Subject: After all the posts about the Flyer, I felt as though I
From: Ron Huebner <[email-masked]>
To: [email-masked], [email-masked]
Date: Fri, 07 Oct 1994 10:17:47 -0600

After all the posts about the Flyer, I felt as though I should step in and say
something....
At the risk of blowing my NDA.... Have any of you thought that there may be
a really good reason for NewTek to not want to have machine control? 
Have any of you thought that there may be a really good reason why
NewTek is touting the Flyer as an online solution, refusing to address offline
work?
Instead of complaining about it... Think about it...
Paul

Paul,
I have thought about it and it still doesn't make sense.  For instance, I have
clients who bring me transfers of film.  They want to cut non-linear, take the
time code back to the lab to translate to keycode or aatoncode numbers
and have the film conformed from these numbers.  Unless Newtek wants to
not only change the way that I work, but change the way Kodak, Fuji,  Agfa
and every film transfer house I know of works as well as a whole passle of
young eager editors who want to bring new technology to both film and
video, they don't get it.  I agree that in many...maybe most...edit sessions
that lack of timecode may not make a big difference.  But imagine how it
would be if one great programmer suddenly said, We have a better way
than Arrex of dealing with the Amigas multi-tasking capability and I don't
give a ?*%# how they've done it for decades.  It may indeed work, but
reeks havoc among everyone else trying to support Arrex and the common
exchange of information.  Time Code is in many (not all) ways like Arrexx in
that it provides a common handle for those of us who work in video, film,
multi-media, and music. All I'm asking for is the option to use it if I need to. 
What I am getting (I went to the Dallas Demo last night) is "you don't
understand that you don't need time code" from Newtek.  They don't seem
to understand how I use timecode--it's not just for video anymore.  I would
appreciate this simple response if they don't intend to support
timecode---"We may not be the right platform for you at this time.  But
come see us in a couple of years."  But instead, I'm told that I don't know
what I'm talking about or that I have to tell clients how they WILL work.  I
don't know about you, but the last time I looked I thought we were in a
service industry.  Because of that, I need to be as flexible as I possibly can
be when a client walks in with 50,000 feet of film and wants it all on-line and
has a wad of cash in his/her pocket.  It happens in the real world.  Most of
the good editors I know-both film and video-are not conservative beurocrats
that insist on doing things the same ole way.  They love to experiment and
they have a vast amount of experience to draw on.  I, myself have been
editing for almost 18 years in both film and video and I relish the idea of
being able to edit images, not numbers.  But numbers work in many
situations where images do not.  So why not give us a choice?  Anyway,
that's my 2 cents worth.  I hope it doesn't sound like a flame, it's not
intended to be.  Just an open discussion of a potentially great new product.