Re: Mac Frame users: OSX

["Thomas Michanek" <thomas.michanek@xxxxxxxxx>]

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From: "David Cramer" <dacramer@home.com>
> I will be holding off before upgrading to Mac OSX primarily because 
> of Adobe's apparent lack of interest in investing in OSX development. 
> I know that Adobe is heavily controlled by its marketing surveys. My 
> concerns over the last few years have been that their surveys seem to 
> have no awareness that the future will be different from the present. 
> I'd like to see some more enlightened forecasting rolled into the 
> surveys. It's the lack of forecasting that has cancelled FrameMaker 
> for Linux and is pooh-poohing Mac OSX development.

I don't know much about Adobe's marketing surveys, but I share the same
conclusion you make. Adobe has developed from a company largely based
on visions of the future, to a company nearly completely controlled by
short-sighted profit. To invest time, money and knowledge into areas
that have a potential to be successful and profitable in a few years
time is no longer the company's greatest strength.

You cannot simply sit around and wait for new technologies, markets or
operating systems to become profitable before you take action. As you
say, Adobe seems to "get it" in a few areas such as electronic document
formats, but unfortunately not in areas dealing with (non-Windows)
operating systems.

> Besides that, I don't think Adobe fully realizes how effective they 
> are as agents of change. 

This is the very essence of my own point of view. By actively promoting
and giving positive signs of interest in a "market", Adobe can influence
its future development and thereby help giving them return of investment.
Taking the release cycle of FM into account, one has to be able to either
correctly forecast what will be profitable a couple of years ahead, or
sit down and look at emerging technologies, software, operating systems,
etc. from more angles than current profitability and then invest into
these areas.

> I don't think John Warnock looked at the fact there were no laser 
> printers and no desktop publishing and said, "Nah, let's not waste 
> time developing PostScript. Who'd use it?"

Exactly! This is what created Adobe in the first place. Has really the
computer industry stalled in development of new technologies? Will
Microsoft continue to dominate the OS market forever? Of course not.
There is an expression applicable to most businesses: "don't put all
your eggs into the same basket". I just wish Adobe could obey it.


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Thomas Michanek, FrameMaker/UNIX/MIF expert
Technical Writer, IAR Systems, Uppsala, Sweden
mailto:Thomas.Michanek@telia.com
http://w1.184.telia.com/~u18407300/
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