What have we learned from the X-Plane Version Update?

24 April 2023 mk

what are the perceptions from the x-plane version 11 to 12 transition? 

wrapping up the question after a few months after its release this is what we learned:

X-plane12 is not less not more than dumping all non-core modules of its predecessor and build a new world-engine around its physics module. 

To clarify this: The core program is a 3d aerodynamics module which basically defines how an oject like an airplane behaves in space. Aeronautical Equations and a bunch of parameters direct these behaviours, and values like physical attitude, shape, wind, weight, engine performance etc. would deliver the variables. Pretty simple, right? To build an airplane model you simply have a look at planemaker, that program does the modelling by whatever numbers you enter.

Oh, you thought it was more complicated?

Nope.

Now, to get you something like make the models usable as first person interactive kind of thing, you would add a world, an interactive 3d-world, so you can see your model actually being flown around from place A to place B. 

you place your object (your airplane) somewhere on that world bowl and ready you are for take off.

And you need a control surface, GUI, a user interface that parameterizes settings, so you can tell where to start, what your graphics card is and how much of this and that you wanna see. for example autogen houses. And of course it adds the interaction control, your joystick.

That's pretty much what it is. 

Now, you wonder what exactly is the difference to X-Plane11?

Laminar, the guys who build x-plane, have realized they would not need to build their own world (like Asobo did), but that they could simply import a ready-to-go 3D world available on the game market. And that is what they did. The game world is called 'unreal engine 5' and almost every game developer out there uses it. Even competitors like PREPARE. 

Unreal engine includes water, clouds, trees, pretty much everything you now see in x-plane12. Replacing xp11's world with unreal takes about 3-20 months, the time laminar took from being completely smashed by MSFS' introduction in August 2020 until their first responsive release of X-Plane12 in 2021. 

Additionally, the planemaker program, in which developers build up their airplanes has been receiving a bit of a cosmetic, for the reason of covering up heritage mistakes and secondly to update the graphic look. Most planes would not transfer from 11 to 12 without the need for some re-engineering. Most freeware got lost that way. 10 percent of payware stuff got upgraded so far.

That wraps it up, that is pretty much the Job Laminar has performed to make a switch from x-plane 11 to 12, trying to satisfy the unhappy community with their gigantic list of requests and feedback.

From that suggestion list (which included over a thousand user inputs and votings) an approximate 20 percent has been responded to by the x-plane12 solution. 80 percent from that list were ignored and not accomplished.

Based on this transformation - as you now have learned how it was done - in comparison to what was expected when looking at both the community feedback list as well as the competitors' solution like MSFS, you would not be suprised to see where the disappointment comes from and why user numbers have decreased so dramatically. Developers who transited from FSX have left X-Plane again and a number of legacy x-plane developers made their decision to leave as well. 

It is proven argument that x-plane12 is not less not more than x-plane 11.60.

This migration process tells that the accomplished degree of true innovation is in fact zero and that MSFS is way too attractive to ignore.  But yes, switching the world-model and tweaking some stuff on the core would bring a bit of a better experience to the remaining users, the flights feel a bit smoother and things look a bit better than before.  

Comparing this achievement to the innovation degree over at DCS and MSFS which is somewhere at 50-80 percent, you wouldn't be surprised to hear that x-plane user numbers have decreased by more than half in 2 years. The X-Plane10-to-11 hype has been reversed by half, counting daily. A considerable amount of users have not even upgrading from 11 to 12, but still run X-Plane 11 on their PC's.

To summarize the conversion you could simply tell, Austin Meyer wasn't willing to innovate. He advised his team to find a way of rebuild the environment while core components remain the same. His ignorance against innovation is basically built on his convincement that the flight model is the decisive element and that proof users would appreciate that feature no matter what. Austin is well known for abandoning critics while building his understanding of things on a rather small group of realism-oriented users who look for a good aerodynamics solution.  

Based on these perceptions the balance in the flight sim market has found its way back to where it was 10 years ago. Microsoft 90, DCS 5, Laminar 3 and Prepared 2 percent market share. The only number that has changed is the total user number, climbing from 1 million to 5.

X-Plane user numbers stuck  - what went wrong ? 

20 Nov 2022 mk

It was assumed XP12 hitting the market would boost user numbers from 150'000 to 300'000, but total numbers go down instead, orders surprisingly retentive. Just a momentum or signs of fail? We search for answers:

1. Expectations 

Hopes were rising during the evaluation and feedback process assumably featuring a competitive world design, matching standards of DCS or MFS. The screenshots published during the final development stages however meant to satisfy some old guard x-planers but not the younger crowd which was in Austin Meyer's focus and which would have built a new customer base to carry x-plane into the next generation.  The beta-releases brought some disappointment instead.

2. ATC

Despite reservations on behalf of customers, Laminar decided to re-enforce their ATC module and even copy past microsoft's menu style. The result was nightmare. Total rejection and dislike from the users for this what we consider being a total fail. Customers clearly argued about the misconcept of legacy ATC interaction compared to real life, but this was obviously ignored and ended in a disaster. 9 of 10 users avoid A.I.-ATC.

Instead online servers with real controllers at the other end seem to make a good alternative and their user numbers climb.

3. Clouds

Main attention went into XP-12's new 3D-World, namely Clouds, Water, Vegetation and Autogen were in the customers focus. The reactions upon laminar's first release were somewhere between disbelieve and disappointment. "Far from expections" so the summary of consumer feedbacks.

Despite, some improvements have been noticed and rewarded, such as a dynamic water surface. Then there is the 3D-Trees and somehwat better ground textures in the airport landscape. Graphic renderings have improved compared to xp11, but can not keep up with other simulations or games. And then come the clouds, the visual key for a flight simulation. While the colorization has much of what we know from real life, the scapes and shapes remain in hope. Not a total fail, but not what was expected either. So is the Weather. A lot of requests went into weather dynamics, asking for local winds and real life conditions, but hardly any of that is being seen in xp12. nicely designed puddles across the airport tarmacs  do not bring an overall weather situation and the rain effect on the windshield are subject to further improvement. Hard to know whether the world design will undergo further developments or whether this is it, for the next 5 years. Rather successul seem the season's changes which finally bring winterscapes into this sim, apparently there is spring and autum color adjustments as well. Yes, much has changed in the 3d-world department, it just hasn't blown minds. In comparison, remember those open jaws when FS2020 was introduced. xp12's world renewal can be pimped up with ortho imagery just like its predecessor, but it won't hide inproper road systems, same old autogen style and yet a fade appearance of the overall environment.

4. Broken Planes

A considerable number of planes would not carry over to the new version. Only a few developers have published an update yet, and it seems every beta release would again break some of the elements making it unusable. It is expected that a very large number of xp11 planes will go obsolete respectively not get developed further. Instead, some new planes are in the development trying to make full use of some of the new features.

