Bingo! QuickTime 3, as ancient as it is, met or exceeded Flash's capabilities until just a few years ago, but few web developers ever used QuickTime for anything beyond simple video playback. Superior features lost to development simplicity. Macromedia Flash (the application) was less expensive, more widely available, better known, and easier to pick up and use than LiveStage Pro. Even if HTML5 becomes a viable Flash competitor technically, it will take one heck of a good, free, multi-platform, point-and-click development application for it to compete with Flash already coming right along with Photoshop and Illustrator in Adobe's product suites.