Does Macromedia Try To Kill Open Source Projects?

I need to start this article out by telling you that I love Macromedia software. I am a loyal customer and will continue to be one, but this isn’t a story of praise, but a story about a company purchasing the rights to a competing open source project and then locking it up and throwing away the key.

This story starts with two companies, eHelp and Nexus Concepts. eHelp was known for creating tools technical writers use to create online documentation, and they made top-notch software documentation tools, however “word processing” tools were not really a growing market, so they began looking at other products they could acquire to add to their software portfolio.

One of the tools they ended up buying was a product called Flashcam, a product that originally sold for under 80 US dollars. This was a very useful product and the company I was working for purchased a license for me. What this product let you do is create demonstrate tutorials and demonstrations like the “How to remove ads from Firefox” demo I created. I can see why a company would want to buy software like that, it allows users to easily show how to do something and can extend the written documentation that technical writers create. Once eHelp purchased Flashcam they changed the name to Robodemo and they then increased the price to over 350 US dollars.

Arround the same time that eHelp purchased Flashcam, a company called Rendersoft was working on a free piece of software called Camstudio. (version 1.1 was released in October 2001.) What did this software do? It origionally allowed users to record all screen activity and save the file as an AVI. That in itself is a useful product, however as the product developed it only got better. When Camstudio reached version 2.0 in March 2003 and suddenly it grabbed the attention of eHelp.

Version 2.0 of Camstudio was released under the following license:

Quote:
Source Code License for v2.0s (GPL / Commercial)

The source code for Camstudio v2.0s and v1.8s is now under GPL (GNU General Public License). You are required to release your source code if you distribute products that are derived from Camstudio’s source.

If you intend to use the source of Camstudio for commercial purposes, or if you do not wish to release the source code of your modifications, you can purchase a commercial license to use the source without the above restriction.

The open source license alone wouldn’t threaten eHelp but the fact that Camstudio saved the live screen captures to a Flash .swf file did. Camstudio also gained the attention of Pc Magazines’ editors and received a five star rating. Robodemo was still a superior product, however a free alternative was available that could undercut the sales of their cash-cow Robodemo.

What did eHelp end up doing? They did an underhanded thing and purchased the software outright from Rendersoft. I don’t blame Rendersoft for selling out, who wouldn’t take a free basket-full of money for a product that costs nothing? I do however blame eHelp for going after a legitimate open source project and providing the project owners with hush money. What happened to Camstudio? It’s project was pulled from the sourceforge site. eHelp then went ahead and re-branded the product as eHelp Camstudio, “updated” it to version 2.1, increased the file size from 2.5 megs to 9.5 megs, added adware with upsells to Robodemo and lastly removed the export to .swf feature.

I now need to get back to my original statement, and that is how Macromedia kills open source projects. They killed it by perpetuating the underhandedness that eHelp originally engaged in. The perpetuated it by continuing to keep Camstudio in-house when their new product is by far superior, although more expensive at arround 500 US dollars. They continue to show how they are not responsible stweards of the swf “standard” by continuously killing/stifling any open source competition.

I would like to end this story with some good news. The good news is that Camstudio 2.0 still exists. You can still download it because (unfortunately for Macromedia) the license it was distributed under allowed such activity. If you are looking for a free alternative to Macromedia Captivate, look no further than Camstudio 2.0 and download it today.

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