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Home > Archive > Macromedia Flash Server > August 2005 > What is FCS for and why is it so expensive?
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What is FCS for and why is it so expensive?
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| Brian Lesser 2005-08-26, 2:45 am |
| I'm trying to unhijack David's thread so I have changed the title on
this E-mail and sincerely hope that if this thread of discussion
continues it is under an appropriate subject heading...
FCS is a Macromedia product and Macromedia controls how it is licensed.
Put together, Macromedia's licensing scheme and upcoming product
changes, will largely detemine what people can afford to do with FCS.
From a distance Macromedia seems most interested in selling FCS into
large media enterprises and Content Distribution Network providers. That
market can afford FCS. In addition Macromedia is pushing hard to make
Breeze the n-way application platform we all initially thought FCS +
components would provide. Both products are expensive and targeted at
large enterprise markets. The result is problematic for smaller
development shops and small to medium size organizations.
My fear is that FCS will be damaged in much the same way the Flash
Remoting Gateway was effectively destroyed as a separate product.
Instead of charging $100 for the gateway servlet Macromedia tried to
charge ten times as much. The result was no one wanted to buy it, it was
reverse engineered, there was a reduction of interest in Flash Remoting
at Macromedia, and a bad customer/developer experience. I don't think
FCS is so fragile. It is a real server and not just a servlet. But at
its current pricing, and with the pervasiveness of the Flash player,
continued attempts to reverse engineer RTMP are inevitable. Macromedia's
licensing may provide short term gains. But at what long term cost? The
next decision after FCS 2's release will be Adobe's...
Yours truly,
-Brian
Stefan Richter wrote:
>
>It's for whatever you see fit. It does video well, it does interactivity
>well.
>
>But no matter what I do with FCS, licensing gets in my way and I
>wholeheartedly agree that a streaming media platform should not be licensed
>in this way. We are already paying enough for bandwidth...
>As for the connections, I have never hit that limit ever. So leave that in
>place if you like but please please remove or relax the bandwidth cap.
>
>And on that note, I have once used up 50% of my Pro license with really
>heavy SharedObject traffic alone. I'm glad I can stick my videos onto
>Akamai's network.
>
>Stefan
>
>
>
>
>
>
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| Andre Fuller 2005-08-26, 2:45 am |
| On 8/25/05 12:05 PM, "II Site Design Gmail" <iisitedesign-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w@public.gmane.org> wrote:
> About Macromedi's investment in the Flash Player. Yes, I do think they
> should be compensated for their research and development. But with Flex,
> Breeze, Flash Pro and FCS, don't you think that they are getting a good
> return on their investment already without having to force developers to
> limit their use of FCS or go elsewhere for good quality, live and on-demand
> video streaming?
I totally agree. They are getting great ROI. However, what I'm suggesting is
that *because* they are making money hand over fist selling to CDNs and
enterprises they are not going to stop, until they realize that, as
expressed in different ways by my esteemed colleagues of this list, in the
long run, they are going to force developers to decide against flashcom,
just as they did with flash remoting, and just as it seems it is going to
happen with flex.
What they need to do is reduce the vagueness of the value proposition, and
make it a lot easier for us developers to justify the software to management
(getting rid of that cursed bw cap would help ALOT). Our only concern should
be if the technology is correct for the solution, and NOT "flashcom would
would be a great solution but we can't afford it", or "we don't know yet if
flashcom is a good solution, because we need to justify buying an expensive
license just to validate a hypothesis".
The long and short of it is they are a public company, and I believe that in
that context, capitalism is king. The developer in me HATES this reality,
but it is the reality nonetheless.
PS. I too apologize for hijacking David thread.
---------------------------------------------------------
Andre A. Fuller [ afuller-PWWqOfD1LBZBDgjK7y7TUQ@public.gmane.org ]
Senior Front-End Developer
TransMedia Corp.
212-675-6664 (ext. 109)
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| . m a r c o s a u g u s t o 2005-08-26, 7:45 am |
| too much greed.......
i dream every night with an os alternative......
On 8/25/05, Andre Fuller <afuller-PWWqOfD1LBZBDgjK7y7TUQ@public.gmane.org> wrote:
> On 8/25/05 12:05 PM, "II Site Design Gmail" <iisitedesign-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w@public.gmane.org> wrot=
e:
>=20
,[vbcol=seagreen]
o[vbcol=seagreen]
mand[vbcol=seagreen]
>=20
>=20
> I totally agree. They are getting great ROI. However, what I'm suggesting=
is
> that *because* they are making money hand over fist selling to CDNs and
> enterprises they are not going to stop, until they realize that, as
> expressed in different ways by my esteemed colleagues of this list, in th=
e
> long run, they are going to force developers to decide against flashcom,
> just as they did with flash remoting, and just as it seems it is going to
> happen with flex.
