I’ve been using SI for ages but agree with some of the other sentiments - for me the random regressions are starting to get annoying. You just don’t know what’s not going to work today - could be suddenly landing clearances stopped working or you’re told to taxi to a runway that wasn’t in your clearance.

Thing is, they are constantly fixing these issues and they work again but they shouldn’t have been issues to begin with. 

I just don’t think the CI/CD model Brian leaned into works for a product like this. Developing on a live network where you can easily break something just doesn’t make sense. You can do it in a product when you are backed by unit tests, but can you even do unit tests on an LLM?

My problem is that BATC is worse at UX and becomes a bit of a pain to use.

And I haven’t tried FSHUD since the initial v2 release but it just wasn’t a great experience back then and put me off a bit. 

Just cant win with ATC I guess,

My long time flight sim buddy David ('G-ROGE' around the different forums) who is a developer in the X-Plane space, also uses SI so, as I haven't been receiving any responses to my own feedback and emails to Brian, I asked him if he'd try an email to Brian. The email asked Brian to take a take a look at this thread, to acknowledge how some of us are feeling about SI at the moment, and hopefully provide some reassurance

Here is the reply from Brian of SI:-

===========================================

Hi David,

 

By policy, we do not participate in AVSIM in any official capacity. We have in the past, but frankly find the community to be toxic, and the discussions are unproductive. It’s not an environment where issues can be resolved in a professional setting.

 

In other words, if you’re having trouble, we ask that our customers please being the issues to our Discord, where they can be addressed!

 

For those who feel we aren’t working hard enough on stability or the core product, I would politely refer them to our change-log, where we post (and clearly demonstrate) dozens of updates and fixes every week (multiple per day).. most of them related to the core product, ATC logic, sequencing, traffic injection, etc.

 

Btw.. the thread started on December 11th was due to a brief outage we experienced (about 30 minutes in length) where there were long delays in ATC response times. It’s disappointing that the community chooses to raise those issues on AVSIM (where we don’t see them, don’t participate, and therefore is entirely unproductive) — rather than simply bringing them to us directly so we can assist. (Had this person done so in the first place, they would have seen immediate resolution to the issue).

 

As far as your specific issue, raising a ticket on this on our Discord would be the fastest way to get it resolved. It’s almost certainly a simple bug in the chatter-selection randomizer that would take us 30 seconds to solve once we’ve got it up. That said, if the chatter is making your sim experience worse, rather than better, I would encourage you to turn it off and use the AI injection instead.

 

Please feel free to post this response in the AVSIM thread if you wish.

 

Brian

===========================================

This is what I interpret from Brian's response:-
 

• He doesn't like AVSIM and therefore, his customers who are members of AVSIM should know better, and should only be using his Discord channel.  Ie. We've been "doing it wrong" and shouldn't have raised issues about SI on AVSIM.

• He somehow feels people are inferring that he not working hard on updates (even though this was never suggested and is largely irrelevent in the context of how SI is performing at the moment.)

• There is a notable absence of any empathy or acknowledgement in his reply.  No "sorry you've been having issues" or "We are looking into these reports". He is incredibly self-assured to a degree that IMHO comes across as arrogant. There is zero humility and zero recognition that his user base are subscribing customers, paying for the service each month.

• His views on AVSIM are incredibly generalistic and unfair. Yes there are negative people. Which community forum doesn't have some negative discourse, strong opinions and blunt passion? More over though, his views on AVSIM are irrelevent. As a customer since day 1, I just want a product that is at least as good as it was 4 months ago. That is not too much to ask.
   
• TL; DR: from this reply I am left feeling that due to his personality and manner, he will never truly listen nor put himself in his customers' shoes.  He knows best.   Self-assurance is good. Arrogance and aloofness are not. If you're a part of his Discord gang you will perhaps be heard.  Outside of that bubble, he doesn't want to know.  He's not interested.  He wants to control his bubble and wants to control the discourse. And his Discord allows him to do that.

If you take just one thing away from this, it should be that support for SI is restricted to Discord.  To some, I know that is no big deal.  For others, it would be a factor in whether to subscribe and pay for the service.       SI has it's own "feedback system" but my own opinion is that this is only used to capture data and stats.  I have filed around 50 reports over the last year and have never seen any evidence that the points raised were addressed.

These are just my take-aways and I fully respect others may have other perspectives and may understand Brian's attitude and motivation better than I.   At the very least, it doesn't seem like good business sense to alienate a chunk of your user base that uses AVSIM.

The AVsim stuff doesn’t matter if the product was good and the company didn’t do illegal stuff like spam people. Not every company can engage on every forum. But the product is getting worse, it’s way too expensive for a very buggy experience, and their overall vibe is “cash in before it crashes down”. 

And the constant victim mentality they have starts to grate ( see how he blamed the users again in the email ..). It might be a cultural thing as well, as some people have listed. The culture of never apologize, never admit fault, constantly blame someone else.  

I give them six months at best, unless there’s a complete change in management/corporate style. 

Edited December 14, 2025Dec 14 by JonathanC

So, in other words,

On Discord he can completely control the narrative.

