AVSIM State of the Union

[reecemj 146]

I read Avsim everyday. It is the best sim website.

[Jim Young 2,356]

22 hours ago, Rob_Ainscough said:

 

What I would like to propose AVSIM provide a means forum/notification of "group" meet and greets where people from the same state and/or similar areas can meet up for a meal/drinks/coffee

AVSIM has a means set up already for individual/group meetings.  The Hangar Chat could be used for initial contact such as anyone interested in the London area who would like to meet up please send me a PM. AVSIM is serious about maintaining privacy of our members so public posts about the details would be discouraged.

[Wobbie 938]

People & their interests do change, as do the sim sites.

I've been simming for many years, & to be very honest, I got tired of the usual point to point flying. So I had a good look as to what  sim sites are available, & what I can get out of them.  I found some pretty unique sites out there, during my internet travels. for example, the late Garry J Smith's Ford Tri-Motor Project, a Russian site with vintage Russian aircraft & scenery. 

Simming is very much different things for different folk, as we all know A survey, I forget which, tells us that simmers of age 55+ tend to stick to what sim they have, & which they've spent money on, & are quite happy with what they have. The young ones to to change/update their sims a lot more often. AS we know, here on Avsim, the focus is very much on new add-ons in the library for  FSX & higher. The forums as well, especially now with 1000's of postings about next years new Microsoft's Flight Simulator. Not much interest or add-ons for FS2004 at all.

Sites like Sim-Outhouse, Simviation & Flightsimulation.com  have become the 'Go to'  sites now for the older sims, with new planes being released on a very regular basis. Are these sites any beter than Avsim? Of course not, they are all part of the simming family, however, fragmentation has & is taking place within our hobby, with each site being supported by their own followers, as well as freeware developers.

So, yes, our hobby IS changing, with different offerings foreach of us...

Remember, simming is all about Fun, Facts, & Fiction.

 

 

[Jim Young 2,356]

I like this poll - https://orbxsystems.com/forum/topic/16120-market-research-poll-which-fs-sites-do-you-visit/page/2/.  I will have to go and see if I can find the last poll Tom did with an outside polling agency concerning AVSIM's demographics.  I would like to see another similar poll but the last time the Board researched it, the cost for the poll was very expensive.

 

[Christopher Low 5,352]

LOL......I voted in that poll just now, and then realised that it was posted in 2010!!

[Jim Young 2,356]

And the last one during the year of 2014.  I am only showing the results in case Christopher Low tries to vote again. 😀

 

[SpiritFlyer 987]

The state of the union of AVSIM is good, and ongoing, as the primary gathering place for those who care and are attached in one way or another to the flight simulation community. I am not privy to any numeral statistics or inside information on traffic flows, but from what I can see are a lot of my friends and acquaintances (and those I hope one day will be so) still checking in and dropping a line or two from time to time giving expert advice.

Yes, there are huge ongoing changes, and all too frequent members that have flown elsewhere beyond our sight, but the heart of flight simulation is still beating, and the need to talk about it here on AVSIM is undiminished. May it ever be so. Leadership comes and goes at all levels as younger and newer mixes with those of us who have a bit more time on the clock. It's always been that way from the beginning, and may it ever be so. 

 

I think Flight Simulation is the best hobby in the world, and AVSIM is still, far and away, the best place to connect with others who agree with me! 

Keep up the good work! 

Kindest regards,

Spirit Flyer 

Stephen

[Camsdad13 64]

Thank you. I appreciate all the different opinions. Maybe is avation in general. Everything in real world is either A320 or 737 more and more. No more tri jets. A380’s being retired and manufacturing ending. 747’s dwindling except in the freighter market. Everything going to twins.

I enjoy this hobby very much. I read AVSIM almost daily. It felt like with the switch to game consoles and tablets the last 10-15 years has put a big dent into PC gaming. It seems that desktop computers keep shrinking in available hardware and manufacturers. Laptops don’t offer the flexibility to change out hardware and to configure how you want. It is probably just me since I built my desktops since the 1990’s. I don’t play any other games except MSFS. 

It appears that payware developers aren’t releasing as much. I’m thinking because P3D versions seem to require significant product updates. Most of us don’t want to pay for the same thing multiple times with updates. I was wanting the Level D 757. I wish more developers would continue selling legacy products or do what RFP and Radar Contact teams did and provide them as freeware. If they are concerned on providing support, provide as is and the community could help each other with support issues.

Freeware developers, possibly the same thing as payware. Too much work to put in for updates in P3D. Many have mentioned in replies that we get burnt out from time to time and leave the hobby. I miss the days here with the Project Freeware Group forum. Those days we had versions of MSFS coming out every couple of years. 

Hardware availability doesn’t seem like the same. It’s probably our Amazon society nowadays. Nobody wants to stock inventory. Manufacturers are the distributors warehouse. Go Flight is an example. You could buy Go Flight pretty much at any FS distributor. You could buy it direct. You could buy it on Amazon. GO Flight was sold and supposed to be restructuring and manufacturing soon. The old owners had very limited inventory and had been out of stock for over a year. The Saitek/ Logitech acquisition took inventory off the market for over a year.  The Honeycomb products look promising. 

