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Microsoft The Internet

Microsoft / Adobe Competition Heating Up 219

Posted by kdawson from the ding-dong-front-page-is-dead dept.
MicroAdobe writes "Microsoft has noticed that some of the coolest sites on the Web, YouTube and MySpace included, get much of their flash from Flash and other design programs sold by Adobe. But as Microsoft gets ready to ship its own line of tools for designers and Web developers, the company is finding it must also defend against Adobe on its home turf, the desktop. At the same time, the line between Internet and desktop programs is blurring, and both companies see an opportunity to capture new business." The article focuses on the competition and doesn't even mention that Adobe's CEO called Microsoft a $50 billion monopolist.
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Microsoft / Adobe Competition Heating Up More

Microsoft / Adobe Competition Heating Up

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  • Id rather set up shop for doing development business for 386DX33 webservers than jump ship on any web related stuff microsoft puts out.

    so many times we are having to bail out refugee clients running away from microsoft stuff on the web that its not funny anymore. (i wont mention names)

    i wouldnt want to imagine a beowulf cluster of what microsoft would put out. and i dont want to be in an "in a microsoft internet microsoft DEVELOPS YOU !" situation.

    so count me any many devs out.

    • Re:Web developer speaking here (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Richard_at_work ( 517087 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @02:40PM (#18772009)
      Im also a web developer, and I *always* wait to experience a product, any product, by any developer, regardless of their prior history before I form any opinion on the product - sometimes its best to put the rhetoric away and join the adult world, especially when it comes to earning money.

      • Cant take risks here (Score:3, Informative)

        by unity100 ( 970058 )
        Unfortunately.

        this is a matter of business.

        setting up a client in a framework/infrastructure means this client will be doing all his/her/their business on that framework/infrastructure, building and expanding on that, adapting to that, basically living on that.

        and when the company that provides that platform pulls the plug or pulls a crap with that platform's users, client and his business is in trouble. this had happened before with many "new experiences and products", and many people had gone thr

        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by Richard_at_work ( 517087 )
          Yes, this most certainly is a matter of business, and if the Microsoft product does it better after I personally assess it to my clients criteria then Im going to use that to earn my money - Im not going to pass up on the chance to earn money because I dont like the company.

          All business is risk, every moment of it for both you and your client, regardless of the product you use to construct their solution. To automatically dismiss a product on any grounds is stupid, but to dismiss a product after you hav
          • we are not talking about "one needs to take risks in business" situation, which is kinda like going ipo and investing.

            this is a matter of reliability. especially businesses thriving on the web have their lifeline in their web presence. risking that is a no-enterpreneurship situation.

            and to clarify - we are not dismissing a product - we are dismissing a company, based on their prior record.

            would you go buy from the same department store if the department store continually screwed you over ?
            • Absolutely nothing triggers an out of hand dismissal.

              Its as simple as that - every single option is kept open. If you dont like it, then thats your perogative, but all it means is Im less handicapped than you are in choosing a solution.
              • its about living life to the fullest, you can take risks and "try out new things".

                you cant throw small businesses or heck, even million dollar enterprises at risk for "trying out new stuff" "just not to be prejudice-driven".

                still you are talking as if this is not microsoft but some other company. microsoft is famous for screwing up whoever it works with, be it partner or communities. remember novell deal, remember linux ? see how microsoft forces (from their point of view) gamer crowd to upgrade to v

                • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

                  by jericsmith ( 998479 )
                  I've read this thread, and it is obvious to me that unity is simply on an anti-MS rant. MS has the most attacked platform/products on the market because they are easy to hate. A monkey could realize what that means in terms of perceived reliability. The fact remains Microsoft has great products and well documented support compared to most other alternatives. MS certainly doesn't hold the monopoly on bad business ethics. Please, stop following your open source idols and go make some money.

                • You guys are funny, here's my analogy.

                  If someone pays me to build them a house out of shit, then sure for the right price yea I'll do it.

                  But, once I have my new found shitbuilder skills I'm not really going to go advertising it in the paper, unless shithouses (ignore the pun) are popular. For that matter I'm not going to invest in shitbuilder tools unless I specifically get a job working with shit.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by hpavc ( 129350 )
        There is no need to determine if Hitler was potentially a valuable artist, while knowing he is an abhorant monster. Likewise there is no need to 'wonder' if Microsoft isn't going to folly their way into the document market with their format. You could host a slash dot with all the flawed by design implementations of products and standards.

