I think Steve makes a very good point. Everyone's so cynical these days
that we tend to think that of all the reasons for something happening,
whatever's in the press release can't possibly be it. We read that the
reasons for the 'merger' (yes, I think that's the wrong word but kinder to
slow-thinking employees of the aquired company) are to complement and
stengthen both organisations and product lines, and we immediately think
the 'real reason' must be something else -to kill off Allaire perhaps or
to wipe out Cold Fusion.
Folks, it just might be that the reason Macromedia bought Allaire was:
(a) it saw it had gaps in its product line and Allaire's products filled
those holes
(b) Allaire had plenty of great developers with skills and knowledge to
complement Macromedia's own
(c) Jeremy Allaire was ready to cash up his paper profits, bank some of
his money and ease up a little in life. He wouldn't be the first by a
long shot. (Where are the developers of Netscape and ICQ these days?)
I had a long time of living in a struggling high-tech company in the 80s
and early 90s - we were taken over, nearly went into bankruptcy, sold off,
restructured a half-dozen times. It got so people would quake in fear
every time anyone called a meeting. We couldn't even have a meeting
about where to hold the Christmas party without people going into huddles
and looking for possible ulterior motives. (They're going to sack us all
at the Christmas party so they wont have to pay us the holiday pay!)
One think I learnt from that horrible period is for most changes, there
are winners and losers. Which you are, often depends on your attitude.
And almost always, the wins arent as big as the winners thought they were
going to be, and the losses arent as dire as the losers expected. Because
people quickly adapt.
So too, this change is going to affect us. There will be changes in
direction. This might be good or not, depending on how we all look at the
changes. But basically, life will continue, people will continue to need
new web sites, and improve older ones. And there are opportunities far
greater than we can ever take hold of in our lifetimes.
Lets see what happens. Macromedia have spent a hell of a lot of money if
they don't want to build on Allaire's strengths.
Cheers,
Mike Kear
Windsor, NSW, Australia,
AFP WebWorks.
On Wed, 17 Jan 2001, Steve Drucker wrote:
> I think you guys are way off-base with your comments about Macromedia's
> acquisition of Allaire. Having worked very closely with both companies
> directly on joint technology initiatives (Harpoon), fused their products
> together for consulting projects (intranet for T-Rowe Price using CF,
> Spectra, Flash, Generator), and developed much of their training course
> materials (Flash, Generator, Spectra) there's no question that the joining
> of these two great companies will result in a web solutions vendor
> powerhouse.
>
> Will Macromedia kill off CF? Of course not! Consider the following:
>
> -Macromedia spent a great deal of effort developing visual tools for CF
> (Dreamweaver UltraDev)
> -Macromedia currently has a hole in their lineup for an application
> server--filled nicely by CF
> -Their flagship server product, Macromedia Generator, currently relies on
> Allaire's JRUN
> -Both Allaire and Macromedia have made a considerable investment in the
> Harpoon initiative demonstrating how to link CF and Flash
> -Macromedia earlier acquired the LikeMinds personalization system to fill
> out their E-Business platform -- to which they can now add Open-Sesame and
> add direct hooks to their new app server -- CF!
>
> CF isn't going away -- in fact, with the added resources of Macromedia, I
> expect a totally killer integrated e-business development platform is in our
> not-so-distant future.
>
> Regards,
> Steve Drucker
> CEO
> Fig Leaf Software
> http://www.figleaf.com
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: JayB [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> Sent: Wednesday, January 17, 2001 11:09 AM
> To: CF-Talk
> Subject: Re: Negative Thoughts
>
>
> At 06:01 PM 1/16/2001 -0800, you wrote:
> >The plan Allaire drew up for CF>5 may not mean anything anymore.
>
> From what I had been hearing on the beta forums, I had thought that 5 was
> well under development (isn't release planned for fall 2001?) Would MM kill
> something that is so close to release (relatively speaking...) since 6 is
> just vaporware right now no?
>
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