Media Shout slams OSX/Quicktime and halts development

Posted:
in Mac Software edited January 2014
http://www.mediashout.com/usernews/h...ac_update.html



Released: May 24, 2006



Dear MediaShout Users, Resellers and Friends:



This special announcement is to let you know that we have stopped work on a Mac OS version of MediaShout. This has been a very difficult decision to make: not only because of the great amount of time and money we've poured into the Mac project over the past three years, but because many users have been counting on something we've promised that is now not possible to deliver.



Before work began on the project almost three years ago, we met with Apple executives and engineers to determine whether OS X and QuickTime could deliver the on-the-fly video transitions and text-over-video rendering at the performance level our users demand. With their assurances that they could, we began the work. A few months into the development we discovered limitations in the Mac OS that would require extensive custom workarounds and high-end programming that our programmers could not provide.



After more meetings with Apple, we started over with a new design and new programmers. But again, the work stalled early this year when we ran into additional operating system and QuickTime limitations that prevented the program from delivering the level of performance for all the MediaShout features demanded by our users. This time Apple conducted a comprehensive evaluation of our code and proposed potential solutions to the performance limitations. We then did a thorough evaluation of the work required to complete the project, and the projected costs of this work. The estimate came to at least twice what we had already invested ? a figure our best sales estimates can't come close to justifying.

We make this decision to not move forward with the Mac project with the knowledge that we did everything within our capability to deliver a product worthy of our users and their ministries. We completely understand your disappointment in not getting this product, and can only share that our disappointment in not delivering this project for you is just as great. However, we make the decision knowing that most of our users will ultimately be better served as we refocus on the aggressive further development of MediaShout on the Windows side.



This is not to say that we've abandoned the Mac OS. We will continue our research and exploration, and if further developments in OS X and QuickTime make a MediaShout-for-Mac project viable, we'll try again.



As always, we welcome your feedback.



Sincerely,



Todd Temple

president

MediaComplete

www.mediashout.com







------------



So what is up with this? Is Media Shout really the most advanced audio-video scripting/presentation package available today? That is my friends claim who is into this stuff?
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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 44
    curiousuburbcuriousuburb Posts: 3,325member
    Looks like their only market is Churches who want to do presentations with hymn lyrics and text over moving backgrounds. And PowerPoint.



    Hardly "the most advanced presentation" suite.



    Move along.
  • Reply 2 of 44
    chuckerchucker Posts: 5,089member
    Dear formerly potential customers,



    fuck you. We're incompetent and don't care for that to change.



    Yours sincerely,

    MediaComplete
  • Reply 3 of 44
    kim kap solkim kap sol Posts: 2,987member
    Yeah...sure, MediaComplete...OS X and QT are incapable of text over moving backgrounds.



    Somehow I think MediaComplete's story is pure baloney. With Quartz, overlaying text onto *anything* is a joke...you don't even need to write a single line of code for it to happen.



    Anyone can try it with Interface Builder. Zero code...if that's too difficult for MediaComplete, I don't think it would be a good idea to have such an incompetent software dev on the Mac side.
  • Reply 4 of 44
    archstudentarchstudent Posts: 262member
    hmm final cut pro and motion are possible.. but mediashout is obviously far more technically advanced than those pieces of software (sarcasm)
  • Reply 5 of 44
    chuckerchucker Posts: 5,089member
    Quote:

    However, we make the decision knowing that most of our users will ultimately be better served as we refocus on the aggressive further development of MediaShout on the Windows side.



    Because, clearly, they know so much about "aggressive further development on the Windows side".



  • Reply 6 of 44
    dfilerdfiler Posts: 3,420member
    Quicktime's legacy codebase is pretty convoluted and crusty at this point. But this mostly means that it is harder for apple to maintain. Developers building on top of quicktime have it pretty easy.



    It sounds like MediaComplete simply mismanaged their software development. They can't pull off text overlays on video? Nah, that's never been done before.
  • Reply 7 of 44
    kim kap solkim kap sol Posts: 2,987member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by dfiler

    Quicktime's legacy codebase is pretty convoluted and crusty at this point. But this mostly means that it is harder for apple to maintain. Developers building on top of quicktime have it pretty simple.



    It sounds like MediaComplete simply mismanaged their software development. They can't pull off text overlays on video?







    It's pretty sad really. To MediaComplete's total discredit, they mentioned OS X and QT being the source of their misery. I built in 10 seconds flat a window that displays QT movies and text right on top of it (granted the text isn't dynamically changing but this is a 10 second project containing zero lines of code.)



    I'll send my resume to MediaComplete...they should be impressed with what I've whipped up in mere seconds.
  • Reply 8 of 44
    dfilerdfiler Posts: 3,420member
    Granted, their problems more likely stem from the "on-the-fly video transitions". This still seems like MediaComplete's incompetance though. Plenty of other programs do exactly what they're describing as impossible.
  • Reply 9 of 44
    chuckerchucker Posts: 5,089member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by dfiler

    Plenty of other programs do exactly what they're describing as impossible.