        Yes, pushing the monopolist's swill can be profitable. Your attachment to reaping the rewards of what is more and more like illegal activities is not so admirable.
      • Of course, the flip side to that is that no product stands alone -- part of your assessment of a product has to include the nature of the producer.

        In the short-term, your client's need may be best fulfilled by a Microsoft product. In the long-term, you may be hampering your client by supporting a company that destroys competitive processes.

        The question is, do you (and your clients) consider the long-term non-obvious implications of choosing to use a Microsoft solution? The most common example I can thin

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by lawpoop ( 604919 )
        "sometimes its best to put the rhetoric away and join the adult world, especially when it comes to earning money."

        Your adult world sounds somewhat naive to me.

        My time is valuable. If someone has a bad track record, I will wait for other people to try out their stuff, and let word get back to me, before I waste my time on someone who has burned me in the past. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.

      • I'm a general IT guy who's occasionally had to do some web work-- does that count?

        Anyway, I always like to keep an open mind and evaluate each product without prejudice. However, when it comes to making a business decision, I absolutely do look at the business practices of the developers.

        Before I start investing in any kind of format or platform, I ask myself questions like:

        • Do I think this [format|platform] will exist in 2 years?
        • Will it be stable enough during those two years that my early work will t

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by aztracker1 ( 702135 )
        I feel the same way.. as much as I absolutely hate the crap that MS is doing politically (re ODF, and Vista), but bust say a lot of their web development tools are really nice. The MS Expression Web Developer, or whatever it is called, is IMHO nicer, and easier to use than Dreamweaver is... though, to be honest, I don't use either, but when making recommendations lately, I usually suggest that people try both out, and decide for themselves.

        I am really hopeful that within the next year, someone creates a

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by morcego ( 260031 )

        regardless of their prior history before I form any opinion on the product

        Does the phrase Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it" [wikipedia.org] mean anything to you ?

      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by mstahl ( 701501 )

        Now hold it down just a minute over there. Join the adult world? Calm down.

        I'm a web designer, photographer and illustrator/graphic artist, and I've been using Macromedia and/or Adobe products of various types since I was in high school ten years ago. They're intuitive, effective, and more importantly than either of those I know how to use them. The key combinations in Adobe Illustrator are the same as in Adobe Photoshop are the same as the ones in Macromedia Fireworks, and I can do them all in my sleep.

        N

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Sciros ( 986030 )
      I've been using Photoshop since 1997, and I'm glad there's a possibility that a new graphics tool will push Adobe to improve their product further rather than just add marginally useful functionality every couple of years. Competition can be a good thing.

      It will take an awful lot to get designers to leave Adobe in favor of Microsoft. Hardly any will, as they don't personally have to pay for it and if they can state a business case to their employers to keep paying for Adobe (which will be easy) then the pri

      • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

        by Tatsh ( 893946 )
        Plus, and this is a different topic, Adobe doesn't get on kids' cases about having pirated copies of their software, since it's only affordable by industry (who pays for it) anyway. Yes, they do. Photoshop starting with CS had product activation, which is cracked by the release groups, but it's much more than before where it didn't verify at all whether a serial number was real.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Sciros ( 986030 )
          Ah, that may be. I haven't seen the latest pirated stuff and I pay zero attention to most installs haha... but in any case I don't see folks getting too *bothered* by Adobe over pirated products. Perhaps the luxury of a monopoly kept them only mildly interested in the whole affair... I am curious to see if their policies become more anti-piracy now.
      • While I agree that some Photoshop competition will be good, Microsoft will have to do more than what they usually do with software. As in, they'll have to release it for Mac OS X as well.

        Which is what really makes me wonder about Microsoft's track record, considering they've been quite happy with discontinuing past products of theirs such as Windows Media Player and Internet Explorer, two apps that are the basis for most of Microsoft's format lock-in on the web. I don't think Adobe has much to worry ab
    • I have to say I'm scared to use Microsofts web tools after seeing what Frontpage did to web building, but at the same time, the article mentions that Microsofts new tools will meet industry standards and not try to throw in their own codes.

      I'm also intrigued to see if they can keep up with Adobe in the web world. Adobe's got such a brand name that people call photo editing "photoshopping".

