I`m a professional amatuer :-))

Tis an interesting question. The music industry has more blowhards than any other maybe. How many people make a living from music production/performance without supplementary income from a secondary job or their partner.  Not very many I bet. 
 
I fully respect those who can make a living from music alone and do not begrudge them the title "pro".

I AM A PROFESSIONAL FORUM READER! AFFORDABLE SERVICES! QUICK TURNAROUND TIMES! Heh!

Seriously, our opinions don't mean squat. You are either really good at what you do or you aren't. I don't bludgeon people over the head with my accomplishments, however big or small, in the music business. I have had some major mountain top moments only to be yodeling in the valley a few days later.
I think PRO is about the level of craftsmanship you perform at. Whether it be guitar playing or looping. I have just as much respect for a 16 year old kid that can put together a kicka@# dance track as I do for George Martin or Tom Dowd. Pro to me means able to deliver at a moments notice. There comes a time in your development as an artist that the bar you set for yourself becomes an everyday achievement. You come to a time where you just instinctively know what to do in any given situation. You do it and it just works! Knowledge is everything!

'Yes, the word, "pro" is as meaningless today as the "all natural" on a food label.   I consider someone who makes their living doing something to be a "professional" because it is their "profession".  It is their trade, their job.   I am a music teacher full-time, and a part-time engineer/producer.  I built and own a recording studio that 4 other engineers work out of.  But we are all part-time.  We all have other gigs that pay the bulk of our bills.  By my own definition, I'm not a pro.  But since I rarely set foot in the studio without being paid, I do consider myself a "pro".  
 
One thing is clear, just because someone IS a paid professional, it does not necessarily mean that they are more skilled or knowledgeable than someone who is not.  While it tends to be true, it is highly circumstantial.  
 
Lastly, no one on these forums looking for help (as I have done many times) has the right to wave it anyone's face or use it as an argument.  There is always a respectful, logical way to explain why a particular suggestion isn't helpful.

On that last point, "I'm a professional, I don't have time to learn this" strikes me as a fairly odd position. Surely being professional in a field means having a good grasp of the tools of that trade, however badly designed you may personally think the tools are. I suspect there are surgeons who have a negative view of this or that piece of operating theatre equipment, but if they throw their hands up and say "I can't be bothered learning to use this", then they're not going to be surgeons for very much longer.

True but there is also a reason many pro's don't upgrade to the latest version of everything right away. PT11 and Logic X being prime examples. It's exactly because they don't want to break something they know is working, whether through bugs, incompatibilities or simply "new ways of doing things". It's really frustrating to have to relearn processes you have been using for ages, especially if for your application the end result is the same.

I get the frustration is all I'm saying.

For sure. You make your practical choices and move forward. If changing your setup so gaining features X and Y means you lose feature Z, then you make a call on whether to do that yet, or at all.
 
My point is simply: "I'm a professional" whatever else it means, surely means "I've got work that needs to get done, and I'll do it by whatever means are required and available".

If you make money on a regular basis at any endeavor you can rightfully claim the "pro" mantle.  Pretty simple.  Of course, you can be a crappy pro...all the way to a genuinely great pro.  But earning a living at it has always been the common denominator.
 

John T
For sure. You make your practical choices and move forward. If changing your setup so gaining features X and Y means you lose feature Z, then you make a call on whether to do that yet, or at all.
 
My point is simply: "I'm a professional" whatever else it means, surely means "I've got work that needs to get done, and I'll do it by whatever means are required and available".

I agree, it's just sometimes you didn't realize something you figured was a "basic feature" would change. I don't think any of those folks on here complaining will stop at that, they just vent and complain and then get the job done, whether by going back to an older version or by figuring out a new way of doing what they need to. The Lanes/Layers discussion is a fair example I think. It works really well for me and I never did much with layers, but pre-X3 there were some things you could do easily with layers and couldn't with lanes, as far as I understand. You go in assuming that there will be a way to do all these basic processes you're used to and suddenly there isn't, or it requires you to do a totally new way of project organization which affects your workflow in other unforeseen ways. I agree one should take the time to learn the new version. But it's still frustrating when the client is sitting there and this thing you used to do all the time is taking ages, or won't work at all.