/Interview/ Q&A: Avi Muchnick
02/02/2010 | Filed under Discover > Interview
Aviary’s browser-based suite of multimedia tools is trying to make it easier and cheaper for people to become web builders. Oliver Lindberg speaks to founder and CEO, Avi Muchnick
.net: Why did you decide to branch out from a Photoshop contest site, Worth1000, to producing creative apps?
AM: I saw a need for creative apps that were low cost and easy to use. Every day I would get emails from people who were looking for places to download stolen versions of Photoshop. I would ignore them of course, but it got me thinking – why not make a low-cost solution to editing software, so that people who otherwise can’t purchase legal copies of the software can do so?
.net: How does Aviary compare to the heavyweights from the likes of Adobe? Who’s the suite aimed at?
AM: The suite is aimed at hobbyists and students. We are targeting a crowd that is using the suite to learn in a low-cost, but powerful way. We aren’t going to unseat Adobe in the professional crowd and that’s not our goal. Our overall company mission is to let anyone make anything anywhere. Everyone in the world with a computer needs access to digital editing tools, whether to touch up a photo or record a family memory on video. It’s our aim to provide everyone with the tool set to do so.
.net: How’s it going? How many people are using your tools?
AM: It’s going great! We have phenomenal adoption rates and our user numbers have really taken off. We have a number of key partnerships in place that have really facilitated our growth and exposure.
.net: What are people building with the suite? What creations have impressed you most so far?
AM: There have been thousands of creations made that warrant attention, everything from music remixes to vector artwork to photo-illustrations. One of the most amazing things I’ve been impressed with were creations made in our effects editor, Peacock. People are using Peacock to build an amazing filter set that will be useful in a number of ways, including in third-party products.
.net: Why did you extend the Aviary suite to include an audio editor, Myna, after concentrating on graphics for five tools?
AM: Getting outside of graphics was always our goal. Creation in general is very cross-discipline and sticking within graphics alone wouldn’t fill our company mission of letting people create anything anywhere. Graphics are just a very small part of the story, but were the lowest hanging fruit for us to begin rolling out our suite with. Now we’ve expanded beyond it we’re seeing great monetisation opportunities for Aviary and more importantly, the users of our tools.
.net: You recently teamed up with Major Lazer and invited people to use Myna’s API to remix the band’s tracks. How successful was it, and are you planning similar contests?
AM: It was a huge success for Major Lazer and Aviary. We were thrilled with the total number of entries (over 9,000) that came in and have several partnerships in the works for similar contests in the near future.
.net: What are the main challenges in making all these tools browser-based with Flash?
AM: The technical limitations in using Flash can be difficult to overcome. For example, there are some limitations on file size in our graphic apps because Flash can’t support larger canvases. So we need to come up with creative ways of addressing that and other limitations that work around Flash. We’re also always looking into other platforms like Silverlight, Java and HTML5 to take advantage of the most robust feature set.
Either way though, obstacles once overcome can have a really neat way of becoming defences against competition who will have to overcome the same obstacles.
.net: Why did you choose to store files in your own internal cloud and back them up with Amazon S3?
AM: When we first launched we treated S3 as a backup service, just to make sure there was some double redundancy for people in place in case our own system ever had an outage. When we were smaller it made sense to have our own internal cloud instead of using S3 for cost and speed savings. But since we launched, S3 has matured into a speedy and scalable product. So much so that we’re actually thinking of using it as our primary storage solution.
.net: All the apps are free and there are subscription fees for the more fully featured Pro plan. But how many Pro users have you got and is this enough to finance your business?
AM: We don’t disclose these numbers, but we’ve been thrilled with how many sign-ups we’ve received and the company’s vitals.
.net: What other apps are in the pipeline and what advances are you making in creating an offline version of Aviary?
AM: We’ve got some very exciting things in the pipeline. One of the apps I am most excited about is a plug-in for Adobe Photoshop that will fit beautifully into how we plan to let our marketplace work.
.net: What are your hopes for Aviary’s marketplace?
AM: We want to help amateur artists monetise their talents. So we view the marketplace as another tool in the Aviary toolkit, but one that lets them harness their talents to earn a living. We hope to tap into the thriving economy for digital goods in virtual worlds and websites by providing the resources to create those digital goods right in those virtual worlds and websites.
Avi Muchnick
Job CEO and founder of Aviary
Age 30
Education Benjamin N Cardozo School of Law, Yeshiva University
Previous career CEO of Worth1000
Online twitter.com/jaxom
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