Iām extremely honored to be mentioned/suggested like this.
Of course, they may not be interested, but Iād love to work with MS/Asobo, at any levelā¦ to help do whatever I can to collaboratively innovate and improve the weather experience for those who appreciate high-fidelity featuresā¦ and also those who want the āawesomeā things about weather that may be more visual or experience-based rather than just ārealisticā for weather/aviation enthusiasts. That would be like a dream come true for me to be able to work with them and help further develop the brilliant weather system they have made with MSFS2020/24.
To those who might be interested, Iād like to share a little background and thoughts regarding all this:
Iāve been advocating for 3rd-party weather setting and general weather extensibility for a long time now. Thatās been my history, making wx add-ons for MSFS for the past 25 years, working as a product manager and developer for many variations of Active Sky, along-side many amazing great programmers and graphics artists whoāve contributed significantly to what weāve been able to achieve. Weāve also been very lucky to have dedicated team members in support, admin and several other areas over the years. They all significantly helped us become the leader in weather add-ons for many years, enabling us all to do what we love and create new aviation weather features and experiences.
Since MSFS2020 and the lack of weather SDK, we initially decided to not develop an Active Sky for the new MSFS until such a time that comprehensive (and supported) weather-setting ability was available. It was initially sounding like this was coming, but it was eventually dropped and made āNot Plannedā status. This was a big blow to us, being the first time we would not have weather extensibility in a major desktop flight simulator platform in over 20 years. It blind-sided us, quite frankly, and was very consequential, being that our entire resources, investments and IP were wrapped up in weather simulation and would not be able to be used to create any related products and achieve any add-on sales for the leader in the desktop flight simulation market.
Since then, weāve been working hard to support our existing customers on other platforms, continuing developing there, and also advocating for a change of decision regarding MSFS2020 wx SDK, as well as trying to find the best way to bring Active Sky features to MSFS2020 regardless of the lack of SDK. Unfortunately, due to the market shift and growing lack of demand for non-MFSS2020 add-ons, we were forced, several years ago, to let our primary development and other supporting staff go so they could pursue other projects and proper compensation. Charitably, Dave Opper was willing to continue helping with customer support for nearly zero compensation, enabling me to keep maintaining HiFi DataNet and existing products, adapt products to newer platform versions, and even add a few new features. Kostas Terzides also charitably worked to integrate with P3D6 and XP12 which were a significant efforts and yielded him almost zero compensation. We all gave it the best we could for as long as we could.
Paying for a sophisticated cloud/network system that is HiFi DataNet, with negative profits, I was also forced to work without compensation over the past couple of years. Every financial resource drained, loans taken, debt accrued, but fortunately all of HiFi products within the previous 10 years stayed online. Unfortunately, I had to shed some older products (AS2012, ASE) and remove server support from them last year, and it was looking like we would possibly have to shut everything down in the coming months. I moved our most recent products to NOAA download primarily, vs. HiFi DataNet, reducing cloud costs significantly and stretching things out a few more months so we could keep things online.
Thanks to the growing encouragement of Active Sky supporters, as well as continued progress with UI-mod based weather setting prototypes (and some significant personal challenges becoming overcome), ASFS became a reality and was finally released last month. It has modestly sold to enough customers to enable me to keep developing AS (and continuing development and support on the other platforms as well) for at least a while.
Recently, this āHire Damianā wishlist item came up and as mentioned I am very honored and grateful. Discussion of this has been mostly positive but there are a few very negative and insulting attacks made against me, HiFi and Active Sky around the net in regards to this. I think most of this comes from misunderstanding. Despite that, I wanted to clear the air about a few things and provide my thoughts, so thanks for that opportunity.
Iāve never considered AS to be any competition or detriment to any sim developer including MS/Asobo, but some have unfortunately pitted us against each other, resulting in defensive reactions which I think explain the negativity. I completely respect and believe I am very aligned with MS/Asoboās work and their vision for weather moving forward. My efforts have always been to extend and build upon, not to replace or compete. I hope I have shown that through the years I can do that, just like many developers can and have.
To re-iterate, Iād be extremely honored, and it would be a real dream come true to be able to work with MS/Asobo at any level to further weather development. Whether that be from some kind of potential employment, partnership, new 3rd-party weather extensibility, or ANYTHING, Iām extremely interested and willing to explore it all in the name of weather innovation, cooperation and mutual respect.
Of course, MS/Asobo may not be interested in working with me, and if so, thatās fully their prerogative and of course they absolutely donāt āneed meā in any way to continue making awesome new weather innovations. They have incredible weather developers and designers who have knocked it out of the park, and Iām sure they will continue to do so regardless of who they work with or partner with.
For now, Iām fully committed to improving ASFS for the current MSFS2020 and making it integrate with MSFS2024 when it comes around. Beyond that, Iām open to exploring anything/everything with MS/Asobo and/or anyone else who might want to work with me.
Thanks to everyone who supports my efforts and my continued ability to work on weather simulation. Thanks to all Active Sky customers and supporters. Thanks to the new ASFS users. Thanks to past developers and staff whoāve selflessly sacrificed so much effort and time for HiFi and our users. Thanks to MS/Asobo for making and continuing the MS franchise, MSFS2020, and MSFS2024, and giving the community some incredible experiences, and giving many developers like me opportunities to continue development. I cannot thank you enough!
-Damian Clark / HiFi