I was a huge fan of FreeHand, the illustration tool that was arguably superior to Adobe Illustrator. (For a list of features that FreeHand brought to designers long before Illustrator did, see the Design Tools Monthly page here.) When Adobe bought Macromedia in December 2005, it stopped developing FreeHand and ultimately discontinued it in 2007.
(By the way, FreeHand still works on Windows Vista and 7, and on Mac OS X 10.6.)
Now “Free FreeHand“, an organization dedicated to keeping the fire under Adobe for having killed the only cross-platform competitor to Illustrator, has filed suit against them.
Read their press release below for details…
————————
Free FreeHand Files Antitrust Lawsuit against Adobe Systems, Inc.
Dear FreeHand users worldwide,
We have exciting news to share. Free FreeHand has filed a civil antitrust complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California against Adobe Systems, Inc. The work of reaching this important milestone has spanned most of 2010, and we are pleased to be sharing this momentous accomplishment with you.
The suit alleges that Adobe has violated federal and state antitrust laws by abusing its dominant position in the professional vector graphic illustration software market. Free FreeHand alleges that Adobe has engaged in a series of exclusionary and anticompetitive acts and strategies designed to kill FreeHand, the dominant competitor to Adobe’s Illustrator software product, instead of competing on the basis of product merit according to the principals of free market capitalism.
Free FreeHand demands that Adobe be permanently enjoined from engaging in acts of monopolization and that competitive conditions be restored in the marketplace — we are pursuing all available remedies in court. A satisfactory result could be reached quickly or take a considerable amount of time depending on Adobe’s legal response, and members can expect progress updates along the way.
Requests for information or questions may be directed to our legal counsel:
Jared H. Beck, Esq.
Elizabeth Lee Beck, Esq.
Beck & Lee Business Trial Lawyers
66 W. Flagler St. Suite 1000
Miami, FL 33130
ph: (305) 789-0072
jared@beckandlee.com
elizabeth@beckandlee.com
Popularity: 8% [?]
5. May 2011 at 7:53 am
Freehand was as widely adopted then back in the day as Quark is today
…nuf said – KB
5. May 2011 at 8:54 am
Kevin: not true. FreeHand was the clear leader for many years in both the packaging and logo design worlds. (Which were the main worlds outside of QuarkXPress that designers were working in.) We used it to lay out the first digital boxes for Celestial Seasonings teas. Even Deke McClelland called it superior to Illustrator in his reviews of several versions for Macworld magazine. David Biedney and Bruce Fraser said much the same thing. It was so far ahead of Illustrator that we couldn’t believe Adobe let Illustrator fall so far behind in features and usability.
Here’s a story from December 1993 in Design Tools Monthly:
Bruce Fraser says that Aldus FreeHand 4.0 is more capable than Illustrator 5.0, with more thought apparently having been devoted to it during development. FreeHand can import and export Illustrator 1.1, 88 and 3 formats, as well as EPS, PICT and RTF. It provides a 54-inch square area for your document pages, which works out to about 24 letter-sized pages, with some extra left over for incidental items. Pages can be any mix of sizes and orientation.
And from May 1994:
MacUser’s David Biedny compares Illustrator 5.0.1 with FreeHand 4.0 and concludes that FreeHand is better for designers in a production environment. Macworld’s Deke McClelland provides a three page side-by-side comparision of features, and comes to the same conclusion, adding that FreeHand is faster, and can import TIFF images.
And from November 1996:
Deke McClelland compared Illustrator 6 and FreeHand 5.5 (which is now at version 7) and found FreeHand the overall most-useful. He tested each application for the smallest number of steps to complete 20 key operations, and hired four artists to report back with their on-the-job impressions of using each program to create specific scenes. FreeHand was a champion on all five of their categories.
It offers drag-and-drop compability with Photoshop and PageMill, style sheets for your various printers, graphic links to external files, search and replace for object attributes, and autotracing rivaling Adobe’s stand-alone Streamline ($199). And here’s one fun feature: you can blend multiple objects along a path.
