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Technology Stocks : Macromedia...making a comeback? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: John Dowdell who wrote (2367)	11/5/1998 4:45:00 AM
From: VentureCap	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 2675

John, others John. Don't you work for Macromedia? I've seen your name on the Flash and Fireworks newsgroups forums with a Macromedia employee handle attached. And to the others. I will be bold when I need some answers. I still own Macromedia and things like this can cause concern if you don't ask questions to keep abreast. And John, my asking about you working for Macromedia is not meant to be negative. I think it is good, because perhaps you can answer some questions if you don't get into trouble. I assume you are not management but an employee in development, marketing, support or something? Not that you shouldn't be bullish on Macromedia. If I worked for them I would show my pride also and post my thoughts and answer questions to clarify and be bullish. If I didn't see it I would be concerned. So I have a few questions if you don't mind. How does QuickTime 3 and LiveStage or this interactive QuickTime stuff match up with Flash or Shockwave? Especially since I am hearing it is far beyond the current capabilities of what Flash can offer and very easy to use and it uses QuickTime 3 and the QT plug-in to play everywhere from the Web, in Word processors like MS Word, Adobe PDF files or anywhere a QT movie can be embedded or played back right now. I hear LiveStage can easily make all those QT movies hot and completely interactive. $$$ Training markets, advertising markets, education etc. And I hear it supports bitmap and vectors and has better compression than Flash? Does Flash work in Word and in Adobe's PDF or Acrobat Reader? Thats' becoming a very big standard for documents publishing. And what really has me concerned more than anything is what if THW does a deal with a competitor of Macromedia and is acquired in the next few months, just like Macromedia acquired Flash back in 1996 from FutureWave Sofware for $14,000 USD? How will this change things? Because the rumors are starting to fly about LiveStage and THW and they could be bought right now for about $8 million USD and they have 6 new tools, which is far more than what FutureWave offered Macromedia back in 1996. Sounds compelling enough for another player to consider? Maybe Macromedia can get there first? If Flash is just starting out as some have posted, then this could have an impact, because players don't really make money for Macromedia, the sales of the tools do. Or am I missing something? Millions of players mean nothing to sales if users aren't buying over 100,000 units of Flash in a year. Corel has a 2.000,000 or more installed base of CorelDraw and so does Adobe with Photoshop. So what is the installed base of Flash tools. Players meaning nothing, but can you give me the installed base of Flash users that have paid for it? Seems that Apple's QuickTime 3 is completely cross platform (Windows 95/98/NT) and it makes sense for many to start considering it because of the major API that QT 3 provides developers. The more developers, the more choice of tools. The more choice of tools, the more rich media content on the Web. And Apple supports QuickTime and the player, not these developers. Or are you telling me that Flash will satisfy everyone to create rich media which is coming into big demand? If so, then why have some many people called THW in the past 5 days to request to be seeded with LiveStage? I ask questions. That's what investors should do. I still own Macromedia, so don't get me wrong, but like anyone else, it is smart to hedge bets and diversify. That's why THW. They are small, but sometimes those are the ones to watch out for. Flash is a prime example of a technology being developed outside of Macromedia first. And everyone knows that Macromedia hasn't had to many tool developers (and I don't mean players companies like the browsers and AOL) but I mean other tool developers beating down Macromedia's door to start developing tools based on the Flash file format and technology to strengthen the Flash's technology standard adoption in the market. If there are others, I have not heard of them building any Flash type tools. Are there any??? I asked THW about why QT 3 and not the Flash? Since you have made available I thought that other developers would jumpo to it if it was such a hot standard??? When I asked management at THW today they said they spent considerable time considering the Flash technology and player to develop LiveStage, but QuickTime 3 was so much more robust for the feature set they had in mind and they also said that Apple encouraged them alot. I think Apple may have made it worth THW's time to develop this for QuickTime 3 to make sure that other developers could see what QuickTime 3 can do. THW has proven this with WebPainter 3 for Macintosh and now they will release WP3 for Windows in a few weeks, all based on QuickTime 3 for Windows. Well, what has made me more nervous today from an article that I read is that I am hearing that Apple will soon release their RTP (Realtime streaming Protocol) version of QT that will really shake the player market up and the LiveStage created movies are seamless to anything new that Apple creates. So instant compatibility with no future issues for THW to worry about. I asked THW to confrim this and they said they would not discuss the details of any confidential relationship they have with Apple with me or anyone else. Kind of makes me think they know something. I am sure happy I don't have any RealNetwork shares because if so, I think they are going to be the big losers if Apple does release this RTP QT soon. I just hope it won't hurt my Macromedia position. And I already know it will only help my THW position. But I own a sizeable position in Macromedia also. Any thoughts? And for all I know Macromedia is in tight enough with Apple that this RTP QuickTime will not effect them too much. But I know one thing. This LiveStage is really hot and neat and starting to get a ground swell just like Futurewave did back in 1996 before Macromedia acquired them. I learned that LiveStage has an english like extremely easy to use scripting architecture like Lingo which goes ten times beyond the present capabilities of Flash 3. An extensive feature set I here. THW will be bought out within 3 months. That's my prediction. Why was FutureWave bought by Macromedia? Well makes sense to me that a major player would jump on LiveStage and THW if they wanted to compete with Macromedia or already is a competitor. I guess I'll get blasted for this but I don't think all posts should be just rah! rah! rah! Cold hard facts backed up give me more comfort.