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Now you're going to have to pay for Photoshop per month ...


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There is also this on Lightroom.

 

https://blogs.adobe.com/lightroomjournal/2013/05/lightroom-and-the-creative-cloud.html

 

Remember though, although its called creative cloud, it's not a true cloud product, software and files reside on local drives, not in the cloud. You only have to connect to the web at intervals for the license to check its valid, it's only a cloud license...

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Remember though, although its called creative cloud, it's not a true cloud product, software and files reside on local drives, not in the cloud. You only have to connect to the web at intervals for the license to check its valid, it's only a cloud license...

 

Indeed until the day you have a problem revalidating your license and then you don't have access any more.

 

What happens if you are working remotely on a 3G card and you happen to be in a validation window and you have a problem. Do they have a grace period or is that it, your software is disabled?

 

Andrew

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As far as the future of CS applications, in his Adobe MAX keynote, David Wadhwani said, 'We have no plans' to continue perpetual licenses. We are not ruling that out in the future.

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Barring something unforeseen from Apple and Microsoft, we plan to update Photoshop CS6 for the next Mac and Windows operating system releases. Once Camera Raw 8 is completed for Photoshop CC, we are going to release a version of it for CS6 that includes any new camera support but without any of the new CC tools and features.Interesting. At first Adobe seem to say they were no longer developing for CS 6.

 

Interesting. Yesterday I had the clear impression Adobe would no longer be developing for CS 6 but the statement above seems to indicate otherwise.

 

Hmm, perhaps it's the first sign of backpedalling following the hostile reaction to the CC announcement from users?

 

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Remember though, although its called creative cloud, it's not a true cloud product, software and files reside on local drives, not in the cloud. You only have to connect to the web at intervals for the license to check its valid, it's only a cloud license...

 

Indeed until the day you have a problem revalidating your license and then you don't have access any more.

 

What happens if you are working remotely on a 3G card and you happen to be in a validation window and you have a problem. Do they have a grace period or is that it, your software is disabled?

 

Andrew

Below is a quote from the Adobe FAQ. I am not clear what it means though. It seems to be contradictory - you are asked to connect every 30 days but you can use the products for 180 days even if offline???

 

Do I need ongoing Internet access to use my Creative Cloud desktop applications?

No.  Your Creative Cloud desktop applications (such as Photoshop and Illustrator) are installed directly on your computer, so you won't need an ongoing Internet connection to use them on a daily basis.

 

You will need to be online when you install and license your software. If you have an annual membership, you'll be asked to connect to the web to validate your software licenses every 30 days.  However, you'll be able to use products for 180 days even if you're offline.

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Adobe are running out of ideas - there is no reason to upgrade these days - what's new?  Nothing worth paying for.  This is a way to get money they wouldn't get from upgrades which I'm sure less and less people are buying.  Si long as Lightroom stays as a single product - i.e. without subscription I don'r really care.

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Remember though, although its called creative cloud, it's not a true cloud product, software and files reside on local drives, not in the cloud. You only have to connect to the web at intervals for the license to check its valid, it's only a cloud license...

 

Indeed until the day you have a problem revalidating your license and then you don't have access any more.

 

What happens if you are working remotely on a 3G card and you happen to be in a validation window and you have a problem. Do they have a grace period or is that it, your software is disabled?

 

Andrew

Below is a quote from the Adobe FAQ. I am not clear what it means though. It seems to be contradictory - you are asked to connect every 30 days but you can use the products for 180 days even if offline???

 

Do I need ongoing Internet access to use my Creative Cloud desktop applications?

No.  Your Creative Cloud desktop applications (such as Photoshop and Illustrator) are installed directly on your computer, so you won't need an ongoing Internet connection to use them on a daily basis.

 

You will need to be online when you install and license your software. If you have an annual membership, you'll be asked to connect to the web to validate your software licenses every 30 days.  However, you'll be able to use products for 180 days even if you're offline.

 

I think this means that the software will attempt to connect to the licence server every thirty days but you can still use it for 180 days if the connection fails.

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I've stuck with CS3 for the same reason as others, that an ageing Mac struggles with higher spec software - and anyway, my OS is staying as is for the foreseeable future too until the machine gives up the ghost or that it can't take updates any more. It all works, my workflow is fast, I pass QC - and that's a big deal for me.

 

My main worry though, is with Lightroom. Adobe have left LR out of the subscription-led Creative Cloud which is a relief but I don't doubt they'll include it in the future. It's been bad enough with the prospect of losing my beloved iView catalogue system at some point without losing Lightroom to subscription too.  

 

(Edited) Here is what they say about Lightroom though I'm not sure what they actually mean: 

[bryan O'Neil Hughes] Lightroom is for photographers. And the Lightroom team is very aware of the reaction by photographers to Photoshop CC. We don't have plans to make Lightroom a subscription-only option but we do envision added functionality for CC members using Lightroom.

