The BIM Molesto.

Greetings!

So I'm having my morning constitutional on Saturday, and I'm thinking about the poor stupid dipshits who keep sticking their pencil dicks into the Revit pencil sharpener, and I run across a Revitard's blog called 'The BIM Manifesto'.

The best I can tell is that this guy is (or at least was) doing Mechanical design with Revit - and while he likes to throw in lots of caveats, it's obvious that he's got the Revit dick squarely lined up and jammed about 3/4 of the way into his eye-socket.  His last post was from July of 2016 entitled 'You Are Not a Victim', so I can only assume that he was beaten to death by someone who got tired of his naive way of discussing the finer points of a piece of software that can and will destroy anything resembling productivity and process in a firm.

The specific article I ran across first was this fairly comical read about avoiding the 'number one money-burning mistake most firms make with Revit' (as opposed to the number two through infinity money burning mistakes that anyone using Revit is making).  Now - I'm proud to be the exact strawman that he casts most of his aspersions on - and I used to hear almost every single talking point that he goes through verbatim from people who could barely issue a project correctly or on time (if at all) once the people I was working with became infatuated with Revit.

He runs down the litany of problems that a firm is going to have if it buys into BIM bullshit, while steadfastly insisting that there is a *correct* way to buy into BIM bullshit.  All they have to do is predict those problems, select the proper solutions, and voila!  It's basically the equivalent of 'step 2 - then a miracle happens'.

One of the main differences that I could see in my experience vs. his, is that he talks a lot about the disconnect between project managers and 'Revit nerds'.  If only those silly PM's would understand that things are different now because of reasons, then they would understand that things are different now because of reasons.  The only PM's I had to deal with were the Architectural PM's, most of whom were actually fairly well versed in Revit (as opposed to the actual Architects who were too busy Architecting to be worried about what software was being used to generate their work product.

There was my boss, the Electrical Engineer - but he trusted me to handle my own projects and only bring them to him when there were questions that needed his input, meaning I was basically my own project manager, as well as doing design, and drafting (and damn good at it I might add).  People generally preferred to talk to me rather than the Engineer (since he lived to make fun of stupid people - especially Architect lackeys), and because I was handling all aspects of the job, it made sense not to waste his time unless it was absolutely necessary.

He personally didn't give a fuck what software I used to do projects, as long as they were done on time and correctly (which they always were) so that he didn't have to hear about it from clients, or anyone else in the office.  Unfortunately after Revit became the 'phallus du jour' for the firm, he started hearing about how we needed to be 'all Revit all the time' from people who had gone from being able to consistently crank out projects to people who spent half the day gazing at their navels and rotating their 3D models around on the screen to look busy.

Mr. 'BIM Manifesto' has a fantastic way of waving his hand at what he seems to be fully aware is a literal mountain of potential for projects declining into irredeemable clusterfucks - and like I said earlier, his solution is simply 'try to avoid them'.  To his credit, that is exactly what my firm tried to do - and as time went on, they attempted to improve the template they were using to start projects, determine processes for how a project needed to be started, and streamline that process so that people weren't getting involved with a project until the Architectural model had reached a significant level of completion.

Of course, by that time, the schedule has moved from 'need it now' to 'need it yesterday', and quickly morphs into 'needed it two weeks ago' - and that's when the litany of problems that he admits can crop up would start.  Even if every single person involved is well-versed in Revit, and is 100% behind making it work (i.e. - clapping their hands loud enough, despite having several fingers removed from one of their hands), all it takes is one assumption (the mother of all fuck-ups) by one incompetent person who inexplicably has the same amount of control over the model as everyone else - and down the toilet you go.

It doesn't help that everyone involved is operating from a cult mindset - one that constantly reinforces it's core beliefs that Revit  = God.   One of my favorite quotes from one of his posts is this:

"BIM Evangelists tend to be really smart people who struggle to understand people who aren't as sharp as they are with software. This lack of empathy means they are likely to lead the group into deep waters before the rest of the pack is ready."

The fact that he uses the word 'evangelist' is telling - but it's especially hilarious given that while 'smart' people indeed struggle dealing with people who are not as smart (like every IT guy who has ever had to remove fifty 'programs' that a user has installed because they click 'OK' on every message that ever comes up on their computer without reading it first can attest), it's rare you find an actual 'smart' person who is willing to buy into the kind of groupthink that Revit engenders.

There were plenty of smart people using Revit at my last firm (primarily in the structural department), but they were far outstripped by those who couldn't find their own ass with both hands, a mirror, and a flashlight.

And those people, my skullfucked friends, were absolutely in way over their heads in extremely deep waters.

But hey - fuck 'em, fuck Revit, fuck Autodesk, and if you don't like it - take a number, then go fuck yourself.

-SkullFuck

Next Time: Is There No Standard Anymore? Part Deux