Original release announcement: https://groups.google.com/g/comp.sys.mac.announce/c/gvPGyuX3...

Nice—we've changed to that from http://www.barebones.com/products/bbedit/index.html above. Thanks!

But then this should be the link, rather than an unrelated page.

first release was April 12, 1992, but it was a proof of concept[1] and wasn't commercialized until May 1993, so perhaps that's why?

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BBEdit

I think it was originally released as freeware. "Proof of concept" in the article was probably referring to an earlier, private incarnation.

It didn't do much back then; the name was accurate. There was a lot of competition over the years but nothing else persevered.

(those are the authors posting)