  • Ack! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Penguinisto ( 415985 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @02:08PM (#18771503) Journal
    Great... just great. Now there's TWO variants of flashing crap that I have to filter out of my browser.

    On the plus side, if the MSFT version is Windows-only, I suspect we'll all have a brand new reason to persuade folks to abandon the OS for Linux/OSX/(and yes)*BSD after this little battle gets done...

    /P

    • Re:Ack! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by CastrTroy ( 595695 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @02:32PM (#18771863)
      No, it gives whiners another reason to say, Linux can't do X, so I'm not switching. It can be added to the list with Photoshop,Games, and a thousand other things. There will be some funny cartoon, or some video website that uses this, so they can say that it's a deficiency in Linux, not an advantage.

    • Re:Ack! (Score:5, Informative)

      by the linux geek ( 799780 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @02:44PM (#18772063)
      It is actually cross-platform. WPF/E or Silverlight, as it is now called, supports both Linux and Mac OS systems.
    • Great... just great. Now there's TWO variants of flashing crap that I have to filter out of my browser.

      Here's a cool trick, don't install it...

      (Didn't this use to be a site for knowledgable nerds?)

  • Compatability (Score:5, Interesting)

    by digitalunity ( 19107 ) <digitalunityNO@SPAMyahoo.com> on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @02:08PM (#18771509) Homepage
    Adobe's CEO brought up what should be the single most important point everyone who is considering a switch to MS products - <b>Microsoft doesn't maintain anything cross-platform</b>.<br><br>
    They may start out cross-platform, but eventually the mac version will fall behind on patches and then get EOL'd.<br><br>

    For any broadcaster that relies on compatibility and reaching the widest market possible, MS would be a bad choice.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by LWATCDR ( 28044 )
      Adobe is better than Microsoft but can you say SVG? If Adobe really means that it is going to provide cross platform support how about Photoshop for Linux?
      The are doing better with Flash now so I can not flame them too much.
    • Oh how true. I also suspect that it will be the same not only for Mac, but also the Firefox version that will fall behind. With the increasing number of people on Firefox, how many people will want to use Microsoft's solution. However, I don't think that a lot of people using flash realize that not everyone is seeing their content. I've heard estimates that as many as 1/3 of users don't have flash installed. Once MS comes out with it's release, I can see them putting it out as a critical update, ensuri

      • Re:Compatability (Score:5, Insightful)

        by fyngyrz ( 762201 ) * on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @02:32PM (#18771861) Homepage Journal
        I've heard estimates that as many as 1/3 of users don't have flash installed.

        And of those of us who do have it installed, some have it disabled 99% of the time. Flash (and most uses of every other active page technology, frankly) = really, really annoying.

        The good news is that the really high quality browsers - like OmniWeb - allow you to globally filter out all such crapola, making exceptions on a per-site basis as you feel appropriate, or vice-versa. So you never have to be stuck looking at some menu-infested, roll-over ridden, animated advertising nightmare.

        And as for scripting - I'll be the one who determines if a website is allowed to use my CPU.

        • The good news is that the really high quality browsers - like OmniWeb - allow you to globally filter out all such crapola, making exceptions on a per-site basis as you feel appropriate, or vice-versa.

          As does the Flashblock [mozilla.org] extension for Firefox.

        • Re:Compatability (Score:4, Funny)

          by kjart ( 941720 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @03:16PM (#18772529)

          The good news is that the really high quality browsers - like OmniWeb - allow you to globally filter out all such crapola, making exceptions on a per-site basis as you feel appropriate, or vice-versa. So you never have to be stuck looking at some menu-infested, roll-over ridden, animated advertising nightmare.

          You paid for a browser? What is this, 1996? o_O

          • Re:Compatability (Score:4, Funny)

            by rishistar ( 662278 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @05:17PM (#18774573) Homepage
            Those crazy Mac users will pay for anything! Just because they can!

          • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

            by fyngyrz ( 762201 ) *

            You paid for a browser?

            Sure. I have absolutely no resistance to paying for software (especially $15 software) that offers me something I will actually use. I like Firefox, and Safari is OK if a bit dull, but frankly, OmniWeb has a far superior tab model for the way I work and think, as well as other built-in capabilities I don't have to go and hunt down. It just works, and better yet, it just works the way I like it to work.

            I have OmniOutliner too — truly great software. Worth every penny.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by jabuzz ( 182671 )
        Well the reports that I have read put Flash penetration at between 90% and 96% of all internet connected computers depending on region.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by thsths ( 31372 )
      > Microsoft doesn't maintain anything cross-platform.