On Avsim, he cannot control the narrative, and therefore negative (and really negative) views get aired and discussed (as they should be).

If its good enough for MS/Asobo to have staff visit AVSIM, and answer questions (both good and bad, and there has been LOTS of comments/questions that would be seen in a negative light over the past 12 months) then it should be good enough for S.I.

Burying one's head in the sand, not listening/answering genuine concerns/issues of current and possible future customers, by ignoring Avsim, is probably counter-productive.

Then again, from what Ive seen over the last 12 months, S.I. will probably give away more freebie S.I. subs to semi and professional streamers (who could probably afford to buy it anyway) to try to present a false image that everything is 'prefect' with S.I.

2 hours ago, JYW said:

 

• He doesn't like AVSIM and therefore, his customers who are members of AVSIM should know better, and should only be using his Discord channel.  Ie. We've been "doing it wrong" and shouldn't have raised issues about SI on AVSIM.

If you take just one thing away from this, it should be that support for SI is restricted to Discord.  To some, I know that is no big deal.  For others, it would be a factor in whether to subscribe and pay for the service.  

I don't use SayIntentions.AI and I have no beef with their team either.  I will disclose that I personally use BeyondATC, but that's only because I don't use ATC enough to justify the monthly subscription (and even BeyondATC, I use it very sparingly these days).

Having said that, I will say for any business, they have their official support channels.  No business is obligated to provide support on unofficial support channels.  If they provide support on an unofficial support channel, I think you should consider that a bonus.

For example, for MSFS, the official support channel is Zendesk.  Even if you post in the official MSFS forum, nobody from the MSFS team is obligated to provide support to you - and if it's a more complex issue, in the official MSFS forum, the mods will tell you to file a Zendesk support ticket.  The MSFS team is not obligated to provide support here in Avsim, Reddit, FSElilte, or anywhere ese.  I have seen Seedy from the MSFS team post a few comments to help people out, but Seedy is not obligated to do that since the official support is still Zendesk.

PMDG has their own official support channels as well. I have never seen PMDG provide support at Avsim, and they are not obligated to do so.  This goes for so many other flight sim products.  

Now I think Brian probably could have been more professional with his response, I'm not sure why he said Avsim is "toxic." I don't agree with that part of his statement. But I think SayIntentions is not obligated to provide support here in Avsim, because if they were, PMDG would also be obligated to provide support here at Avsim (but I haven't seen any PMDG staff post here in the MSFS forum).  I am aware that Avsim has created some forums for official support from the developer, so if the developer agreed to make those forums their official support forum, then they are obligated to provide support at their forum in Avsim.

Realistically, it's not just Avsim where flight sim products are discussed. Flight sim products are discussed at Avsim, r/flightsim on Reddit, r/MicrosoftFlightSim on Reddit, r/Xplane on Reddit, official MSFS forum, Xplane.org forums, Facebook, Twitter, TikTok, FSElite comments, Discord channels, flightsim.com forums, the official forum of the developer, ThresholdX comments, FSNews comments, etc. Look at all these list of forums - a 3rd party developer can't possibly be monitoring all these forums at the same time.

Edited December 14, 2025Dec 14 by abrams_tank

14 hours ago, abrams_tank said:

[...snipped]

Having said that, I will say for any business, they have their official support channels.  No business is obligated to provide support on unofficial support channels.  If they provide support on an unofficial support channel, I think you should consider that a bonus.

 

[...snipped]

No-one is suggesting that a business entity should not have a single, common means of access for support.  That is sensible and will usually result in a more focussed, consistent service.

The issue, if there is one, is the wide-arching castigation of one of the largest flight sim communities as "toxic" and the beligerant refusal to engage with it.

As you said yourself, MS has Zendesk.  Yet does that stop SeedyL coming here and communicating, where he notices there are discussions that he could add value and context to?

The prime point in my own view was not really about the support / Discord aspect - it's that Brian has shown that he is utterly deaf to the voice of the user community - unless they are on his Discord.   All he needed to say was something to the effect of "we have had some service issues and we're sorry that they are affecting people's enjoyment".

Did you read one iota of that intent or attitude in his message? 

It was closed. It was arrogant.  And that is who we are dealing with when it comes to SI.

My prediction is that they will go on adding features like "Have Margot Robbie as your F/O!" and "Help Santa deliver his presents!" (a REAL feature), while the core ATC service continues to degrade.  He messes with the live service, every time he adds, tweaks and expands this bloated, childish content.

Think about the people who are likely to pay a significant subscription fee each month for an ATC service. Don't you think they are more likely to be the serious simulation hobbyists, rather than those who will pay $$ every month to have a new Santa game?

Edited December 14, 2025Dec 14 by JYW

I’ve been a satisfied SayIntentions customer for over 18 months now, and overall I’m genuinely impressed with how much the product has improved and developed during that time — particularly in terms of immersion, realistic ATC behavior and integration with MSFS. The pace of development has been very active, with frequent updates that often fix issues people raise and add new features. 

