Existing users, 
QuarkXPress
Page layout and design for print and web.
Version: 8.12
Design professionals: boycott Quark
Feedback Type: Review
Contributed by: o2partner1 Tuesday, July 22 2003 @ 07:52 PM PDT
Product Platform: MacOSX
Used Product For: Have Not Tried
Recommend Product: NO
I strongly urge everyone to take a stand against this company. They have done nothing but make life miserable for the design community, and they deserve to be put out of business, or at the very least, end the Mac side of their business. After reading many, many nasty reviews of Quark 5 and 6, it appears that Quark has done it again - released a substandard and expensive program. Take a stand: do not buy Quark 6, and do your duty to convince your clients, production departments and vendors to purchase InDesign. Or at the very least, consider a PDF workflow. The only we can affect change is to rally at the end-user level.
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Design professionals: boycott Quark - Thing9
Much as I hate to, I do agree with the 'boycott Quark' sentiment - and have said so here and on other forums.I'm also a design professional, and I've been in the industry for over 14 years. I've used Quark since the beginning when the only other choice was PageMaker which, whilst capable, couldn't match Xpress. At least now InDesign is a very viable alternative - and one which I personally know many companies are considering (if they haven't already gone that route).
However, I would like to add that I actually hope Quark don't go bust - it's my wish that they will simply see sense. Imagine how easily they could 'clear up' the market if they simply changed a couple of things ...
1. dramatically reduce the price (and make the European pricing fair and more in parity with the US pricing as it's currently twice the price in the UK as it is in the States).
2. Recognise that the program needs work to make it a true killer app again. And make the damned thing capable of saving down to v4 - it's ridiculous to have to run both v6 and v5 in order to make files compatible with some of the companies I regularly have to deal with!
I believe people would show new found respect for Quark if they could only be honest, hold their hands up and say 'Sorry, we goofed. We're going to have to delay release while we improve things, but it'll be worth it.'
I don't want to see Quark dissappear. They've been a cornerstone of the design industry for (relatively) ages. I like to support smaller companies over the corporate giants, and Quark are relatively small - with only 1 major product.
However, I will boycott them. I'm setting up a small agency and I simply can't afford nor justify the cost of Xpress 6 over the equal, if not superior, InDesign.
Come on Quark - wake up!
Greg.
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Wednesday, July 23 2003 @ 01:08 AM PDT