5. Missing Features and Tool Modifications.

You may find feature after feature no longer being implemented. No more C-130 Air refueler to start with. Numberous plug-ins are no longer in the game, from marine traffic to weather engines. X-plane becomes more and more a narrowing specialist for its flight modelling and systems. If that will be helping user numbers is doubtful. Hardcore simmers and developers will try and catch up with the updated planemaker tool and the increasing requirement for non-default coding to keep up with digital cockpits.

6. Competition

While Laminar worked on their update, Microsoft and Eagle Dynamics have not taken a rest. Just the opposite, their development curve went steeper and faster. DCS meanwhile features abnormally realistic cloudscapes, dynamic and multiplayer capable. Their water design has been top notch and is being refined to excellence. Microsoft has worked down on issues and finally introduces helicopter dynamics. Great 3rd party aircraft are rolling out almost daily, and in combination with their excellent graphics engine look like the real deal. Emotions across the user crowds are clearly noticable and their numbers take another major milestone. It is obvious how the asobo team pushes flight dynamics development and it is expected that they are catching up with x-plane within the next 24 months. Yes, MFS still has some issues but the rise of attention is gradually obsessive by the crowds and the influencing editors of independant websites. Their innovation curve is steeper than Laminar's, the launch intervalls of newly created add-ons is 10 times higher and the multiplication factor of it all would take grounds from X-Plane. We noticed x-plane developers switching over to Microsoft. Some moved from FSX to XP11 and now return to MFS.

The community today runs all 3 sim platforms simultanously, and the sim hopping becomes a market sensor of its own. If we would summarize the current migration events we would give it the same state as before xp12. Stakes prove: There is no loser in the game, but DCS and Microsoft are clearly winners in regard to user number increase. Much of this increase comes from new simmers, not only from migration.

7. Recharge

What x-plane12 delivers is very much predicted by Austin Meyer  should have named to version 11.60 to be truthful. The new 12 upgrade would cost the users  another $60. This paywall with a wishlist for improvements not shortened much has kept purchases releatively low. 

Animations in Flight Simulators - the very limited side of life. 

How geting planes and grounds crowded with animated Life?

Motion Capture an option with current object8-format? 

Everything for a lively experience: AI-Traffic, Ground Services Movements, Animated Jetbridges and Dynamic Lighting. But where is the crowds? The crews, the passengers? 

X-Plane11 has introduced road traffic  in 2016 which received top reward by the customers, the sim started to become alive somehow, you could pass a busy road on your final approach and you would see ground vehicles moving all around the airports. This was the basis for what should become an overall lively environment, considering the presence of AI-Plane and Boat Traffic in the air and on the seas, complementing it.

The customers now seek the next steps in development: A more accurate and wider translation of Life. Not only that road traffic gets realistic upgrades, people queing up and embarquing planes, trains and buses, you would find up to 150 busy passengers inside your plane, while you fly. Staff loading cargo, walk and work role chosing, be an ATC-controller, a mechanic, a bus-driver?

where are the limits and why do they exist?

How to not let die an excellent aircraft - or how to port aircraft from X-Plane10 over to X-Plane11.

The glorious range of aircraft in earlier versions of X-Plane has experienced anything but a smooth transition along Laminar's continous update process on their X-Plane 11.30 to 11.51 history. Most Developers were urged to work on updates to keep things running up the versions. Unfortunately some havn't followed up on the process, due to economical reason, or developer teams split apart if not entirely gone out of business.

One example is the once top-scorer MD-902 Explorer originally developped by Virtavia (former Alphasim) and Dawson Designs. 

@ZCG, an anonymous user has brought up the topic and suggested a migration technique which would allow users to revive their favourite aircraft models for the latest x-plane versions. But he got offended by one of that webforum's moderators "Brett_S" with some semi-legal argumentation on copyright and forum rules. @Brett_S however is not a lawyer, nor he may oversee the legal dependancies in a case like that.

@ZCG's updating technique is based on a rather simple re-configuration of the .acf-file that drives the aircraft model, and that is laminar's Plane Maker Tool's output format. It would allow the users who own the aircraft to keep it running in X-Plane11 too. As a flashback: The aircraft was developed at the time X-Plane was on the market with version 10. 

Now, there is 3 very simple legal facts about this case: First and decisive is the unlimited use of the purchased product across x-plane versions, which in combination with the obvious absence of the developer would enable the user to undertake the necessary adjustments himself. Which is the second part of the case. Modifications to a product are allowed, even appreciated. There is no constraint that would limit re-configurating or editing any part of the product in any context at all. That is what Flight simmers are actually doing, have been doing for decades: Editing, updating and Uploading edited stuff. And third, never take legal advise from a website moderator nor allow supression of free speech and entrepreneurship. 

We imagine that @Brett_S being a small man with a small power over a small red ban button in his little world called the .org. website, so we re-checked with our lawyers to review the case and give proper advise. Since the text is too long, we would like to summarize the case as simple as possible:

"Putting the sharing idea upfront might not be the best way of transfering knowledge or modifications. A tutorial on how to do it would do the job and address those who already own the product."

Having learned that, we feel pleased to publish @ZCG's  porting technique in Plane Maker for anyone's adaption here and now. Free of charge or constraint, and without obsessive objections on behalf of little website moderators. 

Enjoy:

[Tutorial Video]

@ZCG's background story - or what made him do all the upgrade work?

We have spoken to the pilot, and his story is remarkably interesting for anyone considering modification or upgrade creations:

@ZCG:   "I just kept it alive by continually modifying and saving it in the subsequent versions of PlaneMaker. While I have flown all Hughes/MD's up to the 520 over many years, I have never flown the 902. In order for it to handle the way I wanted it I tuned some of the parameters in PlaneMaker so it would fly the way I thought it should. I have been a commercial pilot on aeroplanes and helicopters for most of my life.

I have done some mods to the instrumentation where possible. I could only access areas available in PlaneMaker as I do not know what tool was used for development originally. Most of it is obvious and will become clear with use. It is very much a personal comfort upgrade and does not reflect reality, but I think it does not corrupt the original. As it is a great machine to do IFR work I thought it would be good to have some of these things like DME's etc. Also the wind indication is helpful as we don't have good visuals for wind in the landscape as in real life. The GNS 430 upgrade is graphically a compromise (especially 2, the top one) but the pop outs work well.

I have setup the aux tank and recalibrated the fuel gauge incl. graphics to reflect the new quantity. I have also tuned fuel usage to best match what is published for the engines as installed and the fuel flow is displayed.

The camera is mainly useful for precise landings on small pads.

One flaw I could not iron out is the overtemp indications on startup, however after that peak all is well.

I hope that all 902 users can get back in the air with this great machine."