Also from November 1996:
Macromedia’s newly-released FreeHand 7 is getting rave reviews, in part because of its advanced and efficient production features. It offers drag-and-drop compability with Photoshop and PageMill, style sheets for your various printers, graphic links to external files, search and replace for object attributes, and autotracing rivaling Adobe’s stand-alone Streamline ($199). And here’s one fun feature: you can blend multiple objects along a path.
And July 1997:
Deke McClelland reviewed Illustrator 7 and says that, compared with Macromedia FreeHand, “FreeHand is the better program, but Photoshop users will feel more at home in Illustrator.”
Sorry, but history is history.
6. May 2011 at 6:51 am
Bring on an experienced Illustrator user, give us the same brief to produce a poster or four-page pamphlet (whatever) with text, graphics, bitmap images, etc and I will guarantee you that I will do it in Freehand in half the time it takes to do it in Illustrator. I am also talking about preparing the file(s) properly for print ie PDF/X-1a format ie cmyk, with clipping, overprint, bleed, etc.
At the end of the day we use Freehand because it’s the most efficient tool to get most jobs done correctly, where the focus is on WHAT you’re producing, not on HOW you’re producing it.
6. May 2011 at 9:40 am
Carlo: that was also my experience during all the years I used FreeHand. I call it “tool-based” (IL) vs. “task-based” (FH)
6. May 2011 at 1:40 pm
Does anyone know what the market share is/was for Illustrator, CorelDRAW, and FreeHand?
In the print world, Illustrator is dominate, but in the overall market (business users), I wonder if that is true?
As far as the suit goes, wasn’t Adobe’s purchase of Macromedia approved by the government? If so, I don’t see how it can be in violation; also, I believe federal laws trump state laws.
Regarding the feature comparisons, the reviews mentioned are too old to be useful. Is there any comparison info between FreeHand MX/11 and Illustrator CS5? That would be more relevant.
By the way, I was able to find FreeHand MX (and PageMaker 7) on sale at Adobe’s site. Legally, is not be updated the same as killing a product?
6. May 2011 at 3:20 pm
Tell me, David, if you were put in an office somewhere inside a huge company and not allowed to move up or get any promotions of any kind, no raises of any kind and told you can’t leave the company, ever, would that be good for you?
That’s essentially what Adobe has done to FreeHand.
My experience with Illustrator CS-CS5 is that it has become more and more bloated and complicated instead of streamlined. I had to learn to use Illustrator 3 years ago when I worked for a company that ONLY used Illustrator. I’ve kept up with Illustrator’s newest versions because of the threat that FreeHand may one day disappear. I still have FreeHand MX on my newest Mac Pro, and it works just fine for now.
I can still create a design in FreeHand — and Illustrator — and finish that same design a lot faster in FreeHand… as long as I’m being fair and using the same specs and tools in FreeHand as in Illustrator.
Some of the Photoshop stuff they’ve added to Illustrator just makes it slower and clunkier. For that, I use PHOTOSHOP and then import the TIF, JPG or GIF file into FreeHand and work from there. OR, I work a basic design in FreeHand and import it into Photoshop to finish. Either way, it’s way faster than doing it in Illustrator and I usually have better results.
Quark, on the other hand, has a few features that help with long documents or text heavy documents, like drop shadows and color blends and such that you can add without leaving Quark, which is very convenient.
If it were up to me, I’d love for Quark, Inc. to buy FreeHand as a companion program for Quark XPress. Then, I’d have the two programs I use most from the same company.
7. May 2011 at 8:31 pm
@Jennifer: The article was about a lawsuit, therefore I was asking business- and legal-oriented questions. Emotion and business decisions are not related. If Adobe as the law on its side, the lawsuit is frivolous, regardless of how much anyone likes/loves FreeHand.
21. May 2011 at 7:23 pm
There was a time when I had an extremely high opinion of Adobe. It was around the same time that Quark Inc. was fast becoming an arrogant, self-centred organisation who believed they had conquered the world with QuarkXPress and that nothing could touch them.
Adobe was continuing to break new ground with Photoshop, Illustrator and then InDesign and, as a designer, I remember being excited at what the industry had to look forward to in terms of its tools of trade.