      True, but Adobe does not exactly have a perfect record either. Flash 8 and 9 where not available for Linux, and even Flash 9 Update has no plugin for a pure64 system. Way to go, Adobe.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by dabraun ( 626287 )

        True, but Adobe does not exactly have a perfect record either. Flash 8 and 9 where not available for Linux, and even Flash 9 Update has no plugin for a pure64 system. Way to go, Adobe.


        There isn't even a 64-bit version of Flash for Windows ...

    • Re:Compatability (Score:5, Informative)

      by vought ( 160908 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @03:04PM (#18772349)
      About Microsoft: They may start out cross-platform, but eventually the mac version will fall behind on patches and then get EOL'd.

      Oh, just like Framemaker.

      And Premier. ...and lots of other apps Adobe used to develop for the Mac.

      And look at where Photoshop is going...an interface mess that's more Windows-on-MacOS than a Mac application.

      Adobe has steadily been losing my respect for years. Perhaps it's because they seem bent on becoming the Microsoft of creativity-based visual communications software.
      • Not saying that Adobe is saintly, but they are bringing back Premiere for OS X this year, actually.

        Adobe's problem in the past few years, in my opinion, is that they have changed their model of a company that creates a few graphics and publishing apps to a company that creates the Adobe Suite. While that means there's more interoperability between those applications, it also means that updates are drastically delayed and features are pushed off until the next big release. Even bugfixes are pushed off.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by notaprguy ( 906128 ) *
      Ummmm....how about Mac Office...the single most successful Mac application ever? In many ways it is better than Office for Windows. But really that's beside the point. Adobe is smart enough to know that for WPF/e/Silverlight to be successful that it MUST be good on platforms other than Windows or nobody will use it. I mean, the whole poing of what they're trying to do is provide an alternative to Flash video (short-term) and Flash "apps" (medium-term). The only way they can do that is to be cross-platform.

  • Spreading thin (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Shnyzx ( 786435 )
    I don't know about this move for M$. They are spreading themselves thin trying to conquer every electronic related market (zune, 360, computers, etc..). Flash is a well established format that many people are accustomed to using and familiar with. Unless M$ has an awesome solution at hand already I believe that they should consolidate their efforts and try to make some headway one their other fronts instead of moving focus from failing efforts.

    • I don't know about this move for M$. They are spreading themselves thin trying to conquer every electronic related market (zune, 360, computers, etc..). Flash is a well established format that many people are accustomed to using and familiar with. Unless M$ has an awesome solution at hand already I believe that they should consolidate their efforts and try to make some headway one their other fronts instead of moving focus from failing efforts.

      Who cares, I say yeah it's bad in terms of a business move for

  • So what is .net? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by 140Mandak262Jamuna ( 970587 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @02:09PM (#18771529) Journal
    "Microsoft can afford to think in a 10-year timeframe," said Rob Helm, research director at Directions on Microsoft, an independent research group. "When you've got a business like Windows that has 80 percent margins and 90-plus percent market share, even a 10-year threat to shave 10 percent off the business is enough to do something about now."

    Did not MSFT claim that it is going to make web app building the main thing? Its MS Visual Studio was morphed into something called MS .NET framework or something? C# and managed C, and ASP server working seamlessly with IE to deliver web applications or some such claim was made?

    How many Web Enabling technologies MSFT has peddled so far? DotNetFramework? ActiveX? some dhtml thingie? The new one is going to replace them? Complement them?

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by Mongoose Disciple ( 722373 )
      Basically, this is over in a completely different space. Apples and oranges. Although, technically WPF is part of .NET 3.0.

      If C#/.NET is Microsoft's answer to Java, this is their answer to stuff like Flash.

      I mean, sure, you could use Flash to essentially build web forms or basic UI. We've all seen that done, and in that sense you could say WPF/Silverlight/etc. overlaps with the kind of UI you could build with C# web controls or Java Swing or whatever, but it's not what Flash is really for. This is MS tr

  • Monopolist, that's rich (Score:5, Insightful)

    by dedazo ( 737510 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @02:09PM (#18771533) Journal
    Coming from the guy who destroyed the graphics design market first by gobbling up Aldus and all the rest, and then bottled up the active content delivery space with Macromedia and proceeded to kill of his "complimentary product lines", that's rich.

