This makes me want to re-read “High Stakes, No Prisoners,” Charles Ferguson’s account from the other side, of building the company up through (I believe) deal closing. It’s been perhaps 20 years since I read that book so the details are hazy but I remember it being very enjoyable.
Really enlightening to read about the integration that happened after the closing here and about the deal from Microsoft’s side!
Incidentally, I’m not sure the HTML authoring problem was every properly solved. I suppose it split into simplified server side tools for consumers (e.g. Squarespce, Blogger) and specialized tools for creatives (DreamWeaver). I always admired that FrontPage tried to provide the best of client and server.
"Nothing like that had ever been done before". I may be getting tripped up on what "that" means, but what about Navisoft, the company run in Santa Barbara by former Ashton-Tate CEO David Cole and CTO Linda Dozier, who became CTO at AOL after they were bought in 1994?
I had some interesting bizdev interactions with them, and was at their offices in 1995 when Steve Case called them and essentially told Linda that, "we've decided we're not a software company, and we never will be" and shut down Navisoft a few months later.
My business partner and I then went out for drinks with them, and proposed creating a software bundle, consisting of the Booklink, WAIS, and Navisoft assets (their multi-platform HTML editing system and their multi-platform, multi-threaded web server that became AOLServer) and paying them a royalty per sale rather than just kill the products.
A couple of days later, I found out thought back channels - there were many - that Microsoft was going to be releasing a host of similar products later in the year. We lost interest because of that.
Anyway, Navisoft's Navipress was around. Not sure Vermeer was the only company doing this, but FrontPage certainly had a better user experience.
Every time I have WordPress pangs 😣 I yearn for FrontPage. 😔
This makes me want to re-read “High Stakes, No Prisoners,” Charles Ferguson’s account from the other side, of building the company up through (I believe) deal closing. It’s been perhaps 20 years since I read that book so the details are hazy but I remember it being very enjoyable.
Really enlightening to read about the integration that happened after the closing here and about the deal from Microsoft’s side!
Incidentally, I’m not sure the HTML authoring problem was every properly solved. I suppose it split into simplified server side tools for consumers (e.g. Squarespce, Blogger) and specialized tools for creatives (DreamWeaver). I always admired that FrontPage tried to provide the best of client and server.
"Nothing like that had ever been done before". I may be getting tripped up on what "that" means, but what about Navisoft, the company run in Santa Barbara by former Ashton-Tate CEO David Cole and CTO Linda Dozier, who became CTO at AOL after they were bought in 1994?
I had some interesting bizdev interactions with them, and was at their offices in 1995 when Steve Case called them and essentially told Linda that, "we've decided we're not a software company, and we never will be" and shut down Navisoft a few months later.
My business partner and I then went out for drinks with them, and proposed creating a software bundle, consisting of the Booklink, WAIS, and Navisoft assets (their multi-platform HTML editing system and their multi-platform, multi-threaded web server that became AOLServer) and paying them a royalty per sale rather than just kill the products.
A couple of days later, I found out thought back channels - there were many - that Microsoft was going to be releasing a host of similar products later in the year. We lost interest because of that.
Anyway, Navisoft's Navipress was around. Not sure Vermeer was the only company doing this, but FrontPage certainly had a better user experience.