Some of us suggested meet and greets. That would be great. AVSIM being one of the leaders in the hobby could look into an AVSIM sanctioned even sponsored by hardware and software developers again. Bring Microsoft back in with the new version in the works. Laminar with X Plane and Lockheed Martin.  Form a committee on what we could all do to improve and create enthusiasm for our hobby. It would be great to get back to those days like when FS9 was released. Create sparks in freeware and payware developers. 

 

 

 

 

[HighBypass 2,339]

4 hours ago, Camsdad13 said:

....No more tri jets...

{cough}..MD-11 {cough}. OK she's a freighter these days, but she's not dead yet! 

[Camsdad13 64]

1 hour ago, HighBypass said:

{cough}..MD-11 {cough}. OK she's a freighter these days, but she's not dead yet! 

I have some insight at UPS. The MD-11’s are scheduled to start being retired with total elimination in 6 years. They already have reduced roles internationally. Even domestic routes are having 747’s filling in. I have heard Fed Ex is planning the same but not sure of schedule and 767/777 will be replacing them. 

You were right, I jumped the gun a bit on Tri-Jets. 

[John_Cillis 2,406]

On 9/11/2019 at 5:05 PM, Jim Young said:

When a new product or simulator is released, the number of hits go well over 2 million hits (from Google Analytics).....

Wow!  I had no idea the numbers were that high on this site.  Even my own business when I was a performance tester at an online education program we only had about 3000-3500 hits a day, and our infrastructure did not allow traffic to go higher, if it did it would shut our site down because our contract with our ISP provider did not allow more traffic. 

Because we were an educational site with a Religious affiliation we often had DOS attacks and I was hired to give our devs and network admins Analytics and how to thwart them. 

Avsim is better positioned on a small budget to handle such attacks, with experienced server admins working in the background, and of course volunteers to boot.  I couldn't give attention to a web site like that anymore since my leisure time, such as what I spend with our hobby, is the mainstay of how I enjoy semi retirement these days.

I no longer develop freeware for the hobby, not because it bothered me, I just ran out of ideas and my aircraft design product of choice was Abacus's AC Cad program.  Really the only successful project I did with that was my trike hosted here at Avsim, which somewhat works in P3D4.x although some parts look like they are made with Star Trek IV's Transparent Aluminum.

I live and breathe for product announcements at Avsim, especially those products kept so under wraps that they surprise me, like Flight Control Replay that works so well with P3D4.X, a product for a small price that gives great flight playback.

John

Edited September 14, 2019 by John_Cillis

[birdguy 3,943]

Sometimes I get a bit burned out but then I change sims for a while.

I have P3Dv4 with all the Orbx scenery worldwide installed.  This is my touring sim.  My aircraft is the Lionheart Quest Kodiak in wheel and float version.

Then I change off to my FSX installation.  This is where my aircraft collection resides in the Orbx North American scenery collection.  I have over 70 aircraft of all types to choose from and add another one from time to time.

When I get nostalgic I go to FS9 and fly my DC-3 or Connie.  Here I have all the California Classic airports installed as well as the 60s ai.   A trip in the Connie from Colombo to Brisbane.  The circa 1960 airports with appropriate ai makes a nice change of pace.

So far this has worked to prevent burnout.

Noel

Edited September 14, 2019 by birdguy

[Sethos 4,333]

On 9/11/2019 at 6:55 AM, Camsdad13 said:

The AVSIM forums appear to not have nearly the participation as we once had here.

My perception of that point is, times have somewhat changed in terms of how communities come together. Especially with Discord and Facebook communities, of which there are many, some of them with a staggering amount of users and activity. So lot of the activity and discussion is moving away from classic forums and central hubs.

[Matthew Kane 1,343]

Lately I have been playing American Truck Simulator a lot, I am trying to get to the point of owning every garage in the sim. I also like the Farm Sim franchise, between those 2 and P3D that is pretty much my simming habits, keeps me happy

[n4gix 4,947]

15 hours ago, Matthew Kane said:

Lately I have been playing American Truck Simulator a lot, I am trying to get to the point of owning every garage in the sim. I also like the Farm Sim franchise, between those 2 and P3D that is pretty much my simming habits, keeps me happy

I became "hooked" on Euro Truck Sim 2 several years ago to the point where I actually became involved with the Pro-Mods group who were into developing new countries and improving the stock SCS map.

Similarly, I became interested in ATS while it was still in beta and had a ball with it as well. Unfortunately I've had to stop since replacing my CH yoke with a new Saitek yoke. I can no longer steer accurately due to the Saitek having a large "null zone" when trying to turn right. I've since found out that this is a common defect with Saitek yokes. It isn't much of a problem with aircraft, but for steering a vehicle at highway speeds it becomes deadly!