    He might be a smaller "monopolist" than Microsoft, but he still has his own little monopoly and all the great things [daringfireball.net] that come from that.

    • Even so, I don't believe Adobe has been convicted of (or charged with) illegally abusing their monopoly.
      Microsoft has.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by dedazo ( 737510 )
        I'm sure that's a great relief to users of software gobbled up by Adobe and then promptly "discontinued" due to "overlap".

      • Re: Monopolists (Score:5, Interesting)

        by owlnation ( 858981 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @02:29PM (#18771817)

        Even so, I don't believe Adobe has been convicted of (or charged with) illegally abusing their monopoly.
        While that's true... Ask an Adobe customer whether they feel they be charged for Adobe abusing their monopoly and you'll get an affirmative answer.

        It's about to get worse with CS3 too, it's split into Vista style packages so now you have to really pay a lot of money to get the programs you need to do business as a professional in the creative industry.

        Probably the only exception to this is Premiere, cos few - if any - professionals use that. Otherwise, there's absolutely no alternative to Adobe products. (Yes, technically GIMP etc exists, but they aren't industry standard so professionals have no chance of using them.)

        80% of my work is done on Adobe products and I really would like to change that.
        • Hmm.. no alternatives? I guess you are correct, nothing compares to say Photoshop [paintshoppro.com], or even InDesign [inkscape.org] ... I mean, not even anyone to compete with Premiere [pinnaclesys.com]. (sigh) If only there were somewhere [sourceforge.net] to find some options to compete with all these Adobe monopoly products...
    • Rich? On the contrary, that seems like the best expert we have on the subject of who is really a monopolist...
    • The scary thing is that I've gotten really good at writing drivel like this. It's nice to see that some people can still correctly translate it.

  • core competences... (Score:3, Funny)

    by cosmocain ( 1060326 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @02:10PM (#18771541)
    ...there was an OS.
    then there was an office-packet.
    eh, it's great to have a server-os, so let's build on. it's really handy with all those nice folks already using our desktop-os.
    uuuuh, some guys are makin' big bucks with a search engine, let's have one.
    hey, gaming. GAMING is the next BIGBIGBIG issue. what about a gaming console?
    see those fruity mediaplayer-guys? they are making big bucks! let's build a rip-off.
    ha, those adobe-guys seem to live from their software. why not try that one, too?

    i think there's a pattern there, but i can't fully grasp it. duh...

  • Interested... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Drew McKinney ( 1075313 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @02:14PM (#18771603) Journal
    Great, it's $600 cheaper, but nobody will buy it if it doesn't bring anything new to the table.

    As someone who has worked with Flash since version 4 (in both a graphical and RIA capacity), the biggest stumbling blocks for Flash were/are:
    1- Adobe Photoshop integration [*check!*]

    2- Usefulness as a RIA application [remember the disaster that was Flash Googlemaps?]
    3- Horribly broken scripting language [still an issue]


    If Microsoft can compete on those points and bring something radically new to the table (say, easy 3D graphical development, quality OO scripting, etc) then they'll have an adoptable product. Otherwise, developers used to using Adobe & Flash products will look the other way.
    • What about your "almost a decade" experience. I know you wouldn't be starting from scratch, but you've had a couple years to get into MX and that came with some background, right?

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by $RANDOMLUSER ( 804576 )

      3- Horribly broken scripting language [still an issue]
      Didja ever notice how much it [amazon.com] looks like a Goa'uld [wikipedia.org]???
    • Plus Adobe can just release a free, open source flash generation package. Why waste time and money competing against MS when they can dominate the market for free? Of course Adobe doesn't make a lot by giving away the s/w, but there is always a market for support and enhanced versions. Once open flash is established, Adobe can then concentrate on something new.

  • BTW (Score:5, Interesting)

    by frakir ( 760204 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @02:20PM (#18771689)
    Microsoft announced yesterday its "Silverlight", previously named WPF/E:
    http://blogs.msdn.com/tims/archive/2007/04/15/intr oducing-microsoft-silverlight.aspx [msdn.com].
    They call it "cross platform, cross browser plug-in" and it is basically a replacement for flash with wmv lock-in. Oh, and no linux (cross platform means XP+Vista+OSX, I guess)
    One nice feature being HD streaming, I have to give it to them.

    I'll still stay away...

