Adobe kills Creative Suite, goes subscription-only

Discussion in 'other software & services' started by Wild Hunter, May 7, 2013.

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  1. Kerodo

    Kerodo Registered Member

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    Yeah, that's pretty much what I figured.... not cheap.
     
  2. Kerodo

    Kerodo Registered Member

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    Yep, it's not something I'm in favor of either.. I bet most people won't go for it.
     
  3. guest

    guest Guest

    Bet there are some airheaded people who support that as well. And they'll say: "You people are afraid of changes!" :argh:

    As long as they also offer a functional products which aren't subscription based, I can tolerate it. No need to be full-blown like the subscription one, just make sure they're usable. There Adobe, I'm being kind-hearted now. :D

    Hopefully they won't do this kind of stuff to flash player. A practical suicide if they did this. :cautious:
     
    Last edited by a moderator: May 8, 2013
  4. Wild Hunter

    Wild Hunter Former Poster

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    You can always save your stuff locally... and open/edit it with the free alternatives.

    These are premier services, not charities. Of course they come with a cost.

    Most people are just too accommodated with pirating.
     
  5. Nebulus

    Nebulus Registered Member

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    I wasn't aware that Adobe CS standalone version was free...
     
  6. Wild Hunter

    Wild Hunter Former Poster

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    Yes. The most complete version had a price of US$ 2,599 with no upgrade rights and no associated cloud services.

    However, pirated versions of Adobe Creative Suite were abundant.

    There is no way to simply "pirate" Adobe Creative Cloud (which costs US$ 49.99 per month for new individual customers or US$ 29.99 per month for old individual customers or US$ 19.99 per month for students or US$ 69.99 per month for new business customers or US$ 39.99 per month for old business customers - always improved, always on latest version, and with several associated cloud services).
     
    Last edited: May 8, 2013
  7. xxJackxx

    xxJackxx Registered Member

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    That is part of the problem and what they are doing is not the correct solution. A professional artist that needs that suite will buy it. A hobbyist cannot afford it and/or will not receive that much value from it. They are likely the pirate crowd. The cloud service will not make more people pay, it will drive away the non payers. Those people may have developed the skills to move up to buying later. Now they will seek alternative products. Not trying to justify piracy, just suggesting there are probably better solutions. Maybe a lower price for the home/hobbyist market. Some money is better than none. It will be interesting to watch and see if their profits increase or decrease over the next couple of years.
     
  8. Wild Hunter

    Wild Hunter Former Poster

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    I think your assumptions are a bit incorrect. IMO, most of their money from standalone software licenses came from professional businesses that faced supervision and needed support, etc, not individual professional artists (this isn't only a logical conclusion, I've seem several examples of individual professional artists using pirated copies). And also, if Adobe wasn't already seeing huge profits from the Cloud offer, they wouldn't go all-in with it.

    To finalize, talking from my perspective, I would never buy a crippled version of a US$ 2,599 Adobe suite for US$ 500 or whatever. However, I see value in this US$ 19.99 per month subscription for students. See, I can have access to the same tools of those who paid US$ 2,599, plus all the improvements that would require more US$ 2,599 or similar after some years, and also several cloud services (that pirates simply can't access)... for US$ 19.99 per month! And if I don't want to be a customer anymore, I can simply stop paying - my files are still mine - and return whenever I want.
     
    Last edited: May 8, 2013
  9. paulescobar

    paulescobar Registered Member

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    Disagree with your perspective. There is/was nothing "crippled" about paying for the stand-alone Adobe software you required.

    For marketing reasons, Adobe pretended that everything they stuffed into "Creative Suite" was somehow related or singular. It wasn't.

    Organizations who sought to cover "all bases" might have found the bundling useful. But most individual designers concentrate on one medium, and hence usually require only one product.

    From my perspective, it made (and still makes) sense to purchase a stand-alone copy of Adobe Photoshop. I have used mine for close to 4 years (and intend to keep using it longer). Hence, the "CS" stand-alone price is actually less than what I would have paid under the "CC" pricing model (for individual app).

    That is simply not true.

    If you read the "CC" FAQ, what they describe is simply the same "CS" software...with a more annoying "call home" frequency.

