The complexity of modern NLEs can easily give the impression that it is only possible to learn one and stick with it.

I've seen this in other fields too, first in mainframe computers when they were all proprietary. I found that once a person had learned one system, they were exhausted, and they just did not want to go through this level of effort again with a different manufacturer's operating system.

in the IBM 360 days, people went to trade schools to learn how to work with mainframes, and "actually printing something" was covered in the second year... Before that there were only debug screens/terminal lists.

I prefer Vegas to any other NLE, particularly when it is assisted by scripts such as Ultimate S so I can do a lot of things much faster than with any other NLE.

After several years of using Vegas only, I found that Final Cut Studio was significantly more capable for many types of broadcast work, thanks to Motion and very powerful plug-ins.

Then recently I found myself facing an enormous (for me) amount of scripted material to edit, with double sound and multiple takes and oodles of little bits and pieces shot separately added. I needed much better media management than either Vegas or Final Cut could offer (it may be of some consolation to Vegas users that FCP's media manager is the #1 source of complaints there too).

So when I got a chance to get a deal on the current Avid Media Composer, I jumped on it. In addition to the best media management of any NLE (by a wide margin), I also got AutoSync that automatically syncs the separately recorded audio (double sound) with the picture, and ScriptSync that automatically lines up each line in the script with the right spot on the timeline (through interpretation and matching of each voice in the dialog track.

So it seems like the right tool for this job, and on top of that it is a very efficient editor. I used to refer to it as "elbow editing," when you are just doing very focused and fast rolled-up-sleeves assembly and trimming, and I think Avid still does this better than anyone else.

Some editing facility owners say they have noticed that identical types of jobs to do standard editing consistently bill the editing suites at one third less time on Avid than FCP. I think that is because so many FCP editors insist on using the mouse for everything (and preferably a one-button mouse of course).

Actually, you can do about as much on the keyboard in FCP as in Avid, and then things go faster.

Having said that, I still always preferred Avid's trimming over FCP or Vegas or PP.

Now overall, for non-scripted material without massive media management needs, Vegas beats every other NLE just by virtue of its different paradigm, working like a multitrack sound editor. This is a phenomenal time saver, and I think the other NLEs will go there too,

Remember when Vegas was about the only NLE to have a mixed format timeline? This was never promoted, just taken for granted. So nobody knew about it, and the competition added it to great fanfare.

I still don't see a major educational effort from SCS to make sure that editors everywhere know what Vegas can do.

In the absence of that ("like.no.other" doesn't quite cut it as an education), I think it is going to be up to us to spread the word about how incredibly capable and fast-to-work-with Vegas is.

Pros need to know that Vegas can let them get the jobs they usually do done in less time, which is increasingly important at a time of decreasing billing. Customers aren't willing to pay as much today, so if you want to be profitable you need to do more projects, which is only possible if you can work more efficiently.

Why is it up to us to spread the message?

If we don't, we may not have a Vegas much longer. Some bean counter may decide that it's not profitable enough, putting some of those resources into Vegas Movie Studio instead, and firing the rest.

So do what you can to get the word out about Vegas and what it can do that others can't.

If you don't, you may have nothing to complain about soon...