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Reved Up Families at Revit Market

Revit Market, being a new-fangled thing, is going through its early adoption phase. A few brave souls glimpse the future, and decide to participate in making it happen.

That's how it is with Reved Up Families, a collection of 400 high-quality Revit families. Reved Up has decided to put their entire collection up for sale at Revit Market.

"We are extremely excited to be publishing our Revit content on Revit Market," says Guillaume Belgique, co-owner of Reved Up Families. "We believe that Revit Market will become THE website that users will go to find quality Revit content. We're excited to be a part of Revit Market's growth and success, and know they'll be an integral part of our growth and success as well."

I've had several inquiries from libraries and users in this week alone who would agree. Revit Market was shown at three recent Revit user group meetings (and those are just the ones I know about). A recent AUGI article about our Revit user survey has gotten the word out even more.

Having lots of families published will be key to the success of Revit Market. If we build it, the people will come.

Liability

I've been getting a lot of phone calls from users recently. I like it. My Revit people, calling me to talk about Revit Market.

One of the big questions that comes up is about liability. If a downloaded family leads to structural or cost errors, who is responsible, the creator/uploader or the downloader/user?

The answer has to be the user. It's the only way that makes sense. The user has the power to use the family any way he or she chooses, and to make changes to the family before using it.

Our End User License Agreement (EULA) specifically states that the purchaser, not the seller, is responsible for how a family is used in a design. The seller makes no warranty about the accuracy or usefulness of the family.

This is similar to the EULA you sign when you purchase software. The manufacturer actually states that they're not responsible for whether the software works. If it doesn't work, you would, of course, return it and expect a refund. What they're really protecting themselves from is you using the software in a manner they didn't intend or expect, or experiencing occasional software failure. (Imagine if you could sue Microsoft every time Windows crashed! What a different world this would be.)

Our EULA serves a similar purpose. We don't guarantee that the item will be useful for any one user, or even that it will work. We give refunds on non-working models and families, but you (and we) are not liable if the user doesn't bother to check a family's integrity before using it for BIM or building instructions.

At TurboSquid, we've been doing this marketplace thing for 8 years, and we've worked out all the kinks in the EULA. We've never had a single problem with this issue. So, go ahead and publish your families with impunity!

Manufacturer vs. User-Generated Content

One of our Revit Market publishers asked me an excellent question today.

"Are you in contact with manufacturers to create or get their content?"

The answer is No, for the simple reason that TurboSquid doesn't deal with manufacturer content. Allow me to elaborate.

There are three types of RFA files:

• RFAs that come with Revit
• Manufacturer-specific RFAs, available from Autodesk Seek, and manufacturer websites, among other places. Examples are Pella windows and Kohler faucets. This content is usually free.
• Everything else: User-generated content that isn't manufacturer specific. This content can be free or for-purchase.

Autodesk Seek does the second, Revit Market does the third.

In my early interviews with Revit users, some claimed that there was no need for user-generated content; the built-in families and manufacturer content were enough for all. After a bit more questioning, I found that every Revit user makes their own content sooner or later, or goes looking for downloadable families online. It's just that no one wants to admit they're doing it.

In fact, they're doing it in droves. See my Survey Says post for the facts: 66% of Revit users need custom families for more than 50% of their projects.

What are these families that people have to make themselves? Everything from furniture to fixtures to construction vehicles. I'm conducting a new survey to find out what customers are looking for in user-generated Revit families. I'll be sure to post the results here when they come in.

Happy New Year from Revit Market

After a short hiatus for the holidays, I'm back to toot the Revit Market horn again.

Our publishing team has stayed busy over the holidays. Our most prolific contributor has been New Zealand-based RVT Pacifica, with a wide selection of doors and windows, and a smattering of other household items like gas ranges, refrigerators, and showers. To see their offerings, type in "RVT Pacifica" as the search term.

Another newsletter will be coming soon, so as always, you can email me to get on the list. I'd also be interested in finding out what kinds of topics you'd like to hear about in the newsletter.

Michele Bousquet

Survey Says...

Before TurboSquid launched Revit Market, we conducted an extensive survey of Revit users. Our goal was to find out what Revit users need and want with regard to Revit families. I thought I'd share the most interesting results with you.

Survey Results

• 66% of Revit users need custom families for more than 50% of their projects. 98% search the Internet for downloadable families.
• The biggest concern on downloads is quality: 87% doubt whether downloaded families will work correctly, and 55% worry about how they'll look in the scene.
• About half the respondents said their Revit families belong to the company they work for, not to them personally.

What We Did About It

In response to concerns voiced in the survey, we added two key features to Revit Market:

Certification. All the Revit families published for sale at Revit Market will be subjected to a certification process. A "certified" family must have correct parameterization, and must work as expected. When shopping at Revit Market, customers will be able to tell at a glance whether a family is certified. They'll also be able to search on certified content only. This feature is going into Revit Market within a few weeks. We've already started doing the testing itself; we're just waiting on the widget that we can set to Yay or Nay for each product. (More about certification)

Rollover Royalty Accounts. Because so many Revit libraries are owned by companies, we've introduced a payment method to cater to this situation. With a Rollover account, the Revit Market account is opened on the behalf of the company, not an individual. Then families can be published on behalf of the company. All sales royalties from each month are rolled into a credit account for the entire company or department, so monies made by a Revit department can be used by that same department to purchase more families. (More about Rollover accounts)

If you have questions about any of these offerings, feel free to email me. I'd love to hear from you.

- Michele

Newsletter

We've got a weekly Revit Market newsletter that goes out to everyone who's contacted me about Revit Market.

The newsletter will address such topics as quality guarantee (certification), corporate accounts, pricing, and our Revit Contest.

If you want to receive the newsletter, pop me an email.

Michele