Adobe's projects are becoming bloatware. Just look at how long it takes Adobe Reader to start up, for simple PDF viewing.
Steve has publically said (at Macworld) that he is pushing Adobe to integrate CoreImage into their products, but without an equivalent on the Windows side, they probably won't invest into it. This is a perfect opportunity to bring a simpler, yet just as powerful, graphics design application to the market that compete head-to-head with Photoshop, but Mac-only, baby!
Ugh. I think I'm pretty unhappy about this, too. Both companies have software that competes, has loyal followings, and does things differently enough to appeal to different people. Merging the two companies will undoubtedly result in the loss of some of that competion which helps products from both companies get better.
OTOH, will some other company rise up and take Macromedia's place? There certainly must be sleeper software out there that can take advantage of being "not Adobe". Maybe Canvas? Or can Corel step up to the plate? (It'd be nice to see Corel start hiring some Mac programmers.)
IMHO, Photoshop and Dreamweaver are so popular (in part) because they are defacto standards. The old "nobody gets fired for buying IBM" cliche. Now that the Macromedia "standard" is gone, who will rise up and be the default alternative to Adobe? Who will be the anti-Adobe in the Web design space?
On a different note, I really hope Adobe XML-izes Flash and adds more support for SVG. Rather than going the other way and saying, "Whew! We finally own Flash. Now we can drop SVG."
Adobe isn't moving away from the Mac nearly as fast as Macromedia was, though. So that flavor of gloom-and-doom doesn't make much sense to me. What is unsettling is seeing a new monopoly in creative software form right before our eyes.
And it does look like Adobe and Apple are increasingly becoming competitors. To say the least.
Hiya Hobbs,
What i meant by my post which was done in haste was to say that Adobe already has serious issues with the management at Apple especially when apple announced FCP way back a market which Adobe thinks it has a god given right to be the monopolistic provider to. As for Macromedia although they were aslo getting less mac friendly as witness by even their tech support docs ( funny how all those screen caps are done off windoze) At least their major output was HTML / CSS and Actionscript a javascript like language. But Adobe... Hmmm one thinks they see themselves as the MS of the Studio. But its funny how many designers hate that approach. Im going back to BBedit. I guess its ironic Macromedia getting "consolidated" just like they did to Alliare...
Macromedia's management sucked, their marketing sucked, OSX support was a joke; Director, originally Mac-only and one the most useful and powerful programs ever (and one that provided me with a living for three years) has just been allowed to wither and die; pricing policies were ridiculous etc etc...
Whatever the long term consequences of an Adobe monopoly, and frankly the jury will be out for some time (did they ever really compete?), Adobe consistently delivers stable and functional programs.
for all of you who think this sucks, ponder this; what if it was microsoft that had purchased macromedia instead of adobe. now that, my friends, would have truly sucked. i believe that most of the macromedia lineup will remain intact with the exception of freehand. most of the mm products are far superior to their adobe counterparts.
dreamweaver is strongly intrenched where as golive has never really caught on and has been in decline for years now. if anything some of golive's functionality will move to dreamweaver.
fireworks is more comparable to imageready than photoshop. one of them will get the ax, my guess would be imageready since it kind of pales in comparison.
flash is going no where. and for those thinking that this may give a boost to svg, i wouldn't count on it. adobe supported svg as a way to compete with flash. now they have flash they really don't need svg.
freehand is gone. to bad. i started out on freehand back in the 5.5 days. i doubt they spin it off. why would they want the competition for illustrator? r.i.p.
coldfusion in adobes hands is very intriguing. this will be interesting to watch. same goes for contribute.
not sure what they will do with the rest of their web services offerings. they may leave it out there to see how it does only to let it die if it under performs.
photoshop has pretty much gotten better and better, illustrator CS is a bit buggy (I havent messed with CS2) but macromedia on OSX blows! Hopefully tiger or adobe can fix the glitches...
Ironically, the only way for Apple to keep certain big players on their platform is now for them to go head to head against them.
a lot of truth in that statement. Apple has no leverage anymore with Adobe owning everything. They'd better start polishing some of those skunkworks projects because Adobe can knife any product they like siting poor Mac support.
Sigh..this is exactly where I didn't want this industry going. I guess Kelby was right to devote Layers Magazine to Adobe.
freehand is gone. to bad. i started out on freehand back in the 5.5 days. i doubt they spin it off. why would they want the competition for illustrator? r.i.p.
Last time, they spun it off because they had to. If they killed it, they would have had a monopoly. I'm not sure it's any different, now.
