Just Two More Quarters (12/18/01)
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Meanwhile, topping the list of long-awaited products that won't ship in January is none other than-- insert trumpet fanfare here-- the Carbonized version of Photoshop. While the web has been abuzz with reports by both beta testers and (cough) "beta testers" that the latest prerelease version of the software is both rock-solid and extremely lickable under Mac OS X, we've also heard that the product is still no further along than mid-beta, and as such, it's not shipping in three weeks, no way, no how. That's disappointing, to be sure, but heck, reality so often is. And if you don't believe us about Photoshop for Mac OS X still being a ways off, perhaps you'll believe Adobe's own CEO.
Yup, faithful viewer Stewart Woods noticed that CNET just quoted Bruce Chizen as saying that his company intends to release Photoshop 7.0 (the first Mac OS X-native version) "in the second quarter of next year." Ouch. So unless Adobe's developers suddenly go "whoops, we accidentally finished the whole project three to six months ahead of time," it sounds like we won't be tooling around with an Aquatic Photoshop until April, May, or June. On the plus side, MacMinute is saying "April," so maybe we won't be waiting for a full six months as CNET implies. In the meantime, loyal Photoshoppers will continue to boot into Mac OS 9 or brave the thorny brambles of Classic for their image-editing needs.
The only thing that gives us pause about this Q2 scenario is the recent rumor (recent as in "two scenes up") that Mac OS X will be shipping standard and default on all Macs come January 7th; if that's true, then graphic designers are going to have to make a trip to the Startup Disk panel after buying their new rigs before they can get down and dirty with the likes of Photoshop, not to mention Quark Xpress. That's not inconceivable, but it does sound a little wonky. And as for the Photoshop release date, well, we've certainly got no reason to doubt Chizen's word-- the guy runs the frickin' company, after all.
Our Conspiracy Sense is tingling; could the Adobe-Apple rift be in full effect, with Adobe continuing to drag its porting feet on purpose (being miffed over Final Cut Pro nuking Premiere sales and the rumored introduction of iPhoto) just as Apple tries to force Adobe's hand by making Mac OS X the standard ahead of schedule? Okay, so it's not all that likely... but it sure gets the blood pumpin' on a chilly December day.
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SceneLink (3461)
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| | The above scene was taken from the 12/18/01 episode: December 18, 2001: The AtAT staff receives a divine vision of Expo goodies to come-- or needs a CAT scan, we're not sure which. Meanwhile, Apple's press invite in the Netherlands hints at a "revolutionary" new product ready for the Expo, and Adobe's own CEO admits that Photoshop for Mac OS X is still three to six months away...
Other scenes from that episode: 3459: Soothing AND Precognitive (12/18/01) So there we were at the mall (not a mall, the mall-- show some respect), drowning amid a sea of desperate shoppers and practically choking on the stench of fear. Normally we can handle the crunch of holiday shopping better than most mortal beings, but this year we let our guard down just for a second and were badly trampled by a marauding band of frothing Xbox-seekers following up on a hot tip about a new delivery at K*B Toys... 3460: The Dutch Conundrum (12/18/01) Heaven knows it's not any great risk to predict a new iMac at next month's Macworld Expo; between the fact that Apple hasn't fundamentally overhauled its consumer desktop for over two years now, the inventory-clearing iMac promotion ending on December 31st, and the reports of massive flat-panel iMac orders leaking out from one of Apple's Taiwanese manufacturing subcontractors, the oddsmakers aren't exactly calling it a "long shot."...
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