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Thursday, May 04, 2006 9:07 AM PT Posted by Harry McCracken
Corel Buys WinZip
Quick note: Corel has bought WinZip Computing, maker of the venerable and popular WinZip compression utility. (Which remains a powerful, versatile, and useful Windows add-on even though the OS has had basic Zip capability built in for eons.)Corel's press release doesn't have much to say about the thinking behind the acquisition. So it's not immediately clear how the company sees WinZip fitting into its portfolio along with CorelDraw, Paint Shop Pro, and WordPerfect. Presumably, there's more behind this than Corel just thinking it would be nice to own a Zip utility...
(Update: WinZip was already controlled by Vector Capital, the company that controls Corel...and the acquisition of WinZip by Corel looks to be tied into Corel's IPO, which happened earlier this week. In other words, there may be a financial imperative behind it rather than a grand product-oriented strategy.)
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Yeah, it's most surely about money, I think. I haven't used Winzip in a loooong time, not since I discovered a just-as-good-if-not-better, FREE program (ZipGenius) that meets my needs perfectly. I guess it matters what one does with such technology, but I have never understood why anyone would pay for a compression utility. I have tried WinRAR, and it is very good (probably better than ZipGenius), but again, why pay for functionality you can get free? If I did more with it, maybe.
Oh, and after 15 years in this industry, I have to say that I don't know of ANYONE who has EVER actually paid for WinZip.
I have no need for WinZip! I fail to see the point why anyone pays for WinZip... :(
ExtractNow is the best utility to decompress ZIP files, and it also does RAR files which are much better. WinZip costs a fee to use. ExtractNow is free! Who cares who owns WinZip!
I use winrar which will do rar and CAB, ARJ, LZH, TAR, GZ, ACE, UUE, BZ2, JAR, ISO
I prefer 7zip, it is free!
It supports:
Packing / unpacking: 7z, ZIP, GZIP, BZIP2 and TAR
Unpacking only: RAR, CAB, ARJ, LZH, CHM, Z, CPIO, RPM and DEB
....I just use the built in Windows zip utility.
I used to use Winzip, until I found out that XP can do the same darn thing. No point in using Winzip anymore.
I for one prefer to use WinZip and I have paid for the software. I have tried some of the other "so-called" zip utilities and as far as I'm concerned, none compare to WinZip. The functionality of the software is great and it is very simple to use. I mainly use it to zip large files, so that there isn't so much extra space wasted on my hard drive. And yes, I do have a large slave hard drive for storage purposes but I do a lot of video editing and sometimes prefer to leave a copy of the video on my hard drive, just in case I'm not happy with the outcome of the edited video. So, I will continue to use a software program that does what I want it to do and works far better than any other "so-called" zip program available.
I still use WinZip. I have for years, for free. Who says you've gotta pay for it. As long as it still works then I will use it.
Ha! I just use the built-in Windows utility as it does pretty much everything a typical person would need to do, compress and uncompress. Using WinZip is like using a program that does everything MSPaint does.
winzip is a very functional/user-friendly application that is well-known in the industry. the purpose of Corel purchasing this software process is defiantly geared toward business and market share. although, there are other things to be considered.
with the advent of white papers and large text file transfers, the use of a well-known file conversions can be beneficial for a word processing application like wordperfect.
this could be the first step for corel to legitimately compete with ms office by having an exclusive file compressing application that does not rely solely on the windows built-in file compression utility. this can bring win-zip enthusiast to corel and vice-versa.
in addition, the power point application which is included in corel is a good way for corel to compete with ms office. many power point's are very large and having win-zip to be able to efficiently compress/decompress these presentations will allow corel to possibly increase market share in the Power Point presentation industry.
Apparently Vector Capital wants to make sure it is making money no matter what. As for Corel and WinZIP, ehh, who cares? Why would anybody want to buy into this company?