 

Photoshop I could live without after some head-scratching so subscribing to a monthly sub? Never. 

 

Rgds,

Richard.

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Actually I think Adobe always had problems with its business model and this is one way of fixing it, though maybe not the obvious way.

 

(Bear in mind that I don't use Photoshop, and I haven't enjoyed my limited experience of it - I much prefer Paint Shop Pro - which is cheaper does the same job (and some of what Lightroom does too) - it has its disadvantages but so does Photoshop. I am not however under any illusion that Corel couldn't go the same way as Adobe.

 

Looking just at Photoshop, Adobe has two products: Elements and CS?. CS? is intended to be a professional product, and has been priced accordingly. Elements, an amateur product, ditto. Now, I know a lot of amateurs who use CS?, but almost without exception they are using pirated or at least semi-dodgy copies. This means that Adobe is missing out on the licence price of both Elements and CS?. By moving to a subscription model, Adobe can charge a professional price - if you are using it constantly then $20 a month isn't that much. Amateurs will have to decide whether to pay the professional price or to use Elements (or someone else's product). Either way, Adobe gets paid for what its users are using, which it will see as good news. Potentially the full version of PS will return to being a premium product, used by premium users, which is also good for image.

 

There is another approach, which could have been implemented as either a pay-up-front or subscription model. That is, they could have got rid of Elements and reduced the price of the full product so that fewer people would pirate it and more people (potentially) would use it - i.e. those who would neither pay the price nor pirate it on principle. However, this wouldn't make it the premium product they probably want it to be.

 

Simon

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Adobe has a large enough relative "monopoly" on this market segment that it can get away with what all large software providers have been hoping to implement for years.  Subscriptions are a very predictable revenue stream and make life a lot more pleasant for for a company.  It also has the benefit of taking a big bite out of software piracy.  The pirates might not buy the product, but subscriptions will make honest citizens out of a lot of people. 

 

Adobe really alienated me 18 months ago when they announced that CS4 wouldn't upgrade to CS6 when it came out.  I bought CS5 at the time because I just couldn't afford to be out of the upgrade cycle. Not long after I bought CS5, Adobe back-pedaled due to community pressure, but I had already spent the money.  To rub salt into the wound, Adobe brought out CS6 only a few months after I had upgraded to CS5.  Now I stuck again.

 

Adobe has been pushing the cloud idea for a while now and given their aggressive history, it seemed inevitable that they would try harder to force the subscription model.  IMHO, the only viable competitors with most Adobe products are open-source and I find open-source harder to learn most commercial products.  I use LightRoom for 90% of what I do but I still need Photoshop for somethings, like fixing stitch errors in panoramas. 

 

Adobe has been trying hard to get into a yearly update cycle.  Lightroom 4 was released in May of 2012 and LightRoom 5 will be out in a few weeks.  We're already on a subscription model, we just haven't realized it yet. 

 

I knew there was a reason I stayed away form the Alamy forum.  Too many things that I have no control over get discussed and then I get stressed by it all. 

 

Charles

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I've never been a fan of Adobe's somewhat high-handed attitude to their customers and getting help from them is painful.

 

Whatever happened to 'the customer is king'? Sounds to me like shooting yourself in the foot. I won't be subscribing. There are plenty of alternatives on the market.

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Well... From all the beginings I didn't liked ADOBE Suite at all... Too much bugs in their 'industry standard' software... Too much clicking in Adobe Illustrator... Too different user interfaces across Photoshop, Illustrator, AE and Premiere... There are better alternatives: Sony Vegas for video editing and even compositing (as AE), Corel Draw for vector drawing and prepress... Real artists use Corel Painter 12 which blows away any of Adobe's approaches... Nevertheless price for using Adobe suite online is too high and you need to have blast fast internet connection... So, NO THANKS Adobe... I am switching to packages where I can have faster production with less mouse clicking and even less bandwidth used... Ah yup... I forgot... If I pay for software I expect it to work as advertised - not as Adobe delivers it full of bugs which you must learn and find ways to avoid them!!! What is wrong with GIMP? It is free and it can help you do almost anything as photoshop...

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Adobe really alienated me 18 months ago when they announced that CS4 wouldn't upgrade to CS6 when it came out.  I bought CS5 at the time because I just couldn't afford to be out of the upgrade cycle. Not long after I bought CS5, Adobe back-pedaled due to community pressure, but I had already spent the money.  To rub salt into the wound, Adobe brought out CS6 only a few months after I had upgraded to CS5.  Now I stuck again.

Ditto exactly.  I shall wait and see but probably just stick with Lightroom and CS6 as long as possible.  Maybe I'll get used to a different workflow by doing RAW processing in Lightroom rather than Photoshop.

 

Pearl

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Looking just at Photoshop, Adobe has two products: Elements and CS?. CS? is intended to be a professional product, and has been priced accordingly. Elements, an amateur product, ditto. Now, I know a lot of amateurs who use CS?, but almost without exception they are using pirated or at least semi-dodgy copies. This means that Adobe is missing out on the licence price of both Elements and CS?. 

