Metacreations press release of 12/14 suggests it will be divesting itself of most of it's graphics programs not related to its Metstream technology. Does this mean the end of Poser, Painter & Bryce?

Here is the link to the press release: http://www.metacreations.com/press/restructure.shtml

I've been wading through the postings on this subject since mid-week, but I'm certainly not one of the Inside People. From the postings, no one seems to know what the future really holds for our beloved apps. I just hope no one buys them, just to sit on them.

Remember X-Tree? Remember Stacker? Remember Fastback? Remember Wildcat? Shall I go on, or are you depressed enough now?

No Nerd, you can stop. I'm sufficiently depressed now!

Metacremations hasn't seen fit to say anything to their (former?) users yet, so they probably don't have anything good to say. I think they are in dire straits, and if they were hoping for favorable investor reaction to their announcement it hasn't happened yet: Their stock has continued it's downhill slide. I'm not sure if they have fully considered the effect that shafting us might have on their credibility with potential Metastream clients. Developing 3D content isn't easy (we know, right?), and any company that uses Metastream is going to have to make a big commitment to creating the content for it to use. I think that leaving us sucking wind might very well make potential Metastream clients fear that they will suffer the same fate someday. That could be costly if they had a lot of Metastream content. Perhaps we can urge Metacreations to minimize the damage by telling us (1) which apps are "history", and (2) making a reasonable effort to find appropriate new homes for those apps. Perhaps they would do better to resolve the matter quickly, rather than making it worse by trying to hold out for the very best prices. Just my two cents. Jude

There's a very positive string on this subject further down in this section. There is, as they point out below, a great deal of room for User development of Poser, of which we've already seen a goo deal. Can you imagine being a user of Poser without the various innovations and improvements provided, largely for FREE(!), by the Poser Community? We're not lost if we have one another, although I flatter myself to include myself in the company of some of the great people out there. Secondly, Jack Kammerer? refers to an app similar to Poser which is in currently development. I was depressed about all this a few days ago. I'm not really so depressed anymore. It's also been posted that Meta will still post the much talked-about P4 patch at some point, in spite of recent events. Life is still good.

Unable to access the URL in #2 above, anyone got a copy?

Geep, For the MC release try: http://forums.delphi.com/bryce/start Go to Recent Discussions - What does it means for Bryce? It's all there.

It's also in the "Talk to MC" forum right here.

To the above 2 replies (Nandus & Nerd), THNX. I found it. When you get to the end of your rope, .......... tie a knot and hang on. Life does not end when corporations do stupid things. Sure, sure, easy for you to say that, you ain't been there. Whoa, hold it a minute, and I'm not trying to jerk anyone's tears, either. Been there, done that. About 20 years ago, I was laid off from a $65K a year job after aprox. 20 years with a company. About 6 months later, my wife passed away and I had 2 kids and a $1K per month mortgage. Somehow, I made it, so...... Tie a knot...... most of the people that got laid off when I did went on to bigger and better things - they would never have found those bigger & better things had they not been forced to look. To those above who are hurting...hope you find your NEW place soon. With regards, geep

I must confess some confusion. If MC is focusing on MetaStream, then it'd probably be in their best interests to publish products which support it, right? We've already seen that Bryce, Canoma, and Carrera all provide export capabilities for MetaStream. Plus, MC continues to sell Poser as a package which can be used with each of the above 3 packages. So my thinking is that Bryce, Canoma, Carrera and Poser remain safe since they're directly linked to MetaStream. That would make sense, wouldn't it? After all, if Macromedia dropped Director and Flash, how would you make Shockwave content? My main concern would be for packages like KPT or Painter since they don't seem directly linked to MetaStream. Infini-D and Ray Dream seem like they're goners since Carrera is poised to be the replacement for both those packages. I just wish MC would provide some confirmation on what's to stay and what's to go so we can move on...

On http://www.macnn.com, they have a story there right now stating that both the creators of Bryce and Poser both own the rights to those products and that they will continue developing them.

Another interesting thing--at least to me--is that I continue to get flyers from MC. Today I got yet another for the Suite--Bryce 4, Poser 4, Canoma. I'm just wondering how in good conscience they can sell it so blithely knowing there will be no support, no further upgrades (at least from them), etc. There is no way they couldn't have known this when they had these flyers printed--or is there? Maybe they are flying by the seat of their pants!! Diane B

Well heck, picnic, that's what they mean by: "The Company will continue to leverage its graphics software technology..." In other words, shaft as many people as possible by letting them continue to buy stuff that might cease to exist next week.

"blush'---guess I should have read the press release. Yes, this is exactly what that means. Diane B