The State of the Software

A few months ago I was so mad at Final Draft, that I started writing a spec for a screenwriting software for Macintosh. In my mind, it would by a Carbon or Cocoa app, and write to an open, human readable format that--should someone stop using the software--they could open with another program. Ideally, that format would be open sourced, and any other program that wanted to write to it could. The program would retail around $30-$40, in the range of a lot of other cool software that I use almost daily.

I was sparked on this quest by an exchange with the Final Draft tech support. I asked them about how I could go about exchanging my disk. I use Final Draft 6, not having found in the newest version any compelling--or, really any--reason to upgrade. I bought Final Draft with version 5, and updated to six only to get OS X support (Both Urban and I are Mac users), since it really lacked any other revolutionary feature additions. When I bought my upgrade it came on a CD-R, which, as anybody can tell you, is a cheaper and softer substrate. Much more prone to scratches than a manufactured CD.

And see, I have this problem that I have to haul the disk everywhere. I have a desktop and a laptop, but I do most of my writing on my desktop. Final Draft kindly allows you to install the program on two computers, but not-so-kindly insists that you boot the program on the second computer with the CD in the drive. This, after the serial number, and having the program "authenticated" by remote connection to the Final Draft headquarters. So, I had to chose: either put the disk in every damn time I start the program on my desktop, which is quite often when we're deep at work and authenticate my laptop which I rarely use, or do the opposite and carry the stupid disk with me. Which I do. Everywhere. So, if I'm inspired, I won't have to open the program in "demo" mode. Which has happened to me. More than once. And I couldn't write.

But, the goddamned disk is scratched up, and it's gonna go bad. I carry it in a CD wallet with soft sleeves, but it's a cheap CD-R and will scratch if you look at it funny. So I contact Final Draft, figuring for shipping they'll give me a new disk, since the one they gave me is pretty much defective--but nope. $20, and I have to send them my disk first. I'm sorry, but $20 on a program I already own, that I need to run the program as licensed, and I have to send it to them first? I hear you loud and clear Final Draft: LICENSED USERS OF OUR SOFTWARE ARE NOT TO BE TRUSTED FOR ANY REASON. THEY COULD, YOU KNOW, NOT SEND THE DISK AND THEN GIVE IT TO SOMEONE WHO WOULD STILL NEED A SERIAL NUMBER TO RUN THE PROGRAM, BUT THEY COULD GET THAT AND THEN WHERE WOULD WE BE? I mean, I accept the serial number, the license, the bloody expensive software to begin with--but this just ticked me off. I hate being assumed I'm a criminal, when I'm jumping through their stupid hoops.

The woman at Final Draft was extremely helpful. I could upgrade, she explained to me, and since they've fixed this strange reason they need my disk back in the next version. Kind of her, no? Only $89.00.

So, I started writing my spec.

But, here's the thing: I like the usability of Final Draft. It's a fast program to write in. From what I hear, Movie Magic Screenwriter is pretty much the same (in every way--same copy protection, same pricing, same pain-in-the-ass, but good usability). And so bloody expensive! Sure, huge movies might be written on them, but more than likely, the products belong to wanna-be's with little cash--which, when you think about it, is probably why they put the copy protection in. Another option might be, you know, actually pricing the thing reasonably, but I digress.

See, there's a big inherent problem in writing the perfect screenwriting package: once you write a usable text editor, there's really no need to keep upgrading it. Sure, you can add feature after feature, but Final Draft's sharing feature is a total and complete JOKE (which, crashed continuously on our computers every time we tried to use it). Compare this to the amazing Coding Monkey's SubEthaEdit (free for personal use, but if you're a big bad company it will set you back $35.00. Reasonable!), and how they handled the sharing. So easy I wrote to them and begged them to license it to Final Draft. But, they ignored me. So, I was back to just hating Final Draft and writing my spec.

Before I got to far, though, I did a Google search for open source screenwriting software, and was totally jazzed when I found Celtx. Celtx is free, and available for Mac and Windows, so go grab it if you don't have it. As of this writing, it's nearing the end of its beta life, although each revision brings tons of changes. It's very promising software, which will include screenwriting and production capabilities. But, and there's always a but--the usability is not great. It's built on the Mozilla programming framework, so looks and feels like Firefox, which is admirable, but not so great and less than elegant. And, it doesn't currently add (more)s and (con't)s. But, in a stroke of absolute, unadorned, crazily amazing brilliance, it stores all of your screenplays as a html files. Because of its price, and open-sourciness, and the openness of the file format, we will likely use this as the software of choice for posting the script when we get to writing it.

But what will we write it in? Well, another contender in the mac world was just announced. I have high hopes, although I won't hold my breath until I see how it works. Also, it's announced price--$150--is still high, in my book. I've begged to be a beta tester, and I'll report back on my findings if allowed by the license.

But since Mr. Shockah and I both own licenses to Final Draft, I suspect that will be what we use. Until some awesome hacker comes along who loves Macs and wants to make some coin undercutting all of the competition with a sweet little package....Let me know. I'll work for free on it.