Well explained, and reflecting the community's will for adaption and improvement. That carries not only sim platforms from version to version, but also favoured aircraft models and their continous functionality across time.

      __________________      legal corner     _________________________

After Life Works - Old aircraft revived for newer platform versions.

What if a developer is gone out of business, What if an airplane never got updated for sequential platform versions? Where do rights start and where do they end? Who would carry those beloved aircraft into today? 

Considering the Commitment on behalf the Author making his product available for proper use on any version of the sim platform,  the initial copyright stays with him as long as he fulfills the commitment. The customer is not paying for a version limitation and that includes the authors obligation to carry the product along platform versions. What many of you know as reverse compatibility would find a special term for flight simulation, and that is obligation of continuity. When the developer is no longer fulfilling his part of the deal, the rights terminate. This is the matter for engineering products, not a picasso paint art if you will. Engineering products are purchased for their functionality, not for their look. The product category is software/entertainment. 

Now, most of the coding elements that have the initial developer the possibility to create his product are not his possession. He uses other people's work to complete his own. No need to explain this even in detail. Nevertheless, the author wants to pull a protection shield over "his" work without a proper legal examination by attorneys. Customers receive a copyright terms and conditions warrant when they purchase the produt, a warrant that is created by the author, and which does not necessarily correspond to public law. So it is a one-side agreement. The user has not agreed. The user paid for functionality, continuity.

What if one party quits his commitment? Can a user pick the base data and make his own functional upgrade?

Upgrade Work - Real life pilots hooking up on an old published aircraft and improve it for newer platform versions.

What if a developer is gone out of business, or no longer fulfills his commitment of keeping the product functional?

Adding Realism

Literally almost every single aircraft in x-plane was originally created by artists who don't fly in real life. 

They use documentation and data that is publicly available and drag these infos through the creation process. That concludes arts, dynamics, animations, sounds and performance data. The result is a sim type of model that may delight unproficient users all the way, but would it stand against proficiency training requirements?

In order to further improve such published airplanes, a post-production modification with the direct know-how adaption of type rated pilots seems an adequate undertaking that can have positive effects to those who use the product. It is a different story whether developers publish references such as "tested by real pilots" against after release modifications by real pilots. The Flight dynamics, manipulator handlings and object details would most probably end in a much more sophisticated simulated aircraft. 

This is not just an assumptive theoretical story. This is what happens daily in the flight sim community. Real Life Pilots levering semi-pro products to realistic level. 

Now, we assume the upgrade work being validated as much as the original work, in work hours and in know how input. And that may end in a win-win situation for both the initial author as well as the pilot levering the product to proficiency standard or even study level. Both, the author and the modder get agreed in sharing the recognition and revenue, if there is such. X-plane is full of such examples, where things worked out well.

But what, if the inital author is vanished? or does not respond to inquires? 

to be continued...

P.S. we found an interesting argumentation on https://www.thresholdx.net/opinion/csopin brought in by an aviation and I.T. attorney, read below. It very much mirrors the above case and the use of false legal spread related to flight sim products. Summary: the online flight sim newspage tresholdx.net is pushing the community to boycott a developer called CaptainSim for their pricing and dictating practices against consumers.

"However, i am surprised about circling in this 1 developer only.

There is plenty of bad practices in this genre, may it be artists creating their own interpretation of law,

may it be forum moderators banning members or deleting posts, or may it be web editors calling the masses to boycot.

Neither is legal, nor is any of what is circling the genre as terms and conditions profoundly issued by

actual attorneys of law.

Flight simming has always been a genre of steeling, reporting, flaming, banning, boycotting, overpricing,

false commitments, pretention and objection. No one is unguilty in this armchair hero industry.

And no court on earth would even look at such a case.

The conclusion is: There is no Authority over Flight simming. There is no legal base for terms and conditions

other than arts copyright. Which, by the way, is not subject to a developer to formulate, but subject to public law.

public law of the respective country a case is appointed.

Last but not least, you prove me those artists haven't stolen either and that what they claim to be their intellectual property is in fact

their intellectual creation. On top of all, spreading false legal terminology should be drawn to court in the first.

so, folks, never take terms and conditions for granted, even if you sign it, they are most likely gonna go to waste at any court."

and we could not agree more.

Aging Industry 

Despite new Sim Platforms and an overall massive Quality Improvement, the total user base is not growing. The slide below explains how and why.

Digital Cockpit Devices - The beauty of analog Gauges has only one Rival, and that is beautiful multifunctional Displays.

It seems that the flight simulation community is spread into 2 groups, and they are persistent. The mass of rather aging professionals who fiddled around beautiful replication of analog devices into the virtual world is slowly overbeaten by an even bigger crowd of youngsters whose preference for digital displays becomes more and more visible. 

The flight simulation platforms Microsoft and X-Plane have carried either intrument type over the last 20 years, DCS would promote 4th generation fighters with mostly analog gauges and something like multifunctional displays running on 368 DOS. But while analog gauges have a limitation by their physical shape. digital displays are continously devloped further in real life in terms of what they visualize. And they visualize a software in the software. Any newer plane or helicopter would replace analog with digital displays, and flight sims reflect that.

Old School pilots and instructors can get grumpy on this development as they fear a new generation of ADHS-students looking for gatchet playing, rather than flying the airplane.

One consequence of this development is that we see more and more fake sim products whose substance is purely gatchets and plug-ins instead of great dynamics modelling. This evil trend started with the Trident Bell412 and is currently with stage Cowan MD500E, both promoted aggressively at high price and both of poor value for actual aviators. Bad aerodynamics, excused by electronic stabilization systems. All possible with these Digital Cockpit Devices. But true fakes for actual pilots. That sort of developers' networked distribution and facebook partners make the situation even worse since they push the promotion and allow going for the money instead of competence. These folks have zero real time flight hours, and they start creating the new rules for flight simming. Consumers lose orientation and common sense. Every purchase encourages developers to follow that shameful practice.

A new generation of dummies is growing, victims of false information and badly designed products. 

The only way to stop them and expose their bad attitude is creating better products. Laminar, Eagle Dynamics and others in that league can propose quality with their introductionary models, and communicate hard about what makes the difference. And they do a great job. Nevertheless i should not receive promotional e-mails from Laminar proposing one of these bad products.

Developers Landscape - a reference map for add-ons

Article in Preperation

Some of the latest Previews of . We take the chance of compiling the last decade's experience and analyses current and future releases against their quality and overall contribution potential for the sim landscape. 

Let's categorize them into Aircraft and Scenery.

