I challenge you to donate

[Tom]

I will make a donation.

I was a bit thrown though to get an email request to donate for "StageStack" - I initially thought you had decided to back a different project, not having heard anything about a name change (I'll have to check in more often). The sudden change, to such a bad choice of name, is not very confidence inspiring - but I realise it's no reflection on their development skills.

[Head]

I don't want to spoil the enthusiasm here,
but has anyone actually *seen* what now is called Stagestack?

I'm somewhat reluctant to invest into something, that I don't even know really exists. They are announcing the milestones, but haven't shown any screenshots or anything tangible.

The unfelicitous new name choice doesn't exactly increase my confidence.
I was very enthusiastic when I heard about expressive, but now I feel disappointed.

If you visit the Stagestack home page at http://www.stagestack.com/, you can see that they have listed the key milestones for product development at the foot of the page, with links to some short videos of the work in progress.

So don't be disappointed, it's all for real. And don't forget, this venture is supported by the same guys (Mark, Thü and Bez) that have spent the past few years taking Adobe to task through the courts. If the Quasado venture wasn't a genuine effort with some real potential, I really doubt that the Forum team would be continuing their efforts to support it at this level.

As for the name, well yes, many are agreed that the change of name to Stagestack was not ideal, however it's clear from Quasado's website that the move was taken with the very best intentions at the time. Remember, these guys are programmers, not marketing consultants, so they have to be forgiven.

At least the naming issue is now out in the open with everyone invited to make their own suggestions. True, this has created the further dilemma of many folk preferring the original name to anything new, and in that respect, the Quasado guys probably don't know which way to turn right now. But at least they're happy to hold their hands up and let the public decide, so they deserve credit for that.

We all just need to have some grace and trust them to do what they do well, which is to press ahead with their development work. Once they've cracked that, it doesn't really matter to me what it's called - if it works, I'll definitely buy one.

[Drwart]

So I put in my donation. I don't have access to a copy of Freehand as I have retired. My employer added CS suite really tried to like illustrator but it is too clunky.