Corel is planning a comeback for WordPerfect! Here’s an article with details.
It’s interesting to read this stuff, but don’t get too worked up. This marks, if memory serves, the 47th time that WordPerfect’s various owners have rededicated themselves to the program and declared their confidence that they will begin to reverse WordPerfect’s descent into oblivion. The article goes through some of the sad history of poor judgment and disastrous releases that led to WordPerfect’s decline. I talk to WordPerfect 12 users all the time; none of them are bragging to me about the ease of exchanging files with Word users, which is the only criterion that matters right now.
It’s more interesting that Corel purchased Jasc’s Paint Shop Pro, a perennial also-ran in the world of graphics and photo-editing. CorelDraw seems to have disappeared as completely as WordPerfect, but perhaps there’s an opening for a player to challenge Adobe’s products if Corel can combine the strengths of CorelDraw and Paint Shop Pro.