Aircraft

                                     Rotatesim

                                                           FlightFactor

                                  JARDesign

Quality

                       Contribution Quantity                            Pricing 

Scenery

Corona boosts the Flight Sim Market - Online Gaming Curve to double up for the last 12 months

Lucky timing for the gaming industry, most titles exceed their expectations in terms of purchases and usage time. So do the 3 big players in flight simming: MFS, DCS and X-Plane. While purchases have raised marginally, the usage time has nearly doubled as a result of the worldwide pandemic, urging people to stay at their homes and find home activity. Time for Innovation: The boom has its effect on the developers' will of creating new content and improve their current product quality, as they expect to stabilize the customer base at high level for the year coming.

What is the best Camera System for a Flight Simulator?

We are talking to Steve Goldberg who works on replacing X-Plane's native camera system with a powerful solution called ABC ("a better camera"). His plugin is available to anyone willing to experiment and scouting new ways of adding special views to the flight experience. The plugin is free and a promising sandbox. 

But hold, what exactly does ABC do? how simple and effective is it,  and where is it going? Does it match my preferences and expectations? 

What do i expect from a camera system? answers in this upcoming interview.

Interview in preparation... 

Since we are not sure yet whether it will be an audio cast or a written interview, please be patient.

Smart Airports - what is this, and do we need it?

Ground Ops and Services in Flight Simulations are currently in their childhood. What is missing is closing the gap between what is goind around your airplane before you land, while you park and when you depart. The gadgets and plugins built into the sims seem to have no relation to the status of your flight whatsoever. They are not linked. Users asking for a full and real airport ops element, so we need to build an Interaction Process that covers both flight and ground and connects them, make them dependant on each other: the actual first person steered flight as well as the independant (A.I.) processes that connects to your flight. A basic scetch of such a process looks like the slide below. It demonstrates how everything is connected, in terms of data delivery as well as timing.

One solution is building triggers into the airport. Triggers are round circles in the geography map, or they can be run by a timer, an if and then co-relation if you will. Nearing ETD means your plane gets lose of catering and cleaner trucks, gets a tug up and ready and ATC spoiling its focus on you. An all independant from you process that works like a clock.

what Sim Developers need to do in order to get a functional airport is creating a ground time process. It starts at the time you plan your flight and deliver the data to ATC. The data then distributes to whoever will be part of the service for your departure. A time and place tracker then releases the events that makes everthing look like in real life. magic.

Current situation in sims equals a tragic silent place with some crazy loading carts curving around, not respecting traffic rules or load schedules. Adding traffic plug-ins like x-life enriches the airplane movements, but they are not interacting with one another. Loading a plane requires hide/show function to make their equipment become alive or disappear. They don't move and they don't atually load baggage.

Memory-CPU-GPU-LOD  -  how flight sim data processes best

With the latest flight simulation standards, never seen loads of data are being processed in order to give you the virtual worlds of your desire. But few know how that data is being processed to deliver without crashing the game or stuttering or freeze in the middle of a flight. You just purchased the latest graphics card, added a ton of memory bars you still end where it began.

Assuming you play on a Windows 10 PC, we will try and spread out every single component that can influence your performance and we show you the tricks you need to know to get the PC do a better job.

article in preparation.  

Salute to Aircraft Carriers! - Almost forgotten Features of X-Plane

The End of VR Headsets

Sales of VR headsets struggles and remains a small market. Most users prefer a free look over their flight controls over carrying some head mounted helmet thing that would provide them a seamless ingame look around experience.  Taking Laminar's user analytics board as a reference, VR is used by less than 2% of all users, a nightmare for the tech giants' products like Oculus, HTC, Pimax, HP, etc. who put great expectations on their investment. But just like google's glasses were buried to grave, same happens to VR headsets now. 

A handful of tec fiddlers found an easy way to get smartphone cams reading your head movements and translate it into the sims. All it needs is their app which opens a network, connecting the phone with the pc or mac. setup is done in a minute, and off you go. 

Smart ideas with small effort have been killing big market players since man has rised, and this new tracking method will do so as well. 

Does it need a game or simulator that is VR-capable? Actually no, this tracker even surpasses such blocks of coding and uses freelook mode to get its job done. The result is astonishing. It works seemless, without any additional device or complicated setups.

The most convincing feature is its cost. Against a headset's price label starting at $500 rising into the thousands, a track app costs does it for $9,99.

this innovation receives our 5 of 5 stars review award.

While SmoothTrack requires an iphone, another product called FaceTrack No IR works with a PC's webcam, and is also avilable for less than 10 dollars. A completly free product is AITrack, which we will explain in a few days from now, just below this article.

Comparing VR, TrackIR and Cam Trackers gets the Cam Trackers high notes. Their limitations begin when looking too much to the sides, happening when you fly dogfights in DCS. VR does not have that directional limitation despite performance limitations exist too. For the regular flying VR is way overdressed considering that facecams seem to do the same job for less. And TrackIR seems having not so good results in reliability and cost. Since it works with reflections of light instead of face recognition you better use it in a dark room with one single light source. The overall winner is the freeware cam tracker, it offers the best value and is continously developed further.

You may some limitations which may be a bit annoying, especially when trying to operate the autopilot or interfaces. All of the gears lack on the possibility to hold the view momentarily to operate instruments (stop-and-go). For those who feel any of these look around gears and apps are too nervous, we recommend the good old free mouselook which works in all sims, in combination with a plug-in called XPRealistic, but which works in X-Plane only. And again, only X-Plane has this simple but sophisticated right click function of stoping the freelook and then go on with the lookaround. 

how motion is generated comparison:

VR headset physical movement from default point $500 - $2500

TrackIR infrared profile $150

CamTrackers face recognition $0-10

Free Mouse Look hand/mouse moves view coordinates free

Market's up - tons of google maps' 3D-models being deported to microsoft's flight simulator - 1 million users in 2 weeks, and they already plunder what's behind. 

being written right now....

Crashing a plane is not a bad thing. Not if you want to see, test and experience the turbulent last moments of a many million dollar investment. Like NASA searches for the moments before the Big Bang, we search for the moments after your Sim tells you: "you crashed" and resets you to take off position. Why would we look for something like this? Does it have any value for entertainment? Or would it help understanding Physics?  Or is it simply a mandatory part of the flight simulation process which to understand is as important as flying itself?

It's been 20 years ago when i did my PPL, and even before my first solo cross country flight i broke a propeller in the attempt of parking the tailwheeled GA-Plane in front of the hangar. At that late time of the day it got so dark and my instructor was talking so much, i somehow missed the very thin red line painted on the ground, centimeters before the closed hangar door, when the still running propeller got a tiny bit too close. The next few seconds would not only be material for a hollywood movie, it branded my attitude for the rest of my life.  The noisy bang of a propeller crashing a wall with extreme force, breaking into pieces and  swirling around your head is one of the most violent and impressive things to experience.

