JohnnyL’s Blogic

Wikipedia defines Software as a Service (SaaS) as a software application delivery model where a software vendor develops a web-native software application and hosts and operates the application for use by its customers over the Internet.

Dramatically reduced cost for computation and storage resources as well as plummeting network bandwidth costs are greatly increasing the ability to deliver software as a service. It is estimated that by 2011, 25% of all business software spending will be delivered via a SaaS model. That is up from 5% in 2005 (per our friends at Gartner). Clearly, SaaS is becoming an increasingly important part of the IT stack; helping organizations in a multitude of industries manage their day-to-day business. The benefits include reduced costs, bug count and IT resources, faster implementation and iterative development cycles, and always being up to date.

SaaS is already an integral part of Adobe’s strategy in the enterprise space with its products Acrobat Connect and Scene 7. And we will continue to increase our investments in SaaS for both the enterprise and our creative pro audiences.

But what about the consumer space? You’ve probably observed the broadband penetration into the home, consumer comfort with web-based applications and the explosion of sharing on the Internet through social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook.

People are taking more pictures than ever before – an estimated 49.5 billion images were captured on digital cameras and camera phones in 2006. Couple that with the number of people online growing at an ever-increasing rate, at all ages. In the US alone, it is estimated that 20% of the online population is represented by the 18 - 24 year old demographic.

But there has been something missing – a complete imaging solution that offers a broad set of functionality specifically geared to this emerging ‘connected generation’. To continue Adobe’s passion of enabling engaging experiences, we have announced Photoshop Express – a new service that will support this community of mass market consumers in the creation of engaging content in rich environments.

Photoshop Express is fully web based. No CDs. No downloads. No updates or activation. Whenever you log in, you’re using the very latest version. While we have leveraged Photoshop core technology to build this new solution, it is not Photoshop online. It is a targeted solution focused on this new generation of content creators that will extend the power of creativity to the consumer at large. For this audience, it is a complete solution. You can easily upload, organize/sort, edit, store and show off your images. And when you’re done, share them anywhere, including social sites such as MySpace and Facebook.

It’s easy. It’s fun. It’s free. All you need is a browser. To learn more about Photoshop Express, and to participate in our just released beta program, go to www.photoshop.com/express.

You take the pictures. We’ll help you make them look great as you share them with others.

Last year I attended my first MAX conference just a few months after started working at Adobe. MAX is our three-day, interactive event aimed at showcasing the latest technologies and strategies to developers, creative professionals and, generally, anyone interested in what we're up to. The most positive response I get from attendees is the insight they get via the keynotes, the number of "sneak peeks” we use to showcase what's on the horizon, and most importantly, the opportunity to speak directly with our top evangelists and engineering experts. The most compelling reaction is a good "oooh or ahhh".

We had great attendance at last year's event. Shortly after, we announced CS3 and began shipping to the kudos and applause of our customers, industry pundits, reviewers, bloggers... just about anyone who used them. The better news is that the momentum just keeps building - and this years' MAX is yet another example. More than two weeks before the start of the program, we passed the 4K registered attendees number for the first time in the history of the event. And I suspect we'll get to the maximum capacity for the show well before opening day and beat last years' crowd by a ton. We've been doing that at all our events this year. The buzz and anticipation that is building for MAX is simply huge - and for good reasons.

MAX 2007 will feature more than 200 sessions in five tracks from which to choose. The group I run, the Creative Solutions Business Unit, developed two tracks this year. The first is Design Across Media - a key workflow for just about every media-based company I speak with of late. And the other is Web, Video and Interactive Design. There are a ton of strong sessions in each of those two tracks.

You shouldn't miss 'What is the New Publishing Workflow Anyway?' being led by Will Eisley. He'll be talking about how Adobe technologies enable you to create, manage and publish content across multiple channels.

And if you want a look into the future, Joan Bodensteiner, Rick Grefe – the AIGA Executive Director, and Darcey Merriam will be talking about Designer 2015 - a look at the trends and opportunities we see for the designer in the year 2015 and "visioning" what creative tools may look like to address the way they will be working.

And for those of you using the Master Collection - or aspiring to use it - some of our top evangelists will be running a session called Unlocking Cross Media Workflows. With Jason Levine, Greg Rewis, Rufus Deuchler and John Schuman leading the session - I can promise that you will not be bored! (We have a strict Adobe policy that these individuals are not allowed to be exposed to caffeine during work hours.) Guaranteed to be both informative and entertaining.

For those of you who attend MAX - let me know what you think of the event. Be sure to attend the sneak peek sessions. And please "oooh" and "aaaah" and applaud when you see things you like. I'm never tired of those reactions!

I sometimes hear about Creative Pros who - in an effort to save money - decide to use open source applications instead of Adobe's Creative Solution products. I come from a company that believes strongly in open source. I actually was the guy that helped open source the Solaris operating system, arguably the crown jewels of the Sun Microsystems software product portfolio. Open sourcing Solaris allowed that community to do what they really loved - tinker with the code to their hearts content. It made sense to open source Solaris for that community and in the right circumstances, I absolutely believe in the model.