That said, I’m struggling to understand why this thread has become a platform for what feels like a small group’s personal campaign against the software rather than a constructive discussion. There are tens of thousands of users enjoying this product, many of whom don’t see the same experience described here, yet the tone has been overwhelmingly negative and often unhelpful.

We all know any complex, live ATC system can have intermittent issues — and that’s exactly the kind of feedback that helps developers improve things — but that’s not the same thing as turning a thread into a place for repeated complaints and negativity.

So my question to both the posters and the moderators here is: why is it being permitted for two or three individuals to dominate the thread with personal attacks and dismissal of real development progress, instead of keeping the discussion focused on actual issues and solutions?

Users with real problems deserve a place to be heard, but let’s keep it respectful and productive. If the goal here is helping each other, it shouldn’t feel like a personal jihad against a product that, for many of us, continues to evolve and deliver.

And...: Ignored. (nice try) 😊 

Edited December 14, 2025Dec 14 by MaGer1965

Discord discussion are usually pointless; as any dev can choice what is showed in discussion. Personally if support is run on discord or based on discord reviews and ms forum take it with a pinch of salt.

Edited December 14, 2025Dec 14 by Marc22

3 hours ago, wsnd_lepa said:

personal attacks

Hi Brian,

Where on Earth are the personal attacks?

Censorship - (appealing to the moderators to close the thread) - is the weakest form of debate. What is there to be defensive about?

Anyway, welcome to AVSIM, I note you joined 3 hours ago, specifically to post in this thread. 😉

AVSIM is full of robust discussions. It's what makes it what it is (and why those organisations that are challenged, tend to call it 'toxic').     

MODS - I won't post anything further on this thread. What needed to be said has been said.  Please lock the thread if you believe also that the discussion has run it's course 👍 

Edited December 14, 2025Dec 14 by JYW

3 hours ago, wsnd_lepa said:

So my question to both the posters and the moderators here is: why is it being permitted for two or three individuals to dominate the thread with personal attacks and dismissal of real development progress, instead of keeping the discussion focused on actual issues and solutions?

Welcome to Avsim and what an interesting first post!

I don't use SayIntentions so I have no horse in this race but could I just point out the irony of your concern about 'personal attacks' when your good friend Brian has just labelled the Avsim community as 'toxic'?

It seems to me this thread is a discussion focused on actual issues that more than two or three individuals are having with your product.

Part of the reasons these boards exist is for the open discussion of these sort of issues. 

Strangely, paying customers often feel they have a right to discuss any shortcomings they find in the products they're spending their hard earned cash on.

Annoying but true....🤷‍♂️

5 hours ago, wsnd_lepa said:

So my question to both the posters and the moderators here is: why is it being permitted for two or three individuals to dominate the thread with personal attacks and dismissal of real development progress, instead of keeping the discussion focused on actual issues and solutions?

Welcome to Avsim Brian!

Let  me understand this, you would like Avsim to moderate and get rid of any negative opinions of your product (which does in fact have many flaws and issues)?  I think it is perfectly OK for paying customers to talk about product issues (especially a product that costs over $200 annually) outside of a Discord where any posts that are not "liked" can easily be deleted out of existence. Speaking of "issues and solutions", many "issues" from long ago (12-18 months) that were touted as fixed at the time are still not fixed.... 

Look Brian is here and posing as someone else...

8 hours ago, wsnd_lepa said:

I’ve been a satisfied SayIntentions customer for over 18 months now, and overall I’m genuinely impressed with how much the product has improved and developed during that time — particularly in terms of immersion, realistic ATC behavior and integration with MSFS. The pace of development has been very active, with frequent updates that often fix issues people raise and add new features. 

That said, I’m struggling to understand why this thread has become a platform for what feels like a small group’s personal campaign against the software rather than a constructive discussion. There are tens of thousands of users enjoying this product, many of whom don’t see the same experience described here, yet the tone has been overwhelmingly negative and often unhelpful.

We all know any complex, live ATC system can have intermittent issues — and that’s exactly the kind of feedback that helps developers improve things — but that’s not the same thing as turning a thread into a place for repeated complaints and negativity.

So my question to both the posters and the moderators here is: why is it being permitted for two or three individuals to dominate the thread with personal attacks and dismissal of real development progress, instead of keeping the discussion focused on actual issues and solutions?

Users with real problems deserve a place to be heard, but let’s keep it respectful and productive. If the goal here is helping each other, it shouldn’t feel like a personal jihad against a product that, for many of us, continues to evolve and deliver.

😄 

This thread has achieved immortality for me now. This is the post that, without any doubt, makes it clear that SI is dead as a dodo. Good luck to Brian and co.. they will need it. 

Edited December 15, 2025Dec 15 by JonathanC

I've used SI almost daily for a year.  (I'm retired). I thought I'd try both BATC and FSHUD before my yearly SI subscription came up for renewal, so I got both a few weeks ago.  Got them working fine, but neither was as interesting as listening to other SI simmers live on SI, even if the program has some glitches.  I really missed this feature in the other two ATC programs, and have "re-upped" with SI despite some of its drawbacks and cost, and will continue with them, simply because of this "live" feature, which is not available in the other two ATC programs.