Last time, they spun it off because they had to. If they killed it, they would have had a monopoly. I'm not sure it's any different, now.
not totally true. although there was an investigation by the ftc, there was a clause between aldus and altsys ( the original developer of freehand) that development and marketing must be continued with freehand. altsys sued adobe and eventually freehand turned back over to altsys whom eventually sold it to macromedia.
for all of you who think this sucks, ponder this; what if it was microsoft that had purchased macromedia instead of adobe. now that, my friends, would have truly sucked. i believe that most of the macromedia lineup will remain intact with the exception of freehand. most of the mm products are far superior to their adobe counterparts.
This is what I think the CS3 lineup will be:
Adobe Photoshop
Adobe Imageready - incorporating some Fireworks features
Adobe InDesign
Adobe Illustrator - incorporating any Freehand features not now in Illustrator
Adobe Acrobat
Adobe Flash - new Adobeized interface
Adobe Dreamweaver (yes, thats right) - completely rewritten with a new Adobeized interface, many GoLive features (such as the layout grid) incorporated
Other Apps:
Adobe Director
Adobe Contribute
Adobe ColdFusion (not part of CS3)
Adobe Flash Player (my guess would be that this probably why Adobe bought MM more than any other reason)
The handwriting has been on the wall for quite some time as far as SVG is concerned. The installed user base for the plugin pales in comparison to the Flash user base. I fully expect Adobe to discontinue their SVG support once Flash becomes theirs.
Adobe Dreamweaver (yes, thats right) - completely rewritten with a new Adobeized interface, many GoLive features (such as the layout grid) incorporated
This is one of my biggest fears. GoLive created the crappiest HTML code ever, completely f'd-up and unusable. Dreamweaver wasn't perfect, but it did a much better job and needed less massaging after the fact. I fear GoLive's DNA will effect Dreamweaver, and it will turn into an "ease-of-use, mass market hobbyist" product instead of trying to be a professional tool.
That, and I liked FlashPaper, which is almost certain to get the axe.
This is one of my biggest fears. GoLive created the crappiest HTML code ever, completely f'd-up and unusable. Dreamweaver wasn't perfect, but it did a much better job and needed less massaging after the fact. I fear GoLive's DNA will effect Dreamweaver, and it will turn into an "ease-of-use, mass market hobbyist" product instead of trying to be a professional tool.
That, and I liked FlashPaper, which is almost certain to get the axe.
i doubt dreamweaver is fucked with too much. it may get a user interface update, which couldn't hurt, and a few features like smart objects. but not much else in the way of golive. you don't go in and change an app that has been kicking your app's ass in the market place just because.
as far as flash paper goes, i think it stays. i can see this enhancing both flash and acrobat.
Comments
Steve has publically said (at Macworld) that he is pushing Adobe to integrate CoreImage into their products, but without an equivalent on the Windows side, they probably won't invest into it. This is a perfect opportunity to bring a simpler, yet just as powerful, graphics design application to the market that compete head-to-head with Photoshop, but Mac-only, baby!
Come on Apple, give Adobe a run for their money.
OTOH, will some other company rise up and take Macromedia's place? There certainly must be sleeper software out there that can take advantage of being "not Adobe". Maybe Canvas? Or can Corel step up to the plate? (It'd be nice to see Corel start hiring some Mac programmers.)
IMHO, Photoshop and Dreamweaver are so popular (in part) because they are defacto standards. The old "nobody gets fired for buying IBM" cliche. Now that the Macromedia "standard" is gone, who will rise up and be the default alternative to Adobe? Who will be the anti-Adobe in the Web design space?
On a different note, I really hope Adobe XML-izes Flash and adds more support for SVG. Rather than going the other way and saying, "Whew! We finally own Flash. Now we can drop SVG."
- Jasen.
GoWeaver
DreamLive
GoLiveWeaver
FreeIllustrator
IllustratorsHand
InFreeDesignHand
InHandDesign
FlaMotion
LiveFlashMotion
FireReady
ImageReadyWorks
St. Elmo's PhotoShopFire
Originally posted by Tazznb
Now watch Microsoft try and force a buyout of Adobe. This Adobe thing sucks, but the M$ thing would massively suck!!
Don't be bloody stupid.
Originally posted by Hobbes
Adobe isn't moving away from the Mac nearly as fast as Macromedia was, though. So that flavor of gloom-and-doom doesn't make much sense to me. What is unsettling is seeing a new monopoly in creative software form right before our eyes.
And it does look like Adobe and Apple are increasingly becoming competitors. To say the least.
Hiya Hobbs,
What i meant by my post which was done in haste was to say that Adobe already has serious issues with the management at Apple especially when apple announced FCP way back a market which Adobe thinks it has a god given right to be the monopolistic provider to. As for Macromedia although they were aslo getting less mac friendly as witness by even their tech support docs ( funny how all those screen caps are done off windoze) At least their major output was HTML / CSS and Actionscript a javascript like language. But Adobe... Hmmm one thinks they see themselves as the MS of the Studio. But its funny how many designers hate that approach. Im going back to BBedit. I guess its ironic Macromedia getting "consolidated" just like they did to Alliare...