    Like "CS", the "CC" software is installed directly on the computer. Like "CS", user must validate online with Adobe. The only difference is that "CC" requires users to "re-validate" at the end of the month.

    Pirates will find a way to liberate the offline components from the online validation. They have done this with countless programs (even operating systems), and they will inevitably succeed against Adobe.

    Hence, Adobe knows this will fail as an "anti-piracy" measure. The rich organizations will continue to fork over cash. The pirates will continue to steal. This scheme will only succeed as a price-increase & perpetual tax on *honest* independent users/designers.
     
  10. Wild Hunter

    Wild Hunter Former Poster

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    paulescobar, I'm perfectly aware that the offline components can be pirated. However, it will be more difficult to keep up with the faster improvements. Also, the whole Adobe Creative Cloud offer can't be pirated - talking about the several cloud services.
     
  11. Wild Hunter

    Wild Hunter Former Poster

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    I'm an enthusiast. I prefer having everything if possible.

    Adobe Creative Cloud meets my needs better than previous offers and for the first time I'm tempted by some paid offer from Adobe (student deal).
     
  12. WSFuser

    WSFuser Registered Member

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  13. JRCATES

    JRCATES Registered Member

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    I just saw where Adobe Photoshop Elements 11 was $59 online...shipped for free.

    I realize that Elements 11 is a watered down version, but for $60 to OWN the product for a lifetime rather than essentially lease the product monthly for $50......I'm thinking that buying the Elements 11 version is sounding more and more like a very good idea......
     
  14. biscuits

    biscuits Registered Member

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    PS Elements is really the way to go for hobbyists and to some extent even SMEs.

    The good thing about the Creative Suite subscription is students and teachers can use the whole, full-blown CS for 240 USD/annum (annual commitment is required) instead of paying thousands of dollars.

    It gets even better for professional freelancers that don't have a consistent stream of projects/assignments. For example they can subscribe for the monthly membership plans then opt out of it if they don't have a project.
     
  15. icarusfoundyou

    icarusfoundyou Registered Member

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    I stumbled upon this thread and thought I'd post my thoughts.

    I'm a long time Adobe user (for at least the past 15 years) and I've never, ever purchased a legal copy of anything Adobe because as a high school student who moved into creative work and it made no sense at all having to put down several thousand dollars on software that would be outdated next year.

    I signed up for the cloud subscription about 4 months ago and I have to say its great. Really, this kind of software is NOT for the average user, but average users are starting to want Photoshop. It will also never stop piracy but it will push more sales for Adobe.

    Especially with Photoshop where you would be forced to do a paid-upgrade to the program just to use a newer RAW format.

    To the people saying they have proprietary file formats and this is extortion, you can always download the free 30 day trial (which is fully functional).

    You don't need to be online at all (my internet has dropped out tons since I got it), it might phone home at some stage but I haven't encountered that.

    What will really help Adobe is making the same packages they had before (design premium etc), because $50 is still quite a high amount to pay for a lot of software that most people will not end up using (for instance I won't use dreamweaver or flash and similar products at all).

    Honestly, in the 21st century, putting down more than a thousand dollars on a single physical product is a ludicrous proposition, not to mention if you purchased Adobe **** legit then you were buying either a mac OR PC copy (there were even region specific versions you had to use for certain language fonts). It's the same thing as Steam, I must have spent thousands of dollars on games that ended up in my cupboard gathering dust, nowadays I buy them on Steam and they're all available all the time and if my house burns down, I can buy a new PC, logon and everything is there.

    One of the biggest pushes in the creative industry is going to come soon when macs lose their value and people start migrating to PCs (Apple already lost the plot with Final Cut). Enjoy having a $1000 set of discs that you can never use again.

    Another huge push will be that first world countries will not be the main market for a lot of companies; soon India, China, Africa and the Middle East will turn into huge markets for companies like Adobe. Do you know what happens every single time someone buys a physical $1000 set of discs from a shop? The exclusive agent will get a cut of the profit. Same thing with all the shiny shops that have to stock inventory, they all get a cut of the pie for physical discs in the year 2013.
     
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