Panic (company)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Panic Inc. | |
 |
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| Type | Corporation |
|---|---|
| Founded | Portland, Oregon |
| Headquarters | Portland, Oregon |
| Key people | Steven Frank and Cabel Sasser |
| Industry | Software publishing |
| Products | Transmit, Unison, Stattoo, Desktastic, CandyBar, Audion (Discontinued) |
| Website | Panic.com |
Panic is an Oregon-based American software company that specializes in shareware applications for Mac OS. It was founded by Steven Frank and Cabel Sasser.
Their first program release was Transmit, an FTP client, in 1998. The program currently competes with Fetch, Interarchy and Cyberduck, the other popular FTP clients for Mac OS X. Transmit has won a number of design awards, including Macworld Best of Show and a 2005 Apple Design Award, for the Best Use of Mac OS X Tiger Technologies.
Audion, released in 1999, was a skinnable MP3 media player that competed with MacAMP and SoundJam MP the only other Mac OS MP3 players at the time. Once Apple's iTunes was released in 2001, Audion's days were numbered and by 2005, Panic retired Audion's development and began releasing it free of charge. Audion's story is documented on Panic's web site.
In 2004, Panic released their third major program, Unison, a Usenet reader. Unison also won an 2004 Apple Design Award, for Best Mac OS X User Experience, and was runner-up for Best Mac OS X Product of the year.
[edit] Software
In addition to their major applications, Panic also has a lineup of what they call "Li'l Apps": a series of smaller applications. These include:
Desktastic - A program that allows you to write on the screen.
CandyBar - A program that allows you to change Mac OS X icons that are usually restricted by the operating system.
Stattoo - A Dashboard-like program that displays some information (like date, time, upcoming iCal events or available hard drive space) on top of your desktop picture.
Discontinued:
[edit] Internet pranks and memes
Though not often documented, Panic software employees have been responsible for a number of popular internet memes and websites, most notably the Spamusement! webcomic, created by Panic co-founder Steven Frank, and "Sidetalkin'," a website created by Panic co-founder Cabel Sasser to parody the Nokia N-Gage.[citation needed]
In November 2006, the founders rented and filled an entire movie theatre for a showing of Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan.[1]