But I was also a QuarkXPress user, and my impression of Quark Inc. was tumbling fast. Despite the good example shown by Adobe at the time, Quark had become conceited, apparently so proud of its achievements with the industry-leading QuarkXPress that the company seemed to stop caring about its customers’ needs. Customer service had become virtually non-existent, promised software updates were frequently overdue, and I remember all too well the days when even comments placed on Quark’s own forums were frequently removed, rather than acknowledged, when they raised issues concerning software shortfalls. But they had cornered the market with XPress, and there simply wasn’t any competition. Sadly, as sometimes happens with folk who just get far too big for their own boots, Quark just seemed to lock themselves in their ivory towers, reveling in their success and raising their prices whilst refusing to acknowledge comment, criticism or request from any quarter.
Meanwhile, Adobe had been quick to react to growing customer disatisfaction with Quark, and by pricing and positioning InDesign as a credible and attractively priced alternative, QuarkXPress began losing market share to InDesign.
But how things have changed …
Fortunately, Quark woke up. Significant internal changes ensued, and now the customer is king, and product quality and support are about as good as it gets.
Meanwhile, Adobe seem to have caught the same dreadful disease that Quark used to have: a grave perception of superiority and self-importance coupled with an innate desire to ignore the needs of their own customers, with apparently neither care nor insight for the longer-term consequences. Adobe reigns all powerful, regardless. Or so they seem to think.
But the truth could not be more different. Mutterings abound across the web from users of Adobe’s products, hinting at a growing sense of frustration with the company for a range of reasons, including rising prices, paid upgrades with relatively new few features (apparently none at all in the case of Photoshop (CS5.5), bloated software products that run slow and require excessive amounts of computing power to be used effectively in the average design environment, and a dictatorial attitude that promotes the user’s choice of any product…as long as it’s an Adobe product.
But surely Adobe must be listening? For example, their recent ‘We love choice’ campaign presents the company as the catalyst for all creativity by virtue of its claimed support for complete freedom of choice. Says Adobe: ‘Innovation thrives when people are free to choose the technologies that enable them to openly express themselves…’.
Sadly, the reality appears to be quite different, and their attitude towards FreeHand is not the only evidence.
For example, when Apple chose to support HTML5 (the open web standard) on its iPhones and iPads, in preference to Adobe’s ‘Flash’ software, Adobe threatened to sue Apple to force them to use Adobe’s own proprietary software rather than the open web standard certified by the W3 Consortium. There is of course ongoing debate about whether such a move would be of benefit to the end user or not. But the point is that Adobe was quite prepared to try to force Apple to use Adobe’s own proprietary technology. Not much idea of choice there, then.
And of course, FreeHand is still on the agenda. Here’s why:
Back in 1994, when Adobe attempted to acquire FreeHand (Illustrator’s only real competitor) trade legislation ultimately prevented the acquisition, and Adobe was obliged to stay away from FreeHand for the next 10 years. But by 2005, no sooner had that binding period lapsed, Adobe were at it again: they bought Macromedia (who by then owned FreeHand) and Adobe succeeded in acquiring FreeHand at last. For reasons unclear, they were not challenged by legislation on this occasion, and consequently FreeHand was acquired, and retired, leaving only Adobe’s Illustrator as the product of choice. No choice at all then, in that case.
Some might claim that this is merely shrewd business practice. But the irony is that it ignores the needs of many thousands of long-standing FreeHand users, not to mention their ‘choice’ of tools, which on one hand Adobe claims to support, but on the other, has taken away.
As QuarkXPress users, I guess we should be thankful that Adobe hasn’t tried to swallow Quark as well.
But the bottom line here is that Quark Inc. got a taste of what happens when you corner a market and then start treating your own customers with the contempt that they most certainly do NOT deserve.
And now Adobe appear to be taking a very similar approach. But should we even care? (Well, they have a monopoly in Photoshop as well, so yes, we probably should!)
It is very true that Quark learnt some essential lessons from their own mistakes, and I’m glad they did; by 2004 they had radically overhauled their approach to marketing, updgrades, fixes, and most of all, customer service. Now, they listen to, and chat with, their customers, they are innovating again, and they have a well-supported product that does what it says on the box.
