Not owning a tool you are paying for is pretty shitty. Was it okay for mine companies to make employees rent shovels? If Adobe allowed you to stop paying, and you could keep using the program but you don’t get updated features any more, I would feel differently. The fact that you have to keep paying and paying and paying and paying to use it AT ALL is shit trash sewer garbage capitalism.
So you don’t buy any games on Steam or Nintendo eShop? You don’t pay for any subscriptions like Netflix or Spotify?
Just chiming in with another reason to not use subscription model software.
https://helpx.adobe.com/la/x-productkb/policy-pricing/executive-order-venezuela.html
It’s in spanish now but basically says, “I know you’re subscribed and paid for this but fuck you no software for you.” All else is irrelevant.
The only way I support a subscription model is one that’s unenforced by technology. Like you start the subscription service and they send you a file to install and you go to an airgapped computer and it just works.
If that’s the subscription model, then sure, I’m all for it. The problem with doing it this way is obvious.
(but for the sake of spelling it out, you’d subscribe for a month, get the deliverables and get rid of your subscription with no reduction in software capability)
1 Like
Going to point out that Rym’s comment about versions is the biggest reason why my company made the switch. You have a lot of small business that depend on this software, and don’t want to make the big capital outlay every single year for every member of the Design/Prepress/Whatever team, but one of your customers just bought a new suite, so you need it, but then everything has to go through that one computer and be backward translated. Which doesn’t always work.
On a personal level, yeah, I can understand how the software license bites.
But production, professional? The system was too chaotic. I’ve worked in both. I prefer today.
1 Like
Seems like you missed the news:
The problem isn’t with Adobe or subscription software. The problem is don’t live in Venezuela.
I didn’t miss the news. And I’m glad it was resolved relatively amicably in this case.
You instead miss my point.
Using a subscription model means someone else has control of how you use their software. I say fuck that.
That reads to me like “the problem is don’t be black, or jewish, live in Maine or worship Islam, whatever else the powers that be decide don’t get to use their software”
I don’t have a problem with how this particular incident went. I have a problem with the way subscription models work.
As many issues as the FOSS community has. Their view on this principal is correct.
1 Like
One, all of those things are entertainment not tools. People aren’t beholden to someone else for their livelihood if they don’t pay Netflix. Two, it is still shitty and I avoid them if possible. If I can get media as a physical copy I do, because I know that five, ten, twenty years from now I can play them. It is also why I pirate or buy physical copies of most media. I can still play my Aliens DVD I bought a decade ago in my PS4 and watch it. It is mine, no one can say “Sorry you can’t watch Aliens any more cos reasons!” I get DRM free games that are actual whole working standalone copies on my hard drive if I can.
I don’t have time to explain to you the difference between OpEx and CapEx, but your anti-subscription sentiment is purely on the consumer and amateur side.
These are professional tools for professionals.
1 Like
I’d pirate or use different tools as a professional. Fuck them.
Again, as a professional, you are working in an environment where you don’t have the choice of using something else.
Now, I can see something in your argument, but that’s the profit motive, not exactly the model. Because the software does need continual development. And the best model might be a foundation, supported by the relevant industries. But that’s still a continuous “donation.”
Nobody would hire you because your clients would demand you send them psd files or would send you psd files you can’t process. Also your competitors would get work done way faster than you, and have better results.
1 Like
This. It’s the industry level workflow.
Quark Express is still technically available if you do print design work and don’t want to pay Adobe. But I never see files from there except in edge cases, and those are all exported to PDF.
Mostly people just use InDesign. Okay, technically, they are stupid and use Illustrator, but my point stands.
You can make and use PSDs in other programs I don’t see the issue.
Only to a certain level of compatibility. Clients going to be really mad when the file you send back is all messed up compared to what they sent you.
Can you really? I’ve always hit a wall at the psd.
Like Rym said above, the two use cases are different and I fall firmly on one side. For me I can exist either be within adobe’s ecosystem or entirely outside it.
Paint.NET and the gimp will get a average user very far, but I really wouldn’t try and make money from them.
3 Likes
Lets step aside from the photo/graphic art side and just look at a related by separate industry that has nowhere near the same level of commercial/retail users: AutoDesk. Autodesk has the engineering, design, computer modeling, etc. markets and is THE STANDARD and your thirdparty software can’t integrate or play ball then you will go out of business (whether you are the purveyor of that software, or some small firm using it because REASONS). Everything works better for the most part because the industry as a whole has coalesced around standard platforms and software. Whenever you have a diverse, industry ecosystem it helps to have shared, central programs avoiding compatibility issues and workarounds and and maximizing productivity.
1 Like
What system does autodesk use when you wanna use their software?
Or, to ask what I’m really asking. Can someone who isn’t you, arbitrarily decide you can’t use the software anymore?
Oh you would probably not like it as much. It is functionally equivilant to the Adobe model. I just put it out there as a less consumer oriented example of why professional industries are more okay with the subscription model. AutoCAD License & Subscription FAQ | Autodesk
This is correct. In my eyes this is about the same. Autodesk can stop you from using their software if they want to.