Before Elements there was PhotoShop LE which came packaged with most scanners. For years Adobe offered various upgrade paths so users of LE and the Educational versions could upgrade to the full version for $150 to $300. Just because someone is an amateur, or doesn't make enough money from photography to afford $700 for the full retain version, doesn't necessarily mean their copy of PhotoShop isn't legitimate.

 

However I will agree that there are a lot of pirated copies out there. That's a what happens when you price software so high and allow it to be activated by a half dozen serial numbers readily available over the internet.

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All of my non photography business software is hosted remotely and we pay a monthly fee per member of my firm to access that. Office 365 is based around a cloud subscription model with remote access. It's the way things are moving and it can offer advantages, but equally you might end up paying for unwanted "upgrades" in some cases.

 

I'd like to see the option of buying the suite or a subscription alternative. I suspect I would end up going with the subscription version.

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For people like me who use about 0.1% of photoshops capabilities, it will simply mean that market alternatives become a necessary option. 

 

The 20$ a month is fine if you use Photoshop's full capabilities but I think Adobe are going to find out how few people do use more than a small percentage. 

 

Now if Apple add a basic layers capability to Aperture X, I would not need to consider Adobe, ever again.

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It's not about us guys . Photogs using PS are probably a very small percentage of the overall Adobe user environment. Quite frankly, I'm surprised that Adobe has taken so long to recognize where their main user base is, and it ain't us. Many other software companies moved to subscription licencing for commercial use many years ago.

 

I'm a retired CIO heading a large IT branch in the public sector. Subscription licencing was simply the way we did most of our software licencing. It helped in many ways, mainly through budgeting. For us it was win-win. It helped us, and it also helped the software vendors in terms of budgeting and cash flow.. These are big issues in larger organizations.

 

However, it doesn't help us smaller users it seems but that is the way it is. There are other alternatives.

 

Ken

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Alternatives such as sticking with what you have. Such as LR2 and PS7.

And a perfectly valid approach it that's what suite us as individuals. Unfortunately, I'm a bit of a tech head that needs new stimulus from time to time, so I generally bite the bullet and spend the money. But that's only me.

 

Ken

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Looking just at Photoshop, Adobe has two products: Elements and CS?. CS? is intended to be a professional product, and has been priced accordingly. Elements, an amateur product, ditto. Now, I know a lot of amateurs who use CS?, but almost without exception they are using pirated or at least semi-dodgy copies. This means that Adobe is missing out on the licence price of both Elements and CS?. 

Before Elements there was PhotoShop LE which came packaged with most scanners. For years Adobe offered various upgrade paths so users of LE and the Educational versions could upgrade to the full version for $150 to $300. Just because someone is an amateur, or doesn't make enough money from photography to afford $700 for the full retain version, doesn't necessarily mean their copy of PhotoShop isn't legitimate.

 

However I will agree that there are a lot of pirated copies out there. That's a what happens when you price software so high and allow it to be activated by a half dozen serial numbers readily available over the internet.

That's almost exactly what I was saying.

 

I wasn't accusing any particular person of software piracy... just stating that many people in my social (photographic) circle seem to take it as almost axiomatic that one has a knocked off copy of Photoshop - I wouldn't say that everyone has exactly acquired it by nefarious means, but I'm sure it wouldn't meet the licence conditions.

 

Comparing Photoshop with a specialist tool for servicing my car... I would work out how much it costs, how often I am likely to use it, and how long it will last before it breaks, becomes useless or obsolete. If that comparison is favourable, I might buy it... if it isn't I'll either get by without it or take my car to the garage to be fixed. To unwind the analogy, I might buy/subscribe to Photoshop or use something cheaper or "free" - Adobe is reasonably closing the door on the option of stealing it.

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Sorry, but I couldn't resist linking to this You tube video:

 

 

Please note that the video contains quite a bit of swearing (all fake subtitles) and is not for the easily offended. Personally, I think its an hilarious take on the situation and actually raises some serious points.

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I'm not convinced about the subscription model, although it clearly works for certain software companies. For instance, Sage have just released their results, having recently moved to a subscription base, The following is a quote from The Telegraph:

 

"Revenues grew 5pc to £708.1m. Sage said its strategy of moving customers away from standalone software packages onto subscription-based online was paying dividends. Sales of Sage One, its entry level subscription for small businesses, grew four-fold in the past year to 11,500, for instance"

 

Regarding piracy, Adobe themselves seem to admit that it won't stop that. Their VP of Creative Solutions said in an interview on DPReview:

 

"While service options that connect to our servers are inherently less prone to piracy, once a user downloads software to their computer the piracy threat is the same as for our perpetual products".

 

So it does all seem to be about cash flow for the company. Although their high end commercial users might accept the change, there are