To date, Flight Simulations have a limited way of presenting the after life sequences. We tested a few and we found that X-Plane 11 does have the potential to make accident physics available. Crashing a helicopter (screenshot) would actually let you see an approximate 1 minute sequential of its main body jumping and rotating around along the ground till it gets to a rest. 

This play of mine has indeed a real life connection. Hundreds of Military choppers crash every year. so do civil airplanes, mostly GA-planes. And we had to learn that even fully mocked-up multimillion dollar Military Simulators do not have - i say again: do not have - any sort of accident simulation. But wouldn't it be great student material to show off bad ending flights as they happen and to get you see what failures led to what kind of accident? Designing the afterlife is not more and not less than explaining the consequences of failure, and the variety is large. A crash does not always ênd in flames, you might end bottom up with your cessna while trying to get the rid of the door in order to leave the wrack. The more i think about these moments, the more i believe, they should be modelled.

Now, if we want to see a better, a more realistic damage modelling in the future, what does it need? Whose developing part is it, and how are such physics implemented? And what does "damage modelling" stand for in the community's understanding of terminology? We are asking Austin Meyer, founder and head of Laminar Research for his expertise and we go and visit some developers as well as flight sim users about their interest for such additional features.

Stay tuned.

Article found on facebook helisimmers by user @Henok

"crash" modelling only vs. the much wider area of "damage" modelling. Crashing a helicopter for 2 reasons: testing survivability and for the actual experience in contrary to a common flight reset. This comes in place where the flight model algorhythm is no longer to execute its code due to some failure, which to define is a developer's option, 3rd party or Laminar. I am trying to understand 1. where x-plane's native code would initiate such failure, 2. how the "after failure" sequence is done and by whom. If you develop a helo, 3. would you as a dev create that crash sequence (e.g. animation, particle, etc.) or would you leave it to x-plane's code? either of these, 4. how would it be done? and 5. Who decides when the crash sequence is terminating? and how? 

Article found on feedback.x-plane by user  @MAC

crash modelling should be added as forensic understanding of failure. no doubt.

Both, the 3D-model of the aircraft breaking apart as well as the timely sequences of the crash dynamics need to be designed as a consequence:

-by aircraft type

-by crash type

not every crash ends in immediate explosions, often the aircraft fuselage survives and slides along the site while broken rotors or even engines swirl thru the air.

https://up.picr.de/39785023pg.jpg

another aspect is the damage to other objects. Good luck in modelling these. To date x-plane comes with soft buildings, so objects would not hit anything than ground once their throw gets to its end.

As much as i would love to see Accident Phyics become part of X-Plane's features, and i have no doubt it's a mandatory feature, as much i see priorities to be taken here.

First and immediate implementation must be the addition of an impact dust explosion.

Without exception any accident produces immediate and considerable dust clouds.

Laminar has to create such animated particles and build a library.

Second and immediate implementation is aircraft authors to deliver their models in pieces if you will.

Based on crash animations which need to be mastered in a dynamics software and added to the flight model as a special event.

The event is released at the time the airplane is no longer under control of the pilot, seemlessly taken over by the crash algorhythm performing its slow dying show that can take minutes.

whatever is being undertaken in regard of implementing collision physics, it will not only be Laminar's sole responsibility to perform this. Sure, they must come with a showcase scenario that gets 3rd parties understand how to do it.

Last i want to mention is the authors' lazyness. To get realistic model breakage, they would need to re-model their 3D-aircraft and explode each and every component of it in a 3D-program, then give it their dynamics. The result will - and i hate saying this - will not be what the creator of this thread had in mind when wishing. The quality of such crash scenarios will be low. Not because it's difficult to do it. It's because those who create aircraft for x-plane in many cases take the fast lane to make a bug or two.

My suggestion hereafter is the following:

Support freeware creators in the main. Their motivation is not the money (speaking of those cashing in lousy stuff at $80). The freeware fiddlers share the desire for experimenting and achieving salute! They should be led a default way of creating such things and port their results into x-plane without big pain.

one way of helping is to go thru the steps mentioned above: create dust explosions, and make it easy to add these. (nobody understands current particle system really). Then, add 2 samples. 1 fixed wing, 1 heli. Provide a sandbox of 5 frames which file a sequence each (broken model status and position on crash site).

Both dust explosions and 3d-aircraft breaking apart can be modelled in blender.

the internet is full of crash footage, analysing them in frames allow to re-model broken planes and give them the appropriate most probable dynamics.

No need to say that accidents come with distinctive sounds which also need to be created and implemented. a crash is a crash when sounds tell you it's a crash. ok?

Picture: A good start for crash modelling is providing the aircraft model in segments. Just like in real life the blackhawk helicopter is produced in hulls and attachments. As by the brutal force of hitting the ground they get lose and start their own animation.

• Scanning cockpits? The new way of 3D-modeling for flight sims

• 3D-surround sound coming to flight simming

• Developers portraits: the artists behind our sims and a new database for artists

• "Officially Licensed Product", what it means

• Google's answer to Microsoft Flight Simulator  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUCDgxKcWDo

• User portraits: get to know 50 poeple and how they use flight simulation

• Airline Brands in Flight Simulation, what is the Deal?

• Fly by Wire Helicopters: A look at Lockheed Martin and Sikorsky's new Raider X Development

One of the attempts of the team that modifies the original BFDG blackhawk model is bringing the proportions and angles of the cockpit to its right position. Panel size, shape and tilt are now going with the official measurements taken from a real life scan. So are the crews being scanned initially, and their animations added in a sequential step. This will bring in action crew representation rather than those stiff still seating passenger-like soldiers which we know and hate from previous versions.

List of Updates

• New Product Branding, global meaning of the product (28 nations)

• Cockpit Panel, doors and Interior Cabin completely overhauled

• 4K Textures with PBR reflections

• U.S. and international model A and L-variants now, representing 2500 active real life operated models

• New Control Menu, for model variant config, view cam sets, crew chief operating, unit patches, mission planner, etc.

• Weight & Balance now directly affected with configuration changes over the internal Control Menu

• Integrated Helicopter-specific Controller Setup Menu: Sensitivity of Pedals, Stick and Collective, hardware profile adjustment, assignable exclusively to the blackhawk (will add own x-plane class of settings)

• all levers, knobs and switches now rotate, clack and ping correctly

• rotor bone now working, blades now flexible

• front gear suspension works now

• flights now start fully configured with pre-chosen equipment and payload, ground staff and crew chief in default exterior position

• additional systems (middle lower console) now functional: specs here soon.

