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ADM -- Just What Is Going On?
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Posted by Jan Rifkinson
Mar 5, 2007 at 01:10 PM
Dominik Holenstein wrote:
>My key learnings:
>- I support and use well
>supported software only. Criterias: E-Mails are answered, a support forum or group
>is available and moderated, there is at least one stable release per year, the website
>is updated regularly, minor releases including bug fixes are distributed for free
>during the year, users are warmly invited to provide feedback, if there are delays
>these delays are communicated openly, or: the developers don’t publish a final or
>clear release date until they are 100% sure they can match the date (like Kinnook or
>IdeaMason did), beta testing is available but on a limited time only
Excellent lessons for me too, Dominik. I was taken in by the adventure & didn’t consider the dangers.
As a rule I support independent developers because I admire their goals & believe they deserve a chance against the big guys. And because they have to fight off the big guys I think that they find innovative ways to handle problems. It’s the same reason I like independent films: old subjects told in new ways.
Yes, there is a place for the big guys & I do use Photoshop but in all cases I think there is no reason for anyone to get personal or rude as some individual(s) were in discussing ADM issues even when they may have a good point to make.
I’ll be interested to see if you get a response from the ADM folk. Unlike you I still use ADM but I’m trying to wean myself off of the program but paying special attention to how other programs import & export data & meta data. I have lost thousands of hours with my ADM adventure & I’m upset by that but I have no choice but to move forward.
Regards to you, Dominik, from a snowy CT
—
Jan Rifkinson
Ridgefield, CT USA
Posted by Daly de Gagne
Mar 5, 2007 at 01:32 PM
Dominik, I appreciate your post, and your review of your involvement with ADM.
In retrospect each of us may have done things differently. I think that people such as yourself did more than could be reasonably expected of one who providing volunteer service.
Re only one person coding: I never knew that until after the fact. When I used to complain that changes in a new beta version suggested very little checking before it was made available for download, Eric would lecture me on that’s the way software is developed. Meanwhile I always felt it was just plain carelessness. But when I realized there was only one coder, I understood why the problem. There just wasn’t time to check a new beta version except perhaps in the most cursory manner—so us “trusted” testers did more of the grunt work than I have ever seen expected on any other developer’s beta.
Yet, last night when I fired up ADM for the first time in weeks I felt nostalgia, a warm response to the program (if not its developer), and a wish that I could use it with confidence.
I hope to God someone from ADM, or with connections to the people in ADM, is reading these posts, and makes sure they get read by Arne and Eric.
Thanks again Dominik.
Daly
Dominik Holenstein wrote:
>Daly,
>Jan,
>
>As a fromer supporter of ADM I have to state this:
>- I supported the
>integration of Skype. Still a great idea but too early
>- I did not put enough pressure
>on removing the bugs and implementing some basic features
>- I did not express my
>concerns enough regarding the fact that only one developer is writing code
>- I did not
>listen to Stephen and his rather hard but in the end true posts here
>- I still like ADM
>very much but I don’t use it anymore
>- I am disappointed about the communication
>breakdown between ADM and its users
>
>My key learnings:
>- I support and use well
>supported software only. Criterias: E-Mails are answered, a support forum or group
>is available and moderated, there is at least one stable release per year, the website
>is updated regularly, minor releases including bug fixes are distributed for free
>during the year, users are warmly invited to provide feedback, if there are delays
>these delays are communicated openly, or: the developers don’t publish a final or
>clear release date until they are 100% sure they can match the date (like Kinnook or
>IdeaMason did), beta testing is available but on a limited time only
>- I don’t
>over-support software anymore. Even with tools like Ultra Recall or IdeaMason I am
>very careful in expressing my support too much because you never know how long they are
>in business. Even Bill Gates from Microsoft said once: ‘Microsoft is always two years
>away from getting bancrupt.’ What that means: You are much faster out of the business
>than you think.
>
>I have written an e-mail to Eric including some questions regarding
>the further develoment of ADM.
>Keep finger’s crossed!
>
>Dominik
>
>
Posted by Daly de Gagne
Mar 5, 2007 at 01:41 PM
Very interesting that this morning I got the following post at my Yahoo GTD Group:
******
FWIW I’ll give you my recent experience (this past week).
I purchased ADM over a week ago - they sent me a receipt for my $129
within seconds.
After waiting three days, I finally emailed them requesting my serial
number so I could unlock the trial edition.
A day later they sent one, but when I tried to use it, the program
said the number was invalid.
Another couple of emails and week later with no response, I canceled
my order and stopped payment on my credit card.
For comparison, check out IdeaMason - a great product and a company
with much better vibes: http://www.ideamason.com/
***************
Things may be worse than we thought, although ADM’s web presence and automation were always pretty amateurish.
Back last night, before seeing this post, I tried the usual download procedure and got no response. I suspect strongly the last English version of ADM was in September 2006.
I can find no reference to the Chinese ADM version on search sites, but did find an interesting blog article about Eric having used an alias when in Korea some time ago, and then introducing himself to someone using his real name.
If anyone has a friend who is able to work the Chinese search sites, it would be interesting to see if he or she could find something about ADM’s progress with a Chinese version. My gut feeling is that it may not be a version for public release so much as one connected with some other project or contract work Eric is involved with in China. But that’s a hunch based on a rudimentary analysis of blog and other web material going back a few years.
Interestingly, the search sites do not show up much of the present discussion of ADM on various groups.