Whatever the long term consequences of an Adobe monopoly, and frankly the jury will be out for some time (did they ever really compete?), Adobe consistently delivers stable and functional programs.
dreamweaver is strongly intrenched where as golive has never really caught on and has been in decline for years now. if anything some of golive's functionality will move to dreamweaver.
fireworks is more comparable to imageready than photoshop. one of them will get the ax, my guess would be imageready since it kind of pales in comparison.
flash is going no where. and for those thinking that this may give a boost to svg, i wouldn't count on it. adobe supported svg as a way to compete with flash. now they have flash they really don't need svg.
freehand is gone. to bad. i started out on freehand back in the 5.5 days. i doubt they spin it off. why would they want the competition for illustrator? r.i.p.
coldfusion in adobes hands is very intriguing. this will be interesting to watch. same goes for contribute.
not sure what they will do with the rest of their web services offerings. they may leave it out there to see how it does only to let it die if it under performs.
Originally posted by Matsu
Ironically, the only way for Apple to keep certain big players on their platform is now for them to go head to head against them.
a lot of truth in that statement. Apple has no leverage anymore with Adobe owning everything. They'd better start polishing some of those skunkworks projects because Adobe can knife any product they like siting poor Mac support.
Sigh..this is exactly where I didn't want this industry going. I guess Kelby was right to devote Layers Magazine to Adobe.
Originally posted by running with scissors
freehand is gone. to bad. i started out on freehand back in the 5.5 days. i doubt they spin it off. why would they want the competition for illustrator? r.i.p.
Last time, they spun it off because they had to. If they killed it, they would have had a monopoly. I'm not sure it's any different, now.
I heard somewhere that Mac sales of CS account for 45-50% of total sales still. I can't see them giving Mac the finger and losing half their base.
Originally posted by MrSparkle
Last time, they spun it off because they had to. If they killed it, they would have had a monopoly. I'm not sure it's any different, now.
not totally true. although there was an investigation by the ftc, there was a clause between aldus and altsys ( the original developer of freehand) that development and marketing must be continued with freehand. altsys sued adobe and eventually freehand turned back over to altsys whom eventually sold it to macromedia.
Originally posted by running with scissors
for all of you who think this sucks, ponder this; what if it was microsoft that had purchased macromedia instead of adobe. now that, my friends, would have truly sucked. i believe that most of the macromedia lineup will remain intact with the exception of freehand. most of the mm products are far superior to their adobe counterparts.
This is what I think the CS3 lineup will be:
Adobe Photoshop
Adobe Imageready - incorporating some Fireworks features
Adobe InDesign
Adobe Illustrator - incorporating any Freehand features not now in Illustrator
Adobe Acrobat
Adobe Flash - new Adobeized interface
Adobe Dreamweaver (yes, thats right) - completely rewritten with a new Adobeized interface, many GoLive features (such as the layout grid) incorporated
Other Apps:
Adobe Director
Adobe Contribute
Adobe ColdFusion (not part of CS3)
Adobe Flash Player (my guess would be that this probably why Adobe bought MM more than any other reason)
The handwriting has been on the wall for quite some time as far as SVG is concerned. The installed user base for the plugin pales in comparison to the Flash user base. I fully expect Adobe to discontinue their SVG support once Flash becomes theirs.
Just my 2¢
Originally posted by 4fx
Adobe Dreamweaver (yes, thats right) - completely rewritten with a new Adobeized interface, many GoLive features (such as the layout grid) incorporated
This is one of my biggest fears. GoLive created the crappiest HTML code ever, completely f'd-up and unusable. Dreamweaver wasn't perfect, but it did a much better job and needed less massaging after the fact. I fear GoLive's DNA will effect Dreamweaver, and it will turn into an "ease-of-use, mass market hobbyist" product instead of trying to be a professional tool.
That, and I liked FlashPaper, which is almost certain to get the axe.
Originally posted by D.J. Adequate
This is one of my biggest fears. GoLive created the crappiest HTML code ever, completely f'd-up and unusable. Dreamweaver wasn't perfect, but it did a much better job and needed less massaging after the fact. I fear GoLive's DNA will effect Dreamweaver, and it will turn into an "ease-of-use, mass market hobbyist" product instead of trying to be a professional tool.
That, and I liked FlashPaper, which is almost certain to get the axe.
i doubt dreamweaver is fucked with too much. it may get a user interface update, which couldn't hurt, and a few features like smart objects. but not much else in the way of golive. you don't go in and change an app that has been kicking your app's ass in the market place just because.
as far as flash paper goes, i think it stays. i can see this enhancing both flash and acrobat.