I've been through dozens of upheavals like this over the years - starting with Impact Systems going belly up after the sharemarket crash in the late 80s and taking 4 months of my sales commission with it, and continuing regularly through takeovers, restructures, management changes, marketing realignments and downsizing.
There are some common threads. The initial reaction of most people is "OH NO!! BAD NEWS!" because the familiar world is being turned upside down, by forces that are outside their control. Then once the initial panic subsides it's usually clear there are some benefits and some downside aspects. In my experience, the people who come out of these things on top are usually the ones who grab onto the benefits and make the most of them. The same applies to us here. This can be seen as a bad thing if you look at it one way or a terrific thing if you look at it another way, as many have said. For those who, like me, panicked initially, think about this ... if the worst happened and the next announcement from Adobe was that ColdFusion was not part of their core plan, what would happen? For a start, nothing. We'd all keep on using and developing ColdFusion. All the web owners currently using ColdFusion would continue using ColdFusion, at least for the time being. There would be no new development in ColdFusion but CFMX7 would most likely continue to be available. We wouldn't feel any impact on this for months, perhaps even years. So the WORST that can happen from this is that we get some time to reorganise our lives. More likely, even if Adobe didnt want to be in the server business, is that they'd look to sell off ColdFusion to someone who DID want to be in the server busines, or who already was in the server business. And another scenario is terrific for us, as many have outlined. Adobe sees ColdFusion as a way to expand their position in the graphics/web development market and pour some serious marketing and R&D money into it. That would be terrific news for us. So the worst case is not all that bad really for us as developers, and the best case is like opening the door to a gazillion new opportunities. I had a moments panic last night when I learned of the takeover (it's not a merger, despite what their announcements say - it's a takeover and it'll be called Adobe) but a night's sleep and a more rational look at it this morning fills me with optimism about it all. BRING IT ON!! Cheers Mike Kear Windsor, NSW, Australia Certified Advanced ColdFusion Developer AFP Webworks http://afpwebworks.com ColdFusion, PHP, ASP, ASP.NET hosting from AUD$15/month --- You are currently subscribed to cfaussie as: [email protected] To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Aussie Macromedia Developers: http://lists.daemon.com.au/