Anyhow, I think it would be very helpful to hear from either Arne or Eric as to the real state of ADM.
Daly
Posted by dan7000
Mar 5, 2007 at 03:59 PM
As a supporter and continuous user of ADM I thought I’d chime in.
I’m definitely not defending ADM’s behavior, but I don’t feel as sour about it as some seem to.
This is just my perspective, but first, I did pay for the beta, and I feel like I got a pretty good value for my money, even if I never get another version. I have entered tens of thousands of topics into around a hundred huge outlines in the past 3 years that I’ve used ADM. I still use it actively for approximately 8 hours a day, 6 days a week. I don’t remember the last time it crashed or hanged. Compare this to MS Word. I paid more for MS Word than I did for ADM, and I use Word far less. Word crashes or hangs very regularly, and it’s slow as a dog.
Second, we have to realize that almost ALL of the software we talk about here is developed primarily by one person—and most of them do it part time. WhizFolders? Jot Notes? InfoHandler? I’ve managed Windows software businesses at big and small companies, and it’s easy to tell from the scope and pace of these development efforts what’s going on. Face it: it costs $180,000 / year to employ a programmer (including equipment, health care, etc). In addition to the programmer, you hopefully have a QA person, a marketing person and tech support (possibly these are the same person).
I’d be surprised if any of these companies has sold more than 20,000 copies in the past 4 years of their work. Most of them cost around $50 or less. That’s $1 mil over 4 years: $250,000 /yr. It’s very doubtful that any VC’s have given money for these efforts, so this is their entire budget if they are a huge succes. (I leave out web clipping programs, who may have been able to get funding).
All that is to just say: nobody should be surprised to learn that ADM had only one programmer. Also, nobody should be surprised if, after years of doing this as a side job without getting close to the obvious goal of getting rich or going public or whatever, the 2-man company gets disgusted and gives up or drops out for a while. This is inherent with these small-time software efforts.
I said that I wasn’t hoping to defend Eric or Arne, but I will say that I object to them being compared to snake oils salesmen. I know people like this and I’ve worked with them. They have a dream, and their dream has sucked years of hard work out of them and it’s not working out.
We, the users, have reaped the benefits of that hard work. Sure, we paid for it, but I think we got the good end of the deal.
-dan
Posted by Graham Rhind
Mar 5, 2007 at 04:28 PM
Hi Dan,
If you’re happy with the program and use it, that’s great; and if you’re happy with what it does for you, that’s great too. (I stopped using ADM when it started losing my data). I’m also not going to bad mouth Eric or Arne personally. What I will say, though, is that I’m one of those one-man software houses, so I know what it’s like. I don’t object when people stop developing for whatever reasons. What I do object to is the fact that they may no effort to communcate this to their existing or new users.
There is nothing on the website to suggest that the program is no longer being sold (if you sell it, you have to support it, at least to the extent of sending out a working unlock code!). There have been no e-mails to users letting us know of the hiatus. For me, that’s just not acceptable. Being British, I don’t have an affinity for sellers of snake oil, but we have other words for such people ......
I promise an update to my software every quarter, and that’s been the case every quarter for the past 6 years. If there comes a time when I stop doing that, I will put that information on my website and tell the users. It’s the least one can do.
Graham
dan7000 wrote:
>As a supporter and continuous user of ADM I thought I’d chime in.
>I’m definitely not
>defending ADM’s behavior, but I don’t feel as sour about it as some seem to.
>
>This is
>just my perspective, but first, I did pay for the beta, and I feel like I got a pretty good
>value for my money, even if I never get another version. I have entered tens of
>thousands of topics into around a hundred huge outlines in the past 3 years that I’ve
>used ADM. I still use it actively for approximately 8 hours a day, 6 days a week. I don’t
>remember the last time it crashed or hanged. Compare this to MS Word. I paid more for MS
>Word than I did for ADM, and I use Word far less. Word crashes or hangs very regularly,
>and it’s slow as a dog.
>
>Second, we have to realize that almost ALL of the software we
>talk about here is developed primarily by one person—and most of them do it part time.
>WhizFolders? Jot Notes? InfoHandler? I’ve managed Windows software businesses at
>big and small companies, and it’s easy to tell from the scope and pace of these
>development efforts what’s going on. Face it: it costs $180,000 / year to employ a
>programmer (including equipment, health care, etc). In addition to the programmer,
>you hopefully have a QA person, a marketing person and tech support (possibly these
>are the same person).
>I’d be surprised if any of these companies has sold more than
>20,000 copies in the past 4 years of their work. Most of them cost around $50 or less.
>That’s $1 mil over 4 years: $250,000 /yr. It’s very doubtful that any VC’s have given
>money for these efforts, so this is their entire budget if they are a huge succes. (I
>leave out web clipping programs, who may have been able to get funding).
>
>All that is
>to just say: nobody should be surprised to learn that ADM had only one programmer.
>Also, nobody should be surprised if, after years of doing this as a side job without
>getting close to the obvious goal of getting rich or going public or whatever, the
>2-man company gets disgusted and gives up or drops out for a while. This is inherent
>with these small-time software efforts.
>
>I said that I wasn’t hoping to defend Eric
>or Arne, but I will say that I object to them being compared to snake oils salesmen. I
>know people like this and I’ve worked with them. They have a dream, and their dream has
>sucked years of hard work out of them and it’s not working out.
>We, the users, have
>reaped the benefits of that hard work. Sure, we paid for it, but I think we got the good
>end of the deal.
>
>-dan
>
>