And obviously, I have thought about whether open source has a place in Adobe's creative products strategy. But what designers need is tightly-integrated workflows and high reliability right out of the box so the really important question to ask is what's the impact to the user. Yes, clearly it's cheaper, but does it really save money in the end?

I read a really interesting blog written by Eric Vreeland, a creative professional who works across print, web and video - virtually all of the CS3 product line. His description of the time it took to manage the lack of interoperability between those products, reduced feature sets, differing interfaces of the various free products, inconvenient file formats, etc. really gave me some insight into his business. He used so much of his time "fixing" all that free software that the savings on the cost of the software evaporated incredibly quickly. Time he could use on new projects - and by the way, bill to a customer to help drive up his bottom line - was taken up being his own system administrator and software integrator.

In the end Eric decided that the open source products had too big a cost to him for this set of tasks, and he bought our Master Collection -- an integrated suite of some 12 individual products like Photoshop, Illustrator, Dreamweaver and Flash software, all with a common user experience, interface, installation, etc. He found he could spend his time taking full advantage of not only rich feature sets but the incredible integration of the products. Less time on getting things to work meant he gets to spend more time on what he really loves. Being creative.

Don't get me wrong, open source software can be a perfect solution. It's just not right for everything. Or for everyone - like many creative professionals who are on deadline and prefer to innovate vs. integrate.

For people like Eric, it has become clear. Less time per project. More time spent on the work he loves. More dollars to the bottom line. Priceless. Just proves the old adage. Time is money.

As I said in my last blog, we promised to look into what we could do to address the concerns raised by the print industry regarding the deal we signed with FedEx Kinko's. We’ve done that.

Adobe announced today that we will release an update of Adobe Reader and Acrobat Professional which will remove the "Send to FedEx Kinko's" button from those products. The update will be released in about 10 weeks. I know that there are a lot of folks who will be asking why we can't do it this afternoon. The answer is we can't just go back to the 8.0 release since the 8.1 release that contains the button included a lot of critical security and quality updates in addition to the new print option. We have determined the best way to move forward is with an 8.1.1 update. We have moved as many people as we can on to the project, but it takes time to do the standard testing that is required to ensure that we don't cause more problems by not performing sufficient testing.

We made a commitment to the print industry to address the concerns they raised about the FedEx deal. We made a commitment to all our customers to deliver the best, most secure product possible. We plan to deliver on both those commitments, and it takes time.

I'd like to acknowledge that FedEx Kinko's really went the extra mile to work with us to come to a resolution. They could have taken a tough line, because we do have a formal contract, but they showed a lot of class and understanding about the concerns within the print community. I do want to say that FedEx Kinko's has a great vision for enabling worldwide remote printing to increase speed and convenience for their customers. So I'd like to give my personal thanks to the team at FedEx Kinko’s.

Thanks to those of you who have shared your ideas on how to resolve this issue and thanks to everyone for your patience as we addressed the concerns.

The last several weeks have been weeks filled with a number of painful lessons learned.

Some of you might have seen the announcement we made with FedEx Kinko's regarding putting a "Send to FedEx Kinko's" button in the 8.1 version of Adobe Reader and Acrobat Professional. And you might have also seen the blogs and articles about the reaction of many members of the print community. The reaction was immediate, strong, and negative. That was our first lesson learned. We met the objective of developing new business opportunities for our technology and addressing a customer's print workflow problem, but did not engage with print industry thought leaders and influencers early in the deal cycle to determine how to best implement the program. We have a long-standing, very supportive relationship with the print community, so getting their input should have been baked into the process.

Bruce Chizen, Adobe's CEO, immediately acknowledged that our process, and therefore the end result, was flawed. We received a number of letters and emails letting us know just how problematic this is for print service providers, universities, government agencies, etc. We initially attempted to respond to each and every email. But as the volume built, we had to resort to a standard letter and a posting on our website. Another lesson learned. Immediate response is great, but the community wants action -- and quickly. What we really needed to do was sit down with them and have a conversation to see if we could find some common ground.

So Tuesday, Bruce and I met with a representative group of print industry leaders. They were tough on us. Big time tough. They told us exactly how they felt and the hard truths of what this deal means to them. We heard them. And they clearly told us what their expectations for next steps are. They had a lot to say, we had a lot to listen to. At the end of the discussion, we committed to coming back to them within two weeks with a decision on how we will move forward. We are going to do everything possible to find a way to deliver a win - win situation on all sides. It's the right thing to do. Another lesson learned.

In the meantime, some good has come out of all of this. We finally got many of the industry leaders in the same room and we spent the last 20 or so minutes of the meeting talking about what we could work on together once we resolve this big hairy issue that is on the table. And we will resolve it. That's the other lesson learned. At the core, we all want to work together, support each other, and ultimately, succeed together.