• Dynamic Crew sets with variety of uniform designs, patches and gatches, modeled in detail

• Animated Crew

• First Person Pilot model on/off function (hands and feet are moving with flight controls)

• New FMOD 3D-Surround Sound Set and XPRv2-Profile: 

     improved sounds for the current 2.5version (not surround) can already be downloaded here:

     https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1Zlao9fhaGj1fjqaT4Y9vV5Eyp320xtLY?usp=sharing

• advanced Indoor lighting system (dome light, panel and instruments illumination, crew compartment)

• Co-Pilot Voice Assistance for Checklist and warnings, Crew Talk

• Missions (fire fight, SEALs ops, border control with moving ground units, carrier ops rescue, marine one, sea pirates defense, airshow)

• Ground equipment, movable, with Crew (replaces default ground traffic) 

• Ground Crew: Marshaller plug-in changes to Military look staff, thatgoes for landbased bases, Frigates, Carriers

• retractable fuselage parts for maintnance, access to rotor engine and nose avionics systems, ground technician modelled

• character switching (become a crew chief in first person, or ground crew soldier, or machine gunner)

• touchable/operable elements (fuel up, ground power, loading cargo)

• working machine gun by mouse control while you still can fly with your flight control hardware or assign autopilot

• unload passengers or cargo to specific place (activation releases door, starts sounds and moves the objects)

• armed blackhawk: working machine gun, rockets, hellfire, chaff and flares (opens targeting window)

• added Jayhawk-variant with external anti-submarine pylons and sensors

• preparing functionalities for UH-60M: FMS, MC, MFDs with Moving Map and FLIR

• paint shop for additional liveries to create

• crash modelling 

• folding rotor blades for carrier or hangar parking

• wingman (up to 2 additional helicopters flying with you)

• downwash animation for dust and water

• in cockpit manual and mission kneeboard (flippable pages)

• ingame tutorial flights with instructor (pre-recorded replay with instructor's voice)

• preflown aerobatic manoevres as replay study, you sit live on copilot seat and pilot talks!

• blackhawk-specific campoints, pre-assigned

• an updated aircraft carrier product (by Khasam Studio) comes with the Seahawk bringing additional features (see article further up) 

• 5-6 large airbases with special features will be  upgraded with heli-specific details: San Diego CA. USCG Jayhawk Base and USN North Island and CVN-70 in port SH-70 Base, Nellis AFB NV. UH-60 Desert Weapons & Tactics Test Base,  NAS Key West FL. , Tucson AFB Border Patrol Base, Hickham AFB Hi., Kane Ohe MCAS HI.. These come with High Resolution Terrain,which combine well with payware sceneries. 

users can direct their wishlist to picaiolo123@gmail.com

test flights here: https://youtu.be/b3vTyWLURmY

v3.0 (will have a new Title) Release expected December 2020  USD 19,00 for v2.5 owners, 39,00 new customers

UH-60M Release expected March 2021, free for v3.0 owners, 59,00 for new customers

Microsoft Flight Simulator - is it that good?

We think we found out how to describe the MFS hype best: Their AI-Buildings and Trees is not more and not less than what Autogen was in the past. Just better and with global coverage. But without local modifications you don't get what you know from real life or from what some users have created in X-plane for example. So when you hear the masses yeehaaing about this new flight sim, we want to let them know that MFS is not more not less than L18-Ortho+Bing Mapping+AI housing and predefined 3D-Vegetation and lots of grey appocalyptic looking cloud layers on top of it. From what i experienced so far is that one place feels like the other, no matter where on the globe you are. Venice Beach looks like Honolulu, Honolulu looks like Tokyo, etc.. You don't find Palmtrees in L.A., instead tall tarmac bricks spread all over. Nevertheless this new Bing Game is a good wake up call for the industry to catch up when it comes to graphics and scenery technology. The greatest advance in visual performance is the cloud build. Taking the average system performance required to run a flight sim at this level of graphic representation it is absolutely astonishing how extensiv and quick drawn their cloud systems are. X-Plane's team probably tries hard to understand how Asobo - the maker of MFS - did that, it's every developer's most difficult job to create this amount of processing content while keeping frame rates flyable. The user interface is very much xbox-like and users being into aviation will not necessarily like it. 

Customer voices since its 18th August launch read like a usual disastrous Microsoft Fail which we had with all their windows introductions in the past. A great part of users havn't been able to either install or run the new flight simulator. Those who succeeded report crashes and other malfunctioning experiences.

Our summary impression is: If you play FS on xbox you will be the perfect target audience for this concept. The default earth representation is unique based on microsoft's ability to source mapping, housing and vegetaton by artificial intelligence and bing map materials. If you come from another flight sim, first thing you notice is a global world with houses everywhere, trees everywhere and a great 3D-cloud engine. Default planes look a bit synthetic (3D-scanned cockpits with systems placeholders that don't work yet) and the flight modelling may not fully satisfy. Sceneries can get a bit boring over time as they look all the same and not authentic, and the game is full of bugs (Jumbo jets flying along sceneries at 100 feet above ground and other crazy things going on). At launch stage we give it a 6 star reference, out of possible 10, and consider it to be somewhere between arcade xbox game and basic flight simulator. We can not deny feeling the FSX-ghost swirling around in this new FS, It is too obvious that most of the legacy FSX code is still present and dominates over what Flight Modelling according Microsoft's Youtube promotional Announcements were supposed to deliver. FS is far away from the X-Plane Experience and we have to summarize that all the hype is and will remain good for their scenery AI and Graphics. A good starting point for users who will eventually look for a better and transfer to X-Plane.

The FS scenery technology, as mentioned earlier, looks great, but it does not adapt the local feel like if you were using Ortho4XP in X-Plane. Flying over Hawaii is no different than flying over Wisconsin. And the reason for this is Asobo's small Vegetation Library in combination with the all present singular water look. AI-housing does not deliver geographic Variety as expected.

We took some users's flight videos as review reference and compare Hawaii flown in X-Plane vs. flown in MFS:

MFS: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1WUVgc2DhB0&lc=UgzktNtt2ZDfauuGyWZ4AaABAg.9BxrMYu1yas9COxbhSXbLa 

XPL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bvetc4JBA5c&list=UUrZI5mghr9bqhNrNkyPbWRA&index=26 

Wishlist - Users talking!

Flight sim products and their add-ons have mainly been released by what developers think they could sell. There was never a wishlist or a consumer-driven product idea, unless you want to include the thousands and thousands of user requests going over mail to the core sim drivers taken out of this statement. 4 main reasons for that: one is the limitation of engineering know how, so even if the crowds shout for something, developers just don't know how it could be done. second is the users incapability of expressing their desires, if it doesn't come down to very simple features. 3rd is by speculation that developers are not good listeners or ignorant. X-Plane's makers understand their product as a test bed for flight concepts, they never reacted the way Consumer-oriented products are, and they don't deal with user requests. And last is the huge priority list vs. limited resources developers deal with. 

In the attempt of shaping a homogen conclusion of all desires, thoughts and semi-projects out there, we list the most obvious and crispy things we found and heard from users, things they want to see in future sim releases. Considering users as flight simmers, not engineers looking for a test bed. They are not listed by priority.

