109 Million Shockwave Plugin Downloads learning curve Very easy to learn. A lot easier than it used to be. The average developer can probably pick up the rudiments as quickly as in Flash. Mastering Lingo is a lifelong pursuit.
Director is a fully-loaded, mature authoring environment for multimedia professionals.
Version 8 is tooled up for the Internet. No Beatnik required. There is nothing better for vectors. Fireworks is the perfect mate for Director. You can transfer vectors, bitmaps, behaviors, text - everything.