To all of you, I do hope Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year were good for you. I am writing this post in Adelaide, South Australia. We have just spent our first Christmas with our grandkids, and our Aussie side of our family. We decided to take a month out and try to relax a bit, with family, sightseeing, and doing a bit of Aussie travel to the likes of the Barossa Valley, and the wonderful city of Melbourne, Victoria. Today is a quiet day, so I decided to get this blog finished and posted, after nearly a month of hesitation and procrastination about posting it out there in the world.
I have had many people ask me about the direction Not Just CAD will take as it starts to build, and being away from home, relaxing and enjoying a quiet glass of good Australian Shiraz, I have had time to contemplate, think, and make some concrete decisions about where Not Just CAD needs to go.
Not Just CAD is slowly, but surely, building towards a launch this year. I am sincerely hoping for an end of Q1 release, towards the end of March 2026. Trust me, that’s a very vague release date, based entirely on how much work needs to be done! I cannot offer any exact guarantees towards the launch as there is still much to be done.
As an educator and instructor of over 25 years standing, I am a huge advocate of learning, and I believe that everyone should have the same opportunities to learn and empower themselves to move forward. We ALL have value, and to that end, I feel that Not Just CAD should have a completely neutral stance when it comes to software and applications. Not Just CAD is about inclusivity, and learning, and improving, regardless of what application you are using.
Not Just CAD is not about corporate competition. It is ALL about learning, improvement, and becoming better. To that end, I am announcing the Not Just CAD Neutrality Charter.
The Not Just CAD Neutrality Charter ensures that our subscription platform remains fair, unbiased, and transparent to all CAD vendors and their communities. Our goal is to empower EVERY CAD professional with skills and workflows that transcend a single application while giving all software vendors equitable representation.
- Not Just CAD will be vendor neutral. Consider us the Switzerland of the CAD world. I have been around the block and seen so much unnecessary rivalry in the CAD ecosystem; between application vendors, resellers, training centres, you name it. It does not help learning, in fact, it hinders it.
- Not Just CAD will NOT be drawn into partisan in-fighting. Not Just CAD is here for everyone, providing a safe space for all to learn, and aims to become a community where any CAD user can find something of use at every turn.
On that note, we have developed this Charter to include the following: –
Our Principles of Neutrality
- Equal Representation: All CAD vendors are given the opportunity to provide content, insights, and contributions without preferential treatment.
- Workflow-Focused: Content emphasizes workflows, processes, and interoperability rather than ranking or judging tools.
- Transparency: Partnerships, sponsorships, and collaborations are disclosed and standardized to avoid perceived bias.
- Vendor Independence: Not Just CAD maintains editorial control and decision-making authority over all content.
- Inclusivity: Emerging CAD platforms and smaller vendors have equal access to contribute and be represented.
Our Vendor Engagement Guidelines
- Contribution: All vendors can contribute. All vendors will have access to identical levels of collaboration with Not Just CAD, without bias.
- Content Submission: Vendor-provided content will be reviewed and standardized to match platform-wide formats and quality standards.
- Branding Policy: Vendor logos and references will be used consistently and proportionately across the platform.
- Conflict Resolution: Any disputes or concerns about content representation will be addressed by an impartial advisory panel.
Any content created will also be impartial and will be without bias. Standards have been created to ensure this, and are shown below: –
Our Content Creation Standards
- No Comparative Bias: Content will avoid subjective comparisons like “better” or “worse.”
- Evidence-Based: Workflow comparisons will rely on measurable outcomes, not opinions.
- Template Consistency: All course structures, naming conventions, and difficulty levels will be standardized across all platforms.
- Neutral Language: Terminology will remain vendor-neutral unless platform-specific instructions require otherwise.
Over time, Not Just CAD will be appointing an Advisory Panel to maintain the Not Just CAD Neutrality Charter. The following will be applied to the Panel, once formed: –
Our Advisory Panel
- The Panel will comprise of representatives from multiple CAD vendors, industry experts, and CAD professionals. The Panel will also utilise representatives from the CAD press to provide impartiality on specific issues.
- The Panel will provide oversight on neutrality, content quality, and workflow accuracy.
- The Panel will provide recommendations for continuous improvement and inclusivity.
Not Just CAD will also maintain full transparency when it comes to developing any content. There will be no bias or preference, and there will be occasional reporting to maintain impartiality. The following will apply: –
Transparency and Reporting
- Not Just CAD will provide occasional reports on vendor participation, content updates, and user engagement. These may be project and/or content specific.
- Not Just CAD will be happy to provide a summary of neutrality practices and platform metrics and make them publicly available.
- Not Just CAD will provide feedback channels for users and vendors to raise concerns or suggest improvements.
To maintain neutrality under the Charter, Not Just CAD will aim, over time, to enforce and review content and vendor engagement. Not Just CAD will build the following practices as the Not Just CAD platform grows: –
Enforcement and Review
- Not Just CAD will start to implement quarterly internal reviews of content and vendor engagement.
- Not Just CAD will start an annual external audit of neutrality practices by independent advisors.
- Not Just CAD will provide swift corrective actions for any deviations from the neutrality principles.
In Conclusion
Not Just CAD is committed to maintaining a fair, unbiased, and inclusive learning experience for all users and subscribers and will be a subscription platform that benefits users, vendors, and the broader CAD community.
To make sure this happens, we MUST be vendor neutral. Up until now, many of you have seen me as a representative of Autodesk. That will continue. I will remain as an Autodesk Certified Instructor (ACI) and an Autodesk Expert Elite (EE). I will, however, be providing content around other CAD platforms and vendors, including Bricsys and BricsCAD, and 3DS and DraftSight. This list is not exhaustive either. The aim is to include ALL CAD applications globally.
I want everyone to be aware that this is NOT a competitive decision. It is a fair and balanced decision, to ensure that ALL CAD users can benefit from the content and values Not Just CAD can offer.
I have worked hard over the last 25 years to endeavour to ensure that all the learners and users I encounter are inspired to learn and build on that knowledge to be better than they were, working towards CADjedi status.
The nickname CADjedi stuck after I used it as forum username, and I just hope that I can exemplify what Mace Windu (a well-known Jedi Knight) once said: –
“You are Jedi Knights. Responsibility. Peace. Discipline. You are the examples the galaxy looks to. Your successes will carry through the Republic and beyond. As will your mistakes. Your choices will matter, helping the Jedi maintain peace in a time of discord.”
There is a lot of discord out there right now, and a lot of vendor competition that not only hinders learning but also hinders progress in the AECO industries. Sure, I understand that maintaining a competitive advantage has its benefits, but why penalize learning to make sure one application platform outsells another? Surely, understanding both applications is more beneficial and provides a much more rounded knowledge base fo the user who is learning?
Not Just CAD has a responsibility to maintain that peace and discipline for that reason, by providing neutrality without bias and learning without barriers.
I do hope that all my colleagues, connections, and friends in the industry understand my need for neutrality at this point. The CAD ecosystem is as diverse, eclectic, and creative as the people that inhabit it, and I hope that Not Just CAD can appeal to everyone and provide something of value to each and every one of you.
If you want to pre-register for the Not Just CAD release, please sign up at https://www.notjustcad.com.
From the southern hemisphere, wishing you all a good weekend,
SCB
