What follows is rambling related to what ImaginaryHuman said.
Just something I feel like adding on as a consideration, but it may not be a good time now to even try marketing BlitzMax. Perhaps once Mark has come up with a 3D solution he's happy with, then doing some proper advertising/marketing/circus sideshows would be a good idea. As-is, the appeal of BlitzMax is mainly that you can write whatever you want on three platforms, and you get 2D code with it. It's not necessarily something that will attract new users.
I suppose what BRL has to do first is decide how they want to present BMax, if at all, to others. Is it the new Basic language that features OO features and a robust compiler for three platforms, is it the 2D game programming language, is it the application programming language, or is it the 3D game programming language? I don't think you're likely to attract a great variety of new users with the first, however true it may be, the second is rather weak, the third could work but MaxGUI is really in no position to offer a better alternative to C# and Windows.Forms, and we're still waiting to see what Mark will do (I'm interested in the tech behind it, not so sure if I'd use it though when I've got TV3D- but that's unrelated).
The short of it is, I think BMax needs to decide on what its goal really is, and then marketing can be done. Right now, it's a bit up in the air since some people expect it to be a Blitz3D 2, others expect it to be their new BlitzPlus, some of us like using it for everything under the sun from writing small utilities to engines, and some use it for 2D games (successfully, I should add, whether or not I like the results).
Considering the last of those has the most successes to back BMax up as a tried-and-true tool, it would be at least a safe bet, but probably wouldn't attract the kind of professional and experienced people like Josh seem to want (I may be misinterpreting, but I gathered that you wanted BMax to gain attention from those people). I personally hope that BMax can be sold on its own as a very comfortable alternative to C++, C#, and the like, since it's a very versatile language that, provided you put the work in, can do close to anything you'd want.
Just something I feel like adding on as a consideration, but it may not be a good time now to even try marketing BlitzMax. Perhaps once Mark has come up with a 3D solution he's happy with, then doing some proper advertising/marketing/circus sideshows would be a good idea. As-is, the appeal of BlitzMax is mainly that you can write whatever you want on three platforms, and you get 2D code with it. It's not necessarily something that will attract new users.
I suppose what BRL has to do first is decide how they want to present BMax, if at all, to others. Is it the new Basic language that features OO features and a robust compiler for three platforms, is it the 2D game programming language, is it the application programming language, or is it the 3D game programming language? I don't think you're likely to attract a great variety of new users with the first, however true it may be, the second is rather weak, the third could work but MaxGUI is really in no position to offer a better alternative to C# and Windows.Forms, and we're still waiting to see what Mark will do (I'm interested in the tech behind it, not so sure if I'd use it though when I've got TV3D- but that's unrelated).
The short of it is, I think BMax needs to decide on what its goal really is, and then marketing can be done. Right now, it's a bit up in the air since some people expect it to be a Blitz3D 2, others expect it to be their new BlitzPlus, some of us like using it for everything under the sun from writing small utilities to engines, and some use it for 2D games (successfully, I should add, whether or not I like the results).
Considering the last of those has the most successes to back BMax up as a tried-and-true tool, it would be at least a safe bet, but probably wouldn't attract the kind of professional and experienced people like Josh seem to want (I may be misinterpreting, but I gathered that you wanted BMax to gain attention from those people). I personally hope that BMax can be sold on its own as a very comfortable alternative to C++, C#, and the like, since it's a very versatile language that, provided you put the work in, can do close to anything you'd want.