Las Vegas, where entirely too many CAD shows are held, is the only city I can identify by sound. The second I enter the airport I am greeted with the jangling disorienting musical tones of the slot machines, a perpetual background. Every now and then, the sound changes as some lucky player is rewarded and coins spill from machine. Still, the big jackpot, the giant dollar sum in blinking lights above, still taunts and beckons. Players move from one machine to another, but the jackpot stays just out of reach.
For the CAD industry, the jackpot is the conversion of millions of 2D CAD users to 3D. Though there have been some small payoffs as hundreds of thousands have converted, but the big jackpot awaits the player who can convert the millions. That jackpot is worth billions of dollars. CAD companies mill about wondering how to get the jackpot.
Yet, from a user standpoint, the answer is ridiculously easy. All that is needed is 3D software that is powerful, easy to use and cheap.
Currently, you can only get 3D design software that is powerful, easy to use OR cheap. Pick any MCAD software and it will satisfy one or two of the requirements. Nobody's software is at once powerful, easy to use AND cheap.
- Next: Who You Calling Cheap? - a definition of terms.
- Still to come - Where current MCAD programs fall short.
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