But is Adobe willing to learn these same lessons from Quark’s experiences in the past?
Does Adobe have the humility to actually start listening to what their customers are saying?
Do they have the integrity to practice what they preach regarding consumer choice and the value that they claim to place on open markets? If they are serious, they’ll give FreeHand back to those from whom they have denied the very choice they say they believe in.
But for now, Messrs Geschke and Warnock, Adobe’s founders, seem to be all hot air and very little substance, as they run roughshod over their customers, presumably in an attempt to present the company as a tight ship before their shareholders. Yet they must surely realise that a company will ultimately only profit if its customers remain satisfied? Right now, that satisfaction appears to be on the decline.
Could it be that Adobe blindly believe, as Quark once did, that they have become king, and as such are themselves untouchable? Or are they in a panic, suspecting that they may have advanced every product to its maximum development potential, and can conceive of no other option than to gobble up the rest of the world in a vain attempt to assure their own continued existence?
Either way, I believe Adobe’s leaders need to humble themselves, learn the necessary lessons from the past, and return to listening to their customers at the personal level. Not to mention putting into practice what they preach about ‘choice’.
Otherwise it may not be inconceivable that Adobe loses favour to ‘New Quark’ in a very significant way, just as fast as they first jumped on the bandwagon when Quark’s own behaviour was equally questionable.
25. May 2011 at 10:40 am
When Adobe killed freehand, I cringed. Illustrator is such a slug of a program compared to the ease of use of Freehand. Why would Adobe do something like that, other than they were afraid that Illustrator would go down the tubes? There were a few issues with files saved out of Freehand, but those could have easily been addressed.
Talk about arrogance. Adobe has now decided that they will ship interim upgrades to their software as well as full version upgrades. So, I just bought the 5.0 upgrade for $400 or more (can’t exactly remember how much it cost) and now, a year later, I bought 5.5 for another $400. The 5.0 version did not ship with a complete set of 5.0 programs. Acrobat Pro was the same version as CS4 shipped. I was not happy about that and told them, to which they pretty much said too bad. When 5.5 shipped, it had Acrobat ProX, the version that should have shipped with 5. But, not all the other software in this interim upgrade was actually upgraded. Indesign, Dreamweaver, and Flash were the only upgraded programs. Illustrator and Photoshop were simply updates to 5.1. So, currently, I’ve paid $800 at least for 5 and 5.5 iterations. A little pricey, I think, especially because I did not see a great deal of change in Indesign, except that it ran slower.
Hopefully, somehow, Adobe will sell Freehand to someone that will update it and put it back on the market. I really want to buy a decent illustrating program. Maybe Quark should try buying Freehand. Now that would be great. QuarkXPress 9 is actually slick and a companion program like Freehand would be ideal.
21. June 2011 at 10:25 am
There’s a bit of myopia about those of us that think it would be better to continue with Freehand. I doubt that anyone here is a developer for FH or IL and would know what a tangled mess programs can be to maintain and upgrade. You can find developers on the Adobe blogs/forums bemoaning some of the legacy code they have to wrestle with in their more popular and more modern programs.
It is entirely incorrect to say that Adobe killed FH. FH development stopped in Macromedia’s hands. MM developers were let go, the MX release had a different look to the other MX apps and of course FH was missing from Studio 8. MM dragged its feet on FH in the end.
FFH must prove that the FTC was in error in 2005 by allowing the merger/acquisition, that it was Adobe (not MM) that ended significant development, and that Freehand can be separated from its owner to be developed elsewhere without infringing on the software patents that Adobe/Macromedia holds.
Ha.
I’m no fan of monopolies but this is a day late and a dollar short. People should have spoken up 6 years ago.
28. January 2012 at 7:42 am
I designed many complex graphics in FreeHand MX. I switched to Illustrator because I had to. What a downgrade! Brushes don’t work, slow, symbols don’t work, and expensive. I’m glad Adobe is being sued for producing junky, bloated, and expensive software. If one thinks Illustrator is great, they never used FreeHand for any length of time. FreeHand can still draw circles around Illustrator.