Posted on 30-4-2002

Flash Future?
By JOHN MARKOFF, NY Times

SAN FRANCISCO, April 26 — Macromedia Inc. , the publisher of the popular
Flash Internet media player, plans to introduce a strategy on Monday
intended to make the company a player in the next generation of the
Internet being pursued by companies like I.B.M., Microsoft and Sun
Microsystems.

Macromedia is trying to use its Flash player — which until now has largely
been used for displaying animated content on the Web — to make the
company's software a significant component in the emerging "Web services"
version of the Internet. Web services are intended to move the Internet
beyond today's relatively static, document-oriented Web by increasing the
power and flexibility of business-oriented services, from shopping to
information retrieval and communications.

In March, the San Francisco-based company began shipping Flash 6.0, a
software component that works with many different computer operating
systems, wireless handhelds and interactive television consoles. The new
version has features that make it possible to transmit audio and video as
well as the ability to serve as a user interface for applications that run
on a centralized server computer and are linked via the Internet.

Macromedia is hoping that Internet developers will increasingly use its Web
development software, known as Dreamweaver, and a range of related products
to design what the company calls "rich Internet applications." These
programs would behave less like the interactive Web pages of today and more
like stand-alone applications. They will give users Internet content, like
audio and video, as well as data for business transactions or other uses.
"We think the Internet costs too much and doesn't do enough," said Tom
Hale, a senior vice president at Macromedia. "We're trying to go from
browsing to doing."

One advantage of the Macromedia approach to Internet interactivity would be
to dramatically lower the bandwidth costs of the Internet for companies who
now send repetitive copies of Web pages to customers who are making online
purchases.

The company plans to integrate several products into one Internet
application called Macromedia MX, to be available in June. It will include
software authoring tools, server software and the Flash player.

The system is intended to coexist with the next generation of server
software from Microsoft, Sun Microsystems and I.B.M., Mr. Hale said. He
said it would also be possible to build complete applications using
Macromedia MX without relying on other Web services applications.