Six Apart is a company that specializes in personal communication products, but they haven't done a very good job of communicating recently. In February Six Apart announced that Movable Type Pro would be out in the summer, and summer passed and went with no comment at all. Schedule slips are fact of life in software, and clearly there was a lot of other good stuff going on with Six Apart's business that might get in the way of releasing a new version of Movable Type, but Six Apart can't expect not to cause comment and speculation with a continuing silence like that. If Six Apart had just announced a six-month (or one year) slip I am sure everyone would have understood, but silence breeds speculation. When this was compounded by the fact that Six Apart didn't seem to take any action to deal with the issue of Movable Type comment spam, leaving volunteers from the Movable Type community to come up with steps to combat the problem, it seems like a natural conclusion to assume that Movable Type as a standalone product is on the back burner, at best.
Don't get me wrong here. I haven't had to pay a cent for Movable Type, and Six Apart doesn't owe me anything. I owe them and the Movable Type community for the wonderful product I have enjoyed the use of for almost two years. If Six Apart decides that their business is best served by ceasing developing Movable Type as a standalone product and by concentrating on Japan, or on Typepad, or some combination of the two, then I will applaud them and wish them well, and recommend Typepad to people starting out writing on the web. However, Six Apart should not be surprised if ardent fans of Movable Type (and of the Trotts personally) like me start speculating about what is going on when there is this kind of silence, and if some of us decide to use other systems that we have more confidence are being actively developed and improved. The November 21 announcement after 9 months of silence was a step in the right direction, but Six Apart needs to do more communicating of its plans on a more regular basis if it wants its current volunteer evangelists to keep spreading the good word about Movable Type, and if it wants continue fostering a community that adds enhancements to its products.
To Ben and Mena, thanks for listening, and thanks for all the fun I have had with Movable Type up until now.
Posted by Geodog at December 2, 2003 10:22 PM | TrackBackMy apologies, but my web hoster has turned off commenting, due to a flood of obscene spam bringing the server to its knees. I hope to have this weblog transitioned over to Wordpress in the near future, so that I can have commenting up and working again. Until then, please feel free to send me your comments via my email contact form.. Please ignore everything below this comment.
Hard to look a gift horse in the mouth, so I won't jump on SixApart for their silence. Would be nice to know what's coming (and when), but considering the value of the current version (not to mention the cost), I'll be patient. No doubt MTP will cause some headaches in upgrading, so the new version will likely be a love/hate thing when it does arrive.
Posted by: gary on December 4, 2003 05:32 AMAs one of those "volunteer evangelists" (sounds more exciting than "forum moderator," no?), I'll say that people's anticipation is justified, and their patience is appreciated. I would imagine Ben and Mena are at the front of the "boy, I wish MT Pro were done already" line, but TypePad obviously kept them busier than they planned. I myself am excited, but I'm prepared to wait because I think MT *as it is* is still the most flexible, interesting software available. I'm not in a big hurry to make a site that looks like everyone else's (integrated features don't really interest me), but I am excited by software that's easier to use and understand. I think Pro will do more, and make it easier for users at the same time. And in response to Gary's comment above, everything that works with MT will work with Pro, so I don't think there will be a mass de-installation of plugins necessary, just the popping of a champagne cork and a few bug fixes. ;)
Posted by: Donna on December 4, 2003 06:01 AMI've actually donated some money toward MT because I love the script so much, but I don't think that means they owe me anything special for my donation. That said, I would like to hear more details on at least a semi-regular basis on what the future holds. As much as I love MT there are some things (such as an integrated user registration method) that I would seriously like to have and which can't be done via plug-ins as far as I know.
I don't mind waiting as long as I have some idea of how long the wait might be. It doesn't have to be anything lengthy, just a "progress is being made and we hope to have something to present in month X, but no promises" would be more than sufficient to keep me quiet.
Posted by: Les on December 4, 2003 10:17 AM