not rude, back to them.  Some customers perceive directness as rudeness.  When a customer starts swearing at me and expects me to be their slave, my own supervisors would remind me I was not paid enough to take that flak, and when I went into management my owners gave me the same backup.  Even supporting my freeware I ran into some demanding customers who would cross the line when I made a mistake, and my reply was simple--"sorry, I will not support you or listen to you anymore".  And when they aired their complaints online here the mods would always back me up and either lock or pull the threads altogether.

John

1 hour ago, scottb613 said:

Hi Folks,
 

Hi Folks,

I'm very easy to get along with - LOL - but I fully concur with this statement - reading PMDG posts and those of their support team - has caused me to steer clear of them since they released the B1900... That - and threads that contained comments critical of their company have been repeatedly deleted on the AvSim general forums - in their entirety - the very forums many of us donate to support...

I'm not expecting this one to remain for long...

Regards,
Scott

Scott, you need to understand that we moderators do not moderate the PMDG forums except to enforce the Avsim TOS. So it is a bit unfair of you to make the claim that every post concerning them outside of their forum is deleted.  Posts concerning them or their products are normally moved to their forum for them to deal with. The only time we would hide a post concerning PMDG or any other "official" support forum is if it gets out of hand or violates Avsim's rules of conduct.

I personally believe that considerate and professional discussions of any vendor is acceptable as long as it doesn't cross the line. If so, then the topic will either be hidden or locked.

 

 

Scott - Rick beat me to it but let me also add - Avsim has no issues with anyone posting a valid complaint about any developer - but when that particular thread descends into a pile on me too hatefest of xyz developer - it will be gone. The broad statement that 

14 minutes ago, 188AHC said:

and threads that contained comments critical of their company have been repeatedly deleted on the AvSim general forums - in their entirety -

is misleading as to the reason(s) behind such deletions.

Vic

Hi Rick,

I have the utmost respect for the mods here at AvSim and the tough often unappreciated job you do around here... I always treat everyone with the same respect I would hope tp receive myself - in my nearly 3500 posts you'd be hard pressed to find one where I had a disagreement with anyone... I have personally participated in a couple threads that criticized PMDG - which I made sure was outside the purview of PMDG's private forum before posting - and they vanished as I watched... Now - granted - a mod could have moved while I watched - then it was instantly deleted by PMDG before I caught it - but it seemed unlikely at the time... I hope you are correct and I am wrong - because on a site where we come together to get feedback from other members on products and services - it seems unfair to artificially mask the true public opinion by painting a false positive... If it is not the policy of AvSim to delete threads that criticize PMDG - or allow PMDG admins to do the same in the general forum - my apologies and I retract my statement...

Regards,
Scott

Hi Vic,

Thanks for your input as well - perhaps it was a fluke or I missed it somehow... Appreciate you guys clearing up a misconception I've held for a while and it's refreshing to hear we don't play favorites with vendors...

Regards,
Scott

I would be interested in knowing how many of you folks have had trouble with PMDG when you've submitted a support ticket?

Grace and Peace,  

1 hour ago, Henry Street said:

PS: How many participants in this thread bought from the Halloween Flash sale?

Sales are nice, and they are sometimes a pleasant bonus, but most of the time I'll pay the full price for something I want and so a discount wouldn't normally induce me to buy something unless I was really on the fence about it, because chances are, if I really wanted it, I've already bought it.

Edited November 3, 20187 yr by Chock

Speaking of misconceptions....I don't do Tubeliners at all but it always seemed that everyone was in love with PMDG. I guess there is a small life leason in there somewhere.😀

Speaking of customer service...Where is my Vertx DA-62!!!!😍

29 minutes ago, Chock said:

Sales are nice, and they are sometimes a pleasant bonus, but most of the time I'll pay the full price for something I want and so a discount wouldn't normally induce me to buy something unless I was really on the fence about it, because chances are, if I really wanted it, I've already bought it.

I'm not much of a sale person anymore either. Seems like everything I bought on sale (except my first Superbug) just sits in the hangar or in unused scenery.

1 hour ago, Bluestar said:

I would be interested in knowing how many of you folks have had trouble with PMDG when you've submitted a support ticket?

I personally haven't had any issues, and that's considering I've submitted several of them recently.