IMindMap new mind mapping application

I've being studying about mindmapping in the last couple of weeks. In the last couple of days I was researching about mindmapping computer applications tools. More on this subject in posts to come.

Since two days, I started testing IMindMap , from Tony Buzan himself.
First some pros. It looks really nice. The way the branches are drawn are much more intuitive and they look like the mind maps in Tony's books. Also, a opinion from a developer, it looks really good for a Java application. Here a quick example of a mind map done with it.



Although it looks much better, natural and organic than the other mind mapping apps, I found it a bit buggy.

Some issues I found:

• The Image library window shows up when passing the mouse over it and sometimes even alone. It also disappears sometimes.
  
• If you save a file somewhere else than the default place it will ask to save as if was a new file when you press ctrl+s. I just tried again now and it worked. A temporary bug? : )
• The speed mapping mode seems interesting. It allows to add branches without using the keyboard. A warning though tells that in this mode some features of the reorganisation are disabled. Although this mode seems really interesting when in the middle of a brainstorming or meeting.
• There's a search for clipart. The first problem is that it is separated from the icon library. There is no way to search in the icon library. Also in the search you get no results for queries really simple like "workflow". Also I found very little icons or images for tech related subjects, even something as general as "database".
  
• A bit of struggle I had at the Imindmap forum: I registered at the forum. At that time I got a message saying it was being validated and I would be able to login in a few hours. 4 days later still nothing. I sent a message to the support. Here is the answer:

Hello Emerson,
We get a lot of spam users registering on the forum and it may be that your account was not activated for fear that it was a spam account.
We would recommend that you re-register on the forum and we can make sure that you are activated.
Please could you confirm which username you are registering under.
We apologise for any inconvenience caused by this.

Best Regards

C'mon, do I look a spammer??? So why not forcing confirmation? Or not replying to me asking me some questions : ) I was just ignored.... really bad, I just imagine how many people have the same problem and never get back. I replying saying I would like to use my username I registered the first time. So far no answer. Update: just got an email saying my username was activated and apologizing for the inconvenient. Well, not so bad then...

I also found their price too spice, specially for a product still under development. They don't show a site-licensing anywhere in the website. In the forum I found the following post :

Hello Desert Rider,

We have recently finalised our volume discount pricing including site licences for educational institutions. Please see below:

Prices listed in GBP. Exclusive of VAT:

Single - £49.95
5 User - £165.00
10 User - £285.00
25 User - £625.00
Primary School Site - £495.00
Secondary School/FE Site - £995.00
University Site - £1,500.0

But nothing in the web-site. They have only 1,2,3,4,5,10,25 discount. And actually it's more expensive (17.4% increase since April). Also I would expect a better price for schools from Tony Buzan, as his business is clearly selling books. The software would pay itself from the purchase by companies and the educational licenses would help selling his books and spreading the software wherever those students would go in their career. As you can check in the previous post a lot of people share the same idea. It's just a shame how commercial this whole thing became. If was really interested in seeing his mind mapping method being used all around he would tackle educational institutions in a different manner.