Now that the initial surprise over Adobe's acquisition of Macromedia is over, it's time to step back and try to figure out just what effect this deal will have on the many products in the two companies' portfolios—and also on the businesses that these products serve.

Most of the synergies are obvious. By far, the biggest is the combination of Adobe's PDF and Macromedia's Flash, two of the most dominant formats on the Web today. It's an easy bet that we'll eventually see Acrobat Reader and the Flash player combined into a single product. (They should call it Karamazov, after those famous flashy acrobats.) Provided that both technologies retain their good cross-platform capabilities, this product merger would be a positive thing.

It's also a near certainty that Adobe's Creative Suite and Macromedia's Studio MX will be tossed in the blender to create a new Web and media development cocktail. I see lots of benefits here, since the resulting product would likely be more developer-friendly than Adobe's current suite and more video- and document-friendly than Macromedia's. However, there will be lots of product losses in this area, with good apps such as Adobe's GoLive likely bowing to Macromedia's Dreamweaver and Macromedia's Fireworks likewise bowing to Adobe Photoshop.

Read the full story on eWEEK.com: Adobe Should Open-Source Macromedia Castoffs

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