>=20
> What they need to do is reduce the vagueness of the value proposition, an=
d
> make it a lot easier for us developers to justify the software to managem=
ent
> (getting rid of that cursed bw cap would help ALOT). Our only concern sho=
uld
> be if the technology is correct for the solution, and NOT "flashcom would
> would be a great solution but we can't afford it", or "we don't know yet =
if
> flashcom is a good solution, because we need to justify buying an expensi=
ve
> license just to validate a hypothesis".
>=20
> The long and short of it is they are a public company, and I believe that=
in
> that context, capitalism is king. The developer in me HATES this reality,
> but it is the reality nonetheless.
>=20
> PS. I too apologize for hijacking David thread.
>=20
> ---------------------------------------------------------
> Andre A. Fuller [ afuller-PWWqOfD1LBZBDgjK7y7TUQ@public.gmane.org ]
> Senior Front-End Developer
> TransMedia Corp.
> 212-675-6664 (ext. 109)
>=20
>=20
>=20
>=20
> =3D-----------------------------------------------------------
> Supported by Fig Leaf Software - http://www.figleaf.com
> =3D-----------------------------------------------------------
>=20
> To change your subscription options or search the archive:
> http://chattyfig.figleaf.com/mailman/listinfo/flashcomm
>=20
--=20
.. m a r c o s a u g u s t o ;
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| Xiaolei Shi 2005-08-27, 5:45 pm |
| I think we as developers should for a second stop worrying about our
happy little acronym/animal named languages and the relative order of
our algorithms to think about the bigger scheme of things. Even if our
role is tantamount to that of a pawn.
When I first proposed the idea of the possibility of building RIA
applications, my employers were simply curious. When I actually
developed a beta RIA application, my employers became ecstatic over
the endless possibilities. As a developer my scope (if you will) only
extended toward technical possibilities: javascript integration, css
styles, remoting and the ability to talk to applications servers,
enterprise javabeans, communicating with legacy systems via LDAP,
webservicies and XML. I'd assumed my boss's visions were fairly
trivial and GUI based. This however only proved my blind arrogance as
a young developer.
Recently, to celebrate our department's victory over competing
webcasting solutions (marratech,digiscript, click to meet), my boss
took me to some steak place and got thoroughly inebriated. He revealed
to me that "While the evetuantual "goal" might be a working e-learning
system with data-mining capabilities (which I haven't built at the
time), The greater picture, Kevin, is certification". Being as dense
as a brick on the subject matter I dismissed what he had said as
drunken ravings. Of course he continued, "Certification, Kevin, can
you grasp the importance of certification? If I can certify math
tutors from india than I can tutor kids here at half the cost!
Globilization is inevitable, soon China is going to have more english
speaking people and the pool will shift there. This is what Breeze is
all about Kevin, you might groan about the cost of it, but
globalizatiton is going to change the whole foundation of education
here, What if MIT decided to do virtual classrooms and offered
certifiication? Everyone will flock to MIT. This whole Big fish eats
little fish thing is going to go full swing when the technology hit
it's tipping point". After which he droned on about how much our
competition sucked and sort of passed out. In the end I think my boss
has a point.It's easy for us developers to dismiss the reasoning
behind bandwidth as "greed", " capitalism" or as Samual Wan puts it
"Cash Cow", and while this isn't false it's not altogether respectful
of the bigger picture and the eventuallity of technology as it breaks
down barriers.
I''ve been with macromedia flash since flash 3, on purely artistic
grounds and I'm still with it as a developer on semi-artistic grounds.
I'm sure fellow developers relate that developing with the "flash
platform" (or whatever they are calling it these days) is a matter of
trust. We trust macromedia to do the lower end stuff - codec/protocol,
while many of us handle application/presentation logic -- which could
possibly extend to various languages.However, we shouldn't view
macromedia as a crutch, it should be just another tool in the
developer's toolbox. We all might still be pawns under market forces
but we are all still at the bottom of the pyramid when it comes to
technological progress.
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|
| > We all might still be pawns under market forces
> but we are all still at the bottom of the pyramid
> when it comes to technological progress.
>
Uuuuuhhhhh..... what?
ryanm
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