Well, thanks for replying, but that ain't nowhere near good enough. SONY advertises that buyers of WMS9 will get:

"106 NewBlue® 3D transitions and effects"

So, that means 106 variations on transitions, and one effect that's free anyway?

How is that not false advertising?

The 106 would be the total number of presets. Several of the presets are in Cartoonr so "effects" is appropriate as you can get many different "effects" from that one "tool".

Am I correct that if you have come down the full Pro line that you cannot get the NewBlue effects free. That they only came with the Studio version? Except for Cartooner of course.

Well, no, it's not appropriate, because the Cartoonr plug-in is free at the NewBLueFX site. Therefore its value as an add-on as a way to justify a higher price is zero.

If this is their idea of forthright ad copy, I feel REALLY ripped off. I was expecting some of those painterly or film effects. And the transitions they give aren't cinematic at all. They're more like corporate video type transitions.

Thirdnostril, it really comes down to semantics, doesn't it? Sony doesn't claim you'll get newblue effects, no, just effects...
For some time now, Sony Creative really makes a mess of marketing Vegas. Adding 'pro' to the vms line is the most obvious example of how they messed things up when VMS9 came out. Never before, the confusion with the pricy full Vegas has been greater for newcomers.
Only last week, they advertised a 35% reduction to all their products, on this very forum, but they 'forgot' to mention that some days before, all prices had gone up substantially, and they also 'forgot' to mention they charge 25€ for 'fedex international priority postage', leaving no other options for postage.

It all boils down to this: is VMS good value for money? Is VMS an application that suits your needs? Do you like its interface?

Um, no, it boils down to, did SONY deliver what a reasonable person would read as SONY having promised?

I could have gone for the cheaper package. I paid extra for additional effects, that turned out to be the one I could get for free.

I think the technical term is bait-and-switch.

bait-and-switch is correct and it's B.S. I feel I was lead to believe the same thing and is why I upgraded too. Not happy at all and not happy none of my emails were answered the day i bought and the day i upgraded.

This is the tenth post in this thread, and no word from management?

Hello?

"This is the tenth post in this thread, and no word from management?"

They seem to have disappeared into the woodwork on this one, taking the money with them... Sony con artists or what.

"This is the tenth post in this thread, and no word from management?"
Sony employees almost never, ever post in these forums. These forums are primarily user-to-user support. I think somebody from Sony might monitor the forums occasionally, but replies are very, very rare. If you have a complaint you should contact customer service directly.

What package did you choose to buy compared to a "cheaper" version? According to the Vegas family comparison it looks like the NewBlue stuff only comes with VMSP Pro-pack.

http://www.sonycreativesoftware.com/moviestudiope/compare

If you are comparing Pro-pack to regular VMSP, the extra cost is getting you a lot of extras: Sound Forge Audio Studio, more Cinescore themes, 1001 sound effects, plus the NewBlue stuff.

If you are comparing Pro-pack to regular VMS, you are also getting hi-def capabilities, in addition to the above, for the extra money.

Sorry you guys are disappointed, but VMS/VMSP/VMSP ProPack are still fantastic bargains.

Well, that certainly isn't the case in the ACID forum, which I've posted to for years.

As far as extras, I already have SFAS, as a musician Cinescore offends me deeply and I would never use it, and I already have 1,0001 Sound Effects from previous purchases, so the whole extra $20 or so was for those fabulous NewBlue FX I saw on their Web site.

Bargain or no, with this country full of people being put out of their homes because of the letter of the contract signed, I get really disgusted with companies who, despite massive profits, have to nickel-and-dime people with these bait-and-switch obfuscatory practices. If working people have to live by what they say, shouldn't SONY? The infinitesmal nature of the amount of effort required to make this issue clear leads me to believe that it was deliberate.

Great program? Absolutely--and absolutely not the point.