These ads are appearing all over graphic design and publishing sites:
Think of them as bulls-eyes for Adobe’s major product lines:
Expression Web targets Adobe Dreamweaver
Expresion Design targets Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop
Expression Blend targets Adobe Flash
Expresion Media taargets Adobe Premiere Elements and Flash Video
Like Madame Defarge of Dicken’s Tale of Two Cities, Microsoft will stick to its knitting and ambitious promos confident that Vista, XAML, WPF/E, and other it-runs-best-in-Windows enablers will turn the tide towards its currently wet-behind-the-ears tools. MSBorgShip Expression is targeting Adobe – Resistance is Futile.
Actually, Adobe has responded creatively with the most ambitious preview of Photoshop ever – get your free beta here. And the enhanced Adobe Labs is offering betas and trial software of very high caliber. But the bottom line, the delayed Adobe+Macromedia product set is going to have to be very good now that Redmond has attached a bullseye to every major Adobe product. And Microsoft Vista is an excellent reminder – Redmond does not have to be functionally best (and now apparently not even close to lowest cost) to win over a market; it pioneers enough to create disruption and then rides promos and monopoly desktop power to very large market position.
Now some will argue that the Apple and Graphics communities are too independent and savvy to fall for the Micrsoft woo. But look at Adobe Premiere Pro’s success as a Windows only package. And consider that the digital image consumer has expanded well beyond the creative pro niche with digital cameras and camcorders bringing millions of consumers into play. In short, the folks at Adobe have their work cut out for them – and the shape is a bulls-eye.
(c)JBSurveyer 2007
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