Sparkle, quit it already
No, I’m not going to argue whether Sparkle will kill Flash or not, I think everything that can be said has been said already. But I must say that I find it odd that so many are afraid of… err… progress. I mean, why are you guys afraid of something better than Flash to come out, instead of freakishly excited?
I use the tools that make most sense, and if Sparkle (or whatever else…) works better than Flash to get a certain job done, I’m very happy to jump to that solution. Don’t see it as a threat, but as a possibility.
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I’m absolutely agree with you. That’s first smart point of view from the time that Sparkle stormed trough the web headlines.
I love Flash, but the main task of developer is to bring better user-experience to users/customers, so if Sparkle will do its job better I would develop in Sparkle. And saying truly, Macromedia needs some wholesome competition to advance in the right direction.
I agree.
Of course there is many people who have a sentiment against MS, and because of that actually hope that Sparkle will be a bad application.
I think that of course it would be fantastic if it was better than Flash, and would not hesitate to use it instead where applicable.
Before I saw the video presentation I must say that I thought that the only reason it might compete with Flash would be MS marketing machine and the appeal it would have to people already using MS solutions.
I never ever seen an app from MS before that I find exciting, and the reason I have a dislike for MS is that the apps they make simply have been bad.
But it seems like Sparkle will be well worth a look and it’s in my view only positive if a dominant but usually lousy company like MS actually manage to get something nice together.
I’m not afraid, but surely you can understand that if someone has invested a lot of time and resources into becoming an expert in a particular software package, and something comes along that could potentially (at least in some eyes), become a replacement for that package, it could cause some concern. “Should I dive into this new thing now, so that when it becomes really popular, I’m still on top of the game? But what if it fails, and I wasted all that time?” I think a lot of the Flash community is just trying to get a sense of what Sparkle means to them personally and their future direction.
From what I’ve seen it seems more of a Director killer than a Flash killer (and I think Director could use some euthanasia right about now…). Flash has a lot going for it that I don’t think Sparkle will be able to touch for many years.
“Flash has a lot going for it that I don’t think Sparkle will be able to touch for many years.”
Based on the channel 9 video, it looks like you could just as easiliy make a case for the opposite. Sparkle has 3D support, hardware acceleration and can be leveraged to create full-blown desktop apps. And it’s still in a pre-release state…who knows what they’ll be adding in the next year.
In any case, I’m optimistic that the competition will be beneficial to developers. But I also understand why people feel threatened by Sparkle. The future has suddenly become more uncertain.
I highly respect Keith Peters comments in the Flash community, but I must say I’m a little surprised that he is so software-centric. I come from a 3d background so I know the importance of not being software-centric … in the 3d realm you need to be flexible and able to use whatever software would be best for the job at hand. I know the Flash world has had several years of one product and only one product, so everyone is in the “Flash Community”, but wouldn’t you much rather consider yourself part of the “Multimedia Community” instead and Flash is one of many tools to grab from. No matter how great a product is and will be, there is always another product around the corner waiting to take the throne … something that makes the industry so great. I would much rather have my business card say Multimedia Developer rather than Flash Developer, its too specific and seems to narrow your potential abilities.
Don’t we have enough to worry about, what with Flash X just around the corner. I mean, if it isn’t bad enough that we have to learn AS3.0 already, then what’s the problem with learning some convoluted, proprietary, Microsoft-Only, NonStandard piece of Bloated Software just to stay competitive.
I figure by the time I get Sparkle mastered, Adobe AS5 will be out… And I don’t mind mentioning how much AS5 (or even AS5.0LE {presumably the Limited Edition version of Actionscript 5.0}) looks a lot like…well, you get picture.
Honestly, I do agree with you, but I kinda felt obligated to, albeit sarcastically, support the panic and mania induced by the introduction of anything labelled as a “Flash Killer”. Besides all the great things that Sparkle is supposed to be able to do, when is it ever going to be released? By the time it is ready for public consumption, I wouldn’t be surprised if it wasn’t actually just a Flash Extension…or perhaps by then it will be compiled from some FlashOS supercompiler…Until I get the beta and can work with it, it’s all hype to me.
Great blog btw.
jase