    Not only that; they also do it at incredible speed. OS X's frameworks in this regard are significantly better than what Windows has to offer.



    Nothing they describe hasn't already been done.
  • Reply 10 of 44
    dfilerdfiler Posts: 3,420member
    Whew, talk about bad press.



    A few weeks from now, googling for their company/product will likely turn up threads like this.
  • Reply 11 of 44
    chuckerchucker Posts: 5,089member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by dfiler

    Whew, talk about bad press.



    A few weeks from now, googling for their company/product will likely turn up threads like this.



    They deserve no better. I have no respect for a company putting up such false claims. It seems clear that the true reason they gave up is that they weren't willing to pay decent engineers to begin with.
  • Reply 12 of 44
    a_greera_greer Posts: 4,594member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by aplnub

    [url]A few months into the development we discovered limitations in the Mac OS that would require extensive custom workarounds and high-end programming that our programmers could not provide.







    This is a really odd thing to say' they were building an app, not a quicktime extention/plugin, having "high level" people is just how the business works...and what exactly do they call hi-level about the programming that needs to be done? text over moving backgrounds is just a matter of having the text in its own layer with alphachannel over the motion graphic; hell, this could be done as an extention to quicktime; you have one pane of RTF files, a second pane of motion graphics and a preview window, then you throw the finished output out to the second display or an AJA card for projection or distribution...
  • Reply 13 of 44
    a_greera_greer Posts: 4,594member
    Upon further review; I have acctually seen the app in church, it is...awcword, the output isnt bad but it is just strange, you would think that a tool like this would allow you to have 2 or three things going at once and switch betwen them, like multicam in FCP or something, but NO, you cant even use the app to play video clips or DVDs back on the jumbo-screens, that has to be done in a seperate app or by switching to VTR/DVD player...



    It has been 2 years since I last tried so that may have changed but last I knew the windows version was a turd.
  • Reply 14 of 44
    cosmonutcosmonut Posts: 4,872member
    The little experience I've had with the program tells me that it's really pretty cool for praise music lyrics, announcements, notices, and so on. The interface on the software is really quite interesting because you can run a pre-made script, edit that script on the fly, pop up custom messages on the fly, and more...all the while throwing up various moving backgrounds. It's pretty slick, but I don't know enough about it to make any good guess as to what specific part they might have felt they had a hang-up with.



    It's too bad. A lot of churches have used it and liked it. I guess they'll have to stick with Windows.
  • Reply 15 of 44
    blue2kdaveblue2kdave Posts: 652member
    I am pretty sure this guy was at Cocoa Boot Camp last year with me. I am betting that they were frustrated by the lack of cocoa specific quicktime capabilities. I am guessing here, but don't think they wanted to get into raw QT programming.
  • Reply 16 of 44
    kim kap solkim kap sol Posts: 2,987member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by blue2kdave

    I am pretty sure this guy was at Cocoa Boot Camp last year with me. I am betting that they were frustrated by the lack of cocoa specific quicktime capabilities. I am guessing here, but don't think they wanted to get into raw QT programming.



    Jebus, did this guy expect the app to code itself.
  • Reply 17 of 44
    kickahakickaha Posts: 8,760member
    Too bad they didn't stick it out then, what with QTKit and all.



    And really... QuickTime is kinda grody, but it isn't *THAT* bad. I've had to deal with much worse.
  • Reply 18 of 44
    maimezvousmaimezvous Posts: 802member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Chucker

    Dear formerly potential customers,



    fuck you. We're incompetent and don't care for that to change.



    Yours sincerely,

    MediaComplete




    That is exactly what I was thinking as I read this letter.
  • Reply 19 of 44
    pbg4 dudepbg4 dude Posts: 1,611member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by maimezvous

    That is exactly what I was thinking as I read this letter.



    I was thinking something along the lines of "We asked Apple to code our application for us but they refused. Therefore you will not be getting a Mac version because we don't want to pay anyone to build it."
  • Reply 20 of 44
    frank777frank777 Posts: 5,839member
    I don't handle church presentations myself, but I do know that Media Shout was well regarded in the Worship space before this debacle.



    However, I've been to enough Christian music seminars/conferences to know that Christian musicians favour Macs by a wide margin.



    It's quite the opposite on the Pastor side, since Windows has more advanced bible study options than the Mac.



    If their claims are somehow true, my guess is that Apple knows whatever limitations were discussed and will update QT in the medium term. Then someone will write some cool code to challenge Media Shout and a whole bunch of Christian musicians will switch over.



    You will notice that they left the door wide open to re-enter the Mac market.

    They are aware that abandoning the market will entail serious risks.
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