Looking at the fantasic capibilites of the Flash Media Server but notice that
it is way out the the price range for most developers. I think 100 connections
for $4500! Ouch.

So wanted to look at alternitives and found somthing very interesting.

"RED5 Server" It is an open flash project currently in development and the
forums is supported by shocksites.com.

So it will be ready sooner then later and needs individuals to ask questions
on the forums at: http://www.shocksites.com/forum/

It will do multi user capibilites and streaming video and sound as well.

Originally posted by: Pixel Pusher
I think 100 connections for $4500! Ouch.


Actually, the license scheme has been revised to offer a 2500 user/25mbps
license option. It's actually better than the FCS 1.5 license, which only gave
you 10mbps. Check the FMS page for details.

I suppose if you budget is tight and you don't need any sort of support, Red5
will be the way to go, but it looks like it will be a while before it's a real
alternative for any sort of enterprise deployment.

Well 2500 is much better but the $4500 is still way out of the range of many
hosting companies and developers.
I did see a few other alternitives like Oregano (no real support) and SUSHI
(which I have not used).

The RED5 List however is very active and is supported by the OSFlash
community. So yes there will be lots of support and users. I think they will
have donated several test servers from a number of hosting vendors (one which
is shockwaveserver.com ).

That part is due to launch in several months (fingers crossed). Soooo it is
closer then you think. Real time multi user functionaliy and streaming
technology rolled in to one.

You remember MS SQL Database? They start taking over the Orical database
market then MySQL came out and it is open source. It is very popular now and I
think the a simular path will happen with RED5 Server.

Any way if possible ask some questions at the RED5 forums:
http://www.shocksites.com/forum/ and help out the community grow ;)

Have a great day!

So if you have time add to the RED5 forum at: http://www.shocksites.com/forum/

Don't ge me wrong here... I have nothing against Red5 and I'm all for open
source projects. My comment about support had more to do with formal support
from a vendor rather than developer community support.