WeylandYutani
Ok, here's the scoop. There is a clip selector that is built in to the VG software but you need to be at least Platinum level in order to use it. There are a couple of stand-alone clip players available, made by users. As well as the one mentioned by robbanjzo above, there's another made by wyldanimal. I've used it in the past but it's a bit buggy. Right now it give me an 'error 380 invalid property' message when I try to add clips, so I have to do it manually. There's probably a solution posted somewhere for this but I haven't found it yet.
As far as I know, any level of user can download and use either of these palyers; you don't need to be platinum. Also, they offer functionality no found in the built-in player, so they're probably worth checking out (sorry, I don't have the links but maybe someone else can post them.)
I agree with you that the built-in clip player should be available to everyone and that Totem is making a huge mistake by not offering it, but I've raised this issue before and gotten nowhere, so it's not likely to happen. I suspect that a large number of potential customers don't renew because they can't play clips in order.