  • This is an important new battleground (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Serveert ( 102805 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @02:21PM (#18771713)
    Microsoft views new rich web apps as a threat to Microsoft dominance. Imagine a world where you use a functional web application that doesn't lock you down to Microsoft's .NET / windows OS. Right now people must use a win32 executable for a decent GUI experience, but with these new technologies, you need only to click a link.

    Microsoft wants to lock this up and make this a .NET / non-linux world, adobe is more interested in truly cross-platform work, so MS is acting quickly to make sure we use their XAML, vs the XUL and the open standard SVG. Adobe, too, isn't thrilled about open standards.

    I think the closest thing we have to a great dev environment+rich web app is Google's GWT. It makes GUI and server integration easy. This makes Microsoft scared. I would love to see more open standards in this respect.. Make XUL a standard, create a library, add it to all browsers, all platforms, same with SVG.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by nine-times ( 778537 )

      The fight between Adobe and Microsoft is, in and of itself, an important battle. Adobe has a lot of control over an entire sector of applications that Microsoft has not been able to control: media software. When it comes to digital print design, Adobe is king. When it comes to Web, Adobe and Macromedia were fighting it out until Adobe bought Macromedia-- now Adobe is the undisputed champion. In video editing, it's pretty much all Adobe, Apple, or Avid.

      Microsoft hasn't really been able to break into any

  • One of MS's talking points was that there's nothing binary or proprietary: it's all plain text XML. That might be slightly easier to work with than binary flash files -- but it also makes work easier for visitors to "borrow." Decompiling even protected flash files isn't hard either, but it's enough to slow down casual moochers and stop most corporate ones.

    Of course, it's kind of silly to brag about openness when the whole thing is based on a closed source plugin. My big problem with the whole thing is that
  • Situations like this point out how stupid Microsoft can be. Adobe already has the web development market locked down. There isn't any room for Microsoft to wiggle in there. Microsoft expecting web developers to adopt their products is naive on the level of OO.o supporters expecting people to dump Office.
    • Except the price for the ms products isn't zero. MS has to provide a compelling reason to switch, selling a product thats a couple hundred less won't do it. You're still risking a couple hundred dollars on an unproven technology that won't be compatible with anything for a couple years, and might not be supported long term. Now if it was free, and open source, those concerns wouldn't be there.
      • an unproven technology that won't be compatible with anything for a couple years, and might not be supported long term

        Any free and/or open source product would still have to get past that rather more significant stumbling block - else Microsoft would now be in deep shit instead of still fabulously successful.

  • Competition is good. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by MaWeiTao ( 908546 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @02:35PM (#18771915)
    I find it funny that Adobe's CEO has the gall to call Microsoft monopolistic considering that Adobe essentially has a complete monopoly over the design industry. Microsoft's control over the PC market pales in comparison to Adobe's control of the design industry, the obvious distinction being that Microsoft's market is much larger.

    I welcome the competition and although I'm not optimistic I would like to see Microsoft become a serious competitor in this market. I'd prefer it were someone else entering this market, I can't say I'm looking forward to bloated applications with cumbersome interfaces. Nevertheless it's been long overdo that something take Adobe down a few notches.

    I'm sure Adobe's CEO is only upset that Adobe's purchase of Macromedia didn't ensure a complete lack of competition for a longer period of time.
  • Or did they "borrow" the flat black look from Apple's Pro tools suites? Hmmmm...

  • On another front (Score:3, Interesting)

    by backbyter ( 896397 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @02:38PM (#18771975)
    http://www.openlaszlo.org/ [openlaszlo.org]

    Uses XML/Javascript to drive either Flash or DHTML.

    Some of their examples are pretty good, while other examples could have used a QA person.

  • As some of you may have noticed, Adobe has discontinued its SVG Viewer [adobe.com], and they suggest using Flash as its replacement for web authoring. The Adobe viewer is the only way to show SVG content in Internet Explorer (that I'm aware of). If IE can't show SVG content, then SVG is effectively dead as a useable format on the web. And that would be a sad state of affairs.

    So what I'm hoping is that Microsoft will see fit to support SVG natively in IE. That would be a good thing, even if the reason they do it is jus

    • Re: SVG (Score:4, Informative)

      by drinkypoo ( 153816 ) <drink@hyperlogos.org> on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @03:07PM (#18772397) Homepage Journal

      The Adobe viewer is the only way to show SVG content in Internet Explorer (that I'm aware of).