1. Walk around and interact, adoption of first person game engine features into flight simming

2. Indepth fully working systems, everything should work in the cockpit

3. integrated flight planning and set up process, GUI/UI/UX rethinking.

4. co-op flying, shared cockpits

5. better damage modelling, from crashes to emergency handling and recovery.

6. living people

7. Traffic, Traffic, Traffic and next gen ATC engine

8. Drivable Cars, Trucks, Boats, usable hangars, equipment, movable troups and other living content

9. better Sound Spheres (3Dsurround, sourced-spots, distant to close resonance, increased variety of sound spectrum)

10. nonlinear operations processes (stories, missions, in sim interaction, deviation from linear A to B flights)

11. Artificial Intelligence (smart copilot, etc.)

12. Real life and lively scenery (moving trees, smoke,  moving waters, traffic)

13. Real looking Massive Tropical Thunderstorm systems and true weather design

14. Better Effects (compare: "anatomy of an explosion")

15. Environmental Elements design (Water, Sunsets)

16. makro-mesh, close up landscape variety around airports or specific flight areas

achievements to date, users love most:

1. Advanced modelling

2. Skies going 3D

3. Improved aerodynamics/flight modelling/effects

4. Life (road traffic, moving waters, weather)

5. Lighting System (spills)

6. Tools/SDK

7. Overall stability and performance management

Summary of it all is lively experience away from patched modules into 1 homogen experience that gets the rid of old techniques and semi-quality content. "It's like advanced users have enough from things that don't work, or that come from a pre-dino-era speaking of scenery, stiff human models, low sounds, etc.

X-Plane12 - what will it be ?

Laminar's thoughts about the current race for scenery design technolgy has not revised their attitude for good flight modelling nor it is on their roadmap to think about it too hard. However, the pressure of being somewhat accurate outside the cockpit is momentarily increasing. The Question whether there will be a Version 12 seems not to be only a Laminar Decision, but a Market Decision. No matter of whether consumers stick to X-Plane or not, Laminar's Mindset seems regardless. Their understanding of flight modelling stands like a rock in stormy waters and it will need a major external impact to  allow true Innovation. 

We have soared through some breathtaking technological advances that could help X-Plane to do a major leap and receive the accuracy that tomorrow's users are looking for. 

1. Scenery Technologies

Usually there is more than 1 key player on the market. Speaking of Microsoft's Partnership Networks who are into a next generation digital living globe product, Laminar does not have any access to these top financed players. However, there is  a light coming from Google's Side of the planet. What's not to be considered to be a network could become one. Combining the forces of Google's Earth with Blender and X-Plane could rapidly boost the entire simulation market. Laminar's expertise would need to focus on the integration and how to make the masses of data available to end users while adopting seamless flight. The requirement of doing something to improve the current scenery representation can not be denied. If there is an X-Plane12, it must come with some sort of advanced scenery solution or X-Plane will die, slow and hard. 

2. Weather

X-Plane already has 3rd party developers on hand that deal with weather design. Xenviro, a russian developer, has figured out the key elements of designing realistic skies and clouds for their platform. At current stage xenviro's product is stuck at pre-vulcan level and seeks adaption from OpenGL to this new graphic engine that drives x-plane in the future. Assuming both performance and quantity of dataflow will improve, Xenviro could be the holy grale of creating the next generation weather look. Early August 2020, Laminar's Austin Meyer has fiddling out a new approach towards global weather systems representation. While this still does not answer any questions regarding scenery advancements, it underlines his attitude towards realistic flight. Connecting makro-weather algorhythms to  the already great flight modelling would strengthen X-Plane's reputation and would definetly overrun Microsoft's FS product in that regard. I am sure we can expect a much more versatile realtime  weather system soon and an even greater flying experience, already in Version 11.50+. What is pending on the weather design axe is a massive augmentation of cloud building. Xenviro's creative brains shout for more access to x-plane's inner values, so that they can tweak on the parameters needed to build those highrise tropical thunderstorm systems we all have in mind. Let's not forget that Laminar has two solid fears in that regard, and that is performance and safe code. A sim is as good as fluid you fly. Users hate stuttering images and flying below 20 frames per second. It is not just disgusting, it kills the element of advanced flight modelling. Once Vulcan is implemented and proof of performance increase is given, the next step will certainly be massive cloud systems, which we expect to be much more realstic than Asobo's fantasy game ash-clouds, and it will allow using some advanced rendering engine for next generation graphics, that ugly x-plane colouring must be solved.

3. Partnerships and Co-Developers

Laminar's issue with 3rd party developers could eventually turn into a solid partnership, considering each one's expertise is becoming a key element, not only in designing content but being a fully responsible Partner. We see 6 key contributing sources for a flight simulator:

• X-Plane's Development Team for the core sim architecture and functionality

• Weather Designers, xenviro seems the only capable on the horizon.

• Scenery Designers, possibly led by the Orbx Network, while Google's Network could be the ulitmate and immediate shortcut

• Aircraft Builders, already in action. Many hardcore projects going on.

• Tool Builders, key professionals left x-plane for unknown reason, and there is no good source in sight. Laminar must re-develop their tools to help designers jump on x-plane.

4. Timing and Variety

The consumer migration in the sim world is considerable. We are looking at a mass of potentially 3 Million users out there who travel from one product to the other and back again. X-Plane is not focussing on FS-customers for reasons explained in an earlier article. X-Plane's customer base has a clear tendency for realistic flying. 2019 to 2020 aproximately 80'000 users moved to X-Plane to build a base of total 150'000. Those coming from FSX will at a some degree go back to FS2020. Nevertheless they will take their x-plane experience with them, and some will go back to X-Plane for a better flying. At the current stage, many users will have 2 sims installed, while FS attracts by their 3D-world, and X-plane by their flight feel.

5. Key Add-ons

Combining environment design and dyamics modelling is all there is. And there is quite a bit of sub-segments here, which to create at highest possible quality is the winner and gets it all at the end of the day.

6. Marketing

Laminar is not a marketing company. They don't invest into communications and consumer dialogue. Their way is letting the users do the work, word of mouth and Youtube-Proof if you will. It is like they are trying hard to do the opposite of Microsoft - Big announcement, Low Delivery. Well, Laminar could certainly take a piece of that, maybe it sometimes it needs a bit of a noise to be heard. Their X-Plane12 release will probably create considerable internet chat, as it is expected to reveil laminar's new position on the flight sim market. Laminar themselves will  not say much,  to remain consistant in their underdog behaviour. We expect a polarized effect upon that new release, either big disappointment or great surprise. All it comes down to is how they will answer the scenery technolgy question.

