Oh joy...we'll need to consider the options including getting GoLive
CyberStudio Personal Edition for all our Visual Page copies to evaluate.

Thanks for the message, John.
Belinda


On Mon, 3 Aug 1998, John B Harlan wrote:

> >Closing the Book on Visual Page
> >-------------------------------
> >  by Adam C. Engst <[log in to unmask]>
> >
> >  Normally in TidBITS we try to be calm and well-reasoned, but every
> >  now and then, we hear about a move so stupid that it makes our
> >  stomachs hurt. That's happened recently at Symantec (motto: "If
> >  you can't beat the competition, buy them and kill their product")
> >  with their highly regarded HTML authoring tool Visual Page. We've
> >  written about Visual Page a number of times in TidBITS, and it's
> >  fared well in all our comparisons of basic HTML authoring tools.
> >
> ><http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tbtxt=Symantec%20Visual%20Page>
> >
> >  Visual Page was a perfect middle ground between a text-based HTML
> >  editor like BBEdit and the high-end as represented by GoLive
> >  CyberStudio, Macromedia Dreamweaver, or NetObjects Fusion. The
> >  fact is, most people would probably prefer not to learn the
> >  details of HTML, nor do most people need the burgeoning feature
> >  sets offered by high-end programs.
> >
> >  Add to this the fact that Adobe seems to be ignoring the Mac with
> >  PageMill 3.0 (currently available only for Windows) and that Home
> >  Page has disappeared into the gaping maw of FileMaker, and you
> >  come up with a situation where Symantec was, as it has been said,
> >  faced with insurmountable opportunities.
> >
> >  When faced with such a loss of competition, would you immediately
> >  decide to refrain from additional Macintosh development? I didn't
> >  think so. However, the official word, as relayed on Symantec's
> >  support newsgroup by Scott Morrison, Lead Technician for Internet
> >  Tools Technical Support, is "We have no plans for any future
> >  upgrades to this product." Of course, the Windows version of
> >  Visual Page 2.0 just shipped, where it will have to do battle with
> >  Microsoft FrontPage, which is bundled with everything short of
> >  breakfast cereal.
> >
> >  Scott Morrison, by the way, does deserve a golden apple for his
> >  work in Symantec's newsgroups. He was unfailingly honest about the
> >  situation, managed to remain polite while replying to irate Visual
> >  Page fans, and even offered the professional courtesy of
> >  recommending that people check out GoLive CyberStudio, which now
> >  has a Personal Edition that Visual Page owners can pick up for
> >  free (see "GoLive CyberStudio Gets Personal" in TidBITS-433_).
> >
> ><http://www.golive.com/>
> ><http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tbart=04922>
> >
> >  Our colleague Neil Robertson, a professional Web designer at
> >  Phinney Bischoff Design House and a frequent speaker at Web design
> >  conferences, seconded the pointer to CyberStudio. "I was already
> >  seriously looking at GoLive Cyberstudio since Symantec was taking
> >  so long to upgrade Visual Page, so it now looks like Symantec has
> >  lost my business and any future recommendations I might have
> >  made."
> >
> ><http://www.pbdh.com/>
> >
> >  When I asked Scott Morrison if there was anything Visual Page
> >  users could do, he encouraged people to leave messages in the
> >  Symantec technical support newsgroup, where he plans to collect
> >  them for presentation to upper management. So, if you're a Visual
> >  Page user, check out the Web interface to the Symantec newsgroups
> >  and offer your opinion. Make sure to include quantifiable numbers,
> >  such as the number of copies your organization owns, the number of
> >  copies you caused to be bought, and the number of Macs for which
> >  you're responsible. And if you're an individual user, your
> >  opinions count as well, perhaps even more so than before with
> >  Apple's renewed focus on the consumer market with the iMac.
> >
> ><http://service.symantec.com/cgi-bin/newsgroups.pl?count=50&sortby=
> >BYSUBJECTA&group=symantec.support.devtools.mac.visualpage.announce&
> >Submit=Browse>
> >
> >  I think what tweaks me off the most about this entire situation is
> >  that all these programs originated on the Mac, starting with
> >  PageMill. They came from small start-ups inhaled by larger
> >  companies, who have either let the products languish or refocused
> >  their entire attention on the Windows world. Companies that have
> >  remained independent and focused on the Mac, such as GoLive
> >  Systems and Bare Bones Software, seem to be doing fine, so I don't
> >  believe the market has changed all that much.
> >
> ><http://www.barebones.com/>
> >
> >  I think we're staring into the twisted visage of corporate greed
> >  here. Sure, the Mac market isn't as large as the Windows market,
> >  but as has been pointed out ad infinitum, Mac users buy more
> >  software and tend to be more brand loyal (even considering the
> >  Apple soap opera of 1997). Loyalty would seem to be a concept lost
> >  on companies like Symantec, Adobe, and FileMaker, and as long as
> >  they don't get it, I see no reason they deserve any loyalty from
> >  the user community.
> >
> >
> >Cleve Callison <mailto:[log in to unmask]>
> >General Manager, WMUB Public Radio
> >Williams Hall, Miami University, Oxford, OH
> >513-529-5958, 513-529-6048 FAX
> >http://www.muohio.edu/wmub/
> >
>
>           Miami University
>
>           John B Harlan
>           Campus & Community Wide Information Systems (CWIS) Coordinator
>
>           Client Services
>           Miami Computing & Information Services (MCIS)
>           201 Gaskill Hall
>           Oxford, Ohio 45056-0000
>           (513) 529-5330 voice  (513) 529-1434 fax
>           [log in to unmask]
>           http://miavx1.muohio.edu/~harlanjb/
>