      A quick google for "SVG plugin internet explorer -adobe" turned up MozzIE [sourceforge.net] (hackish) and Renesis Player [emiasys.com] which is cross-platform for "Windows, Windows CE, Linux, Mac and more".

      You haven't tried very hard to find an alternative, have you?

    • So what I'm hoping is that Microsoft will see fit to support SVG natively in IE.

      I strongly suspect that pigs will fly out of my ass before MS supports SVG in anything. The lack of any vector graphics standards other than EMF in MS products is a key to their vendor lock-in strategy. As an example, the company that I work for needs to supply reports and documents to the federal government for various contracts. Our customers expect Word and PowerPoint documents. Much of our data is best represented in vector graphic format. The only choice is EMF.

      Oh, and one more thing...there is no "

  • The real question is... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Eric Damron ( 553630 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @02:49PM (#18772139)
    How does Microsoft leverage their monopolies to take control of the situation? Should they incorporate it directly into their operating system and browser or as a free addon to their office product?

    Maybe they could tweak IIS so that it slows Flash down while optimizing the speed of their products?

    So many dirty tricks and so little time...
  • I think it's odd that Adobe is responding they way they are to Microsoft's announcements. Wouldn't the leader in the category be better off keeping quiet, ignoring the guy who is barely in the game if at all? I blogged on this more at http://notaprguy.wordpress.com/2007/04/17/my-flas h -is-bigger-than-your-silverlight-or-my-acronym-is- better-than-your-acronym/ [wordpress.com]

    • Wouldn't the leader in the category be better off keeping quiet, ignoring the guy who is barely in the game if at all?

      Adobe and Microsoft are now in a battle for the very small brains of PHBs everywhere. Microsoft has instant credibility with these people because they are stupid and the argument "if it wasn't the best, people wouldn't be using it!" makes sense to them. Adobe needs to discredit Microsoft now to kill the buzz before it starts if they want to really nip this thing in the bud.

      • Sorry, PHBs? Pin-headed... Adobe is not going to "nip this ting in the bud" no matter what they do. MSFT rarely gives up. They'll keep trying and trying and trying.Ignoring them now will slow their growth. Talking about them doesn't.
      • Different PHB's, different market, Adobe has the credibility, not MS.

        • Different PHB's, different market, Adobe has the credibility, not MS.

          I disagree. Adobe fears the PHBs at the top, who can tell the PHBs in charge of selecting technology what to do.

          Microsoft has more credibility among PHBs overall than Adobe, because they are even more the "big swinging dick".

  • Linux support must be getting too good (Score:4, Informative)

    by also-rr ( 980579 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @03:00PM (#18772291) Homepage
    I remain convinced that part of the reason that Microsoft is attempting to push it's own alternative to Flash is because Linux support is finally decent.

    Not only is there the binary client but some of the free alternatives can now handle YouTube. Development was getting a little closer to cross platform content and entertainment that the internet promised rather than the platform locking that was looking likely at one point.

    Anyway I installed swfdec today on a PPC machine and documented the steps [revis.co.uk]. The results are very good for an application in such an early stage of development. While you might think the internet *with* Flash is annoying, you try living without it for a while and see how much the Firefox "you need more plugins to view this page" bar bugs you.

  • SMIL? (Score:2)

    by cxreg ( 44671 )
    What ever happend to SMIL? Seems like the best possible solution in this space, I can't understand why the ball has been dropped.
  • The article focuses on the competition and doesn't even mention that Adobe's CEO called Microsoft a $50 billion monopolist.

    But does he really mean it? After all, one of the stupidest business models ever is to go up against an entrenched monopolist on their own turf.

  • The article focuses on the competition and doesn't even mention that Adobe's CEO called Microsoft a $50 billion monopolist.
    So why does your company steadfastly refuse to develop a lot of software for platforms other than Windows, and refuse to get involved in their development?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by norkakn ( 102380 )
      They are pretty good about supporting OSX. By pretty good I mean that their products are just as shitty here, but they bought all of the competition, so we deal.
  • >The article focuses on the competition and doesn't even mention that Adobe's CEO called Microsoft a $50 billion monopolist.

    Adobe's CEO got it wrong. Looks like MSFT's current market cap is over 282 billion [yahoo.com] so aren't they a $282 billion monopolist?

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