Censorship in X-Plane Forums -  scary practices rising.

we have received a dozen plus complaint letters from X-Plane customers reporting their bad experience with forum owners who ban users for the reason of "unliked" comments. Investigations confirm that forum rules are indeed tight and near to a "keep quiet or ban" attitude. We tested 10 well known websites against critical contributions, which were in line with the rules but contained qualified and critical questions regarding incedientially chosen add-on products. The outcome was so scary that we decided to identify the players behind these free speech prevention practices:

• X-Plane.org Owner: Mr. Nicolas Taureau, 50 years old, 803 E Georgia St, Tallahassee, FL. (850) 727-8468, office: 2535 Marston Rd

We have a high confirmed number of user bans and contribution removals conducted by Mr. Taureau on the .org-forum and 2 law suites initiated or pending by or against Mr. Taureau in the state of Florida, U.S.A.

The site is not owned by Laminar Research (X-plane developer) nor its founder Mr. Austin Meyer. However some of the illegal practices are known to Mr. Meyer and legal cases could therefore extend towards him as long as Laminar tolerates its same product name associated. Getting commissioned by X-Plane add-on sales is Mr. Taureau's main income source, it is unsure whether he is pursuing a work.

Associated moderators of the .org who practice abandonments and censorship:

Mr. Brett Sumpter, Atlanta GA., pest control and add-on designer, moderator in the .org website

Alberto Salvi, Italy, Head of Trident (creating add-ons)

• facebook.com/groups/xenviro Moderator/website owner: Mr. Magnus Lorvik, Norway

A considerable amount of user bans conducted by Mr. Lorvik. No current law suits in the United States. Mr. Lorvik is Norwegian citizen who joined russian developer Xenviro as a moderator for their websites and beta-tester for their weather engine. He also owns the website www.thresholdx.net (names himself "CEO" of that website) where technical reasons obviously prevent his banning practices. It's forum carries external chat engines as disqus implants and are therefore not under Lorviks control.

Such practices are critical once they get publicly known. We understand that these individuals conduct a product communications environement that only allows positive resonance and which is of promotional advantage to them. This prevents from truthful users' expertise and therefore misleads others in their interpretation of things. They actively perform censorship and conduct violation against the 1st amendment, on a daily basis. We consider such practices being used in countries like China or North Korea as highly destructive against democracy and our understanding of balanced oppinion making and exchanging knowledge. Being permanently monitored by these named individuals is an intolerable intervention down to detail. Our tests have proven that both Mr. Taureau and Mr. Lorvik delete user contributions that are completely legit and do not interfear with any kind of common sense rule. It is the sheer quantitiy of deleted posts and banned users that made this issue worth looking at and write about it. 

The entire community is affected, and users leave the x-plane knowledge environment for a good reason. We assume that over 70% of the original user content is not visible in the x-plane.org forums respectively on the xenviro facebook site, because they were deleted on the go and never appeared online. It is obvious that the owners of the websites monitor evey single post at the time they are uploaded, and delete it if it doesn't please them. Their filtering fully depends on their personal mood, oppinion, grade of education, will and intentions. Those posts that made it live are a product of the website's personal mind pattern. They hide behind administrator status and pretend running an army of moderators while they perform a one-man-job or a small same-attitude group of clickers. Mr. Taureau's favourite functionality is his warning bar which hits most users before they even write something in the forum: "Your content will need to be approved by a moderator. Because of a warning you received, this content will be hidden until a moderator approves it." This feels like he is trying to demonstrate power. 

The concerned users have no possibility to interact with that sort of personal filtering, nor they can let others know that their post was deleted or edited by Mr. Taureau. This is totallity regime handling, worse than China, Russia or North Korea could ever practice.

Some of X-Plane's most valuable geniuses (including tool creators like Jonathan Harris and many other top shots) have left the Laminar world or got banned from the forum by Mr. Taureaus practices. Their contributions were a key to X-Plane's acceptance among flight simmers and their contributions still remain a visible asset on these Terror-Websites. Mr. Taureau's main driver to ban critics is his dependancy on add-on sales. His store maintains a 10% worth for sale products while he keeps promoting so called trash add-ons for the money. Hearing from community members, his personal character can only be described as "insane maniac" whose "erratic behaviour" deserves a ban himself, by Laminar Research, and by the users.

it is strongly recommended that Laminar steps away from such website owners in order not getting legally involved themselves, and to undertake the necessary steps to inform the public about alternatives. For that reason it is recommend that x-plane.org is being forced by laminar to change its domain name. It's additive describtion "the community's website" must be deleted as well, because it is misleading. It is Mr. Taureau's website. He took the name and even registered a company called x-plane.org LLC with it.  Laminar's Mr. Meyer has been addressed by users and he has failed of taking action so far. He prefers having the advantages of someone running the forum business and describes the banning practices as "micro management he does not want to be involved with".

Responding to such incidents is the core responsibility of companies dealing with the public and the product owners have a right and a duty of intervening with associated circles of interest that mistreat their markets. Thank them for their work but let them go. Looking into a possible future release of X-Plane 12, an examination of their market environment means an essential step in correcting such legacy destructive matters.

To users and developers  it is recommended to ban these 2 websites and use or drive their own store respectively exchange their knowledge on a different platform. Individuals like these 2 can only be defeated by simply not using their stores or forums. Don't buy from them, don't give them your business, it's as simple as that.

If time allows we will publish a complete overview of stores and forums available.

some sources of events:

https://www.reddit.com/r/flightsim/comments/al6qst/owner_of_xplaneorg_has_lost_his_mind/

https://forums.x-pilot.com/forums/topic/13700-psa/

We are publishind some of user reaction here:

by @MAC, September 2020

"the .org should be disempowered, i think many agree.

As an observer i see written content and users disappearing every week from interesting discussions. Must have been hundreds of users banned from their forums? 

It appears a few so called "moderators" in the .org , including their owner, attempt to control the x-plane world with active cencorship and conduct a scary user abandoning practice, in the majority of cases for no reason other than personal affectation, powerplay if you will. Why discussing if i can push the red button?

Obviously the community has no other place to defend their interests, because they get banned instantly when speaking up. Being forced to buy products from such a place is rediculous. 

One monopoly place like the .org is not good for x-plane. 

Tolerating their behaviour makes laminar not less guilty.

Suggestions:

-Force them to change the domain name, gain legal distance and send a clear signal to the community of non-acceptance. "the community's website" slogan, an additive to the .org's website title, must be deleted.

-Make their bans public. That should include either party's argument. Deleted content must be re-established for verification.

-Establish an idependant store/download section and community forum in X-plane itself. 

-Give the .org moderators an unmistakable one-time and final warning."

alternate x-plane related websites:

x-pilot.com

simmarket.com

justflight.com

aerosoft.com

X-Aviation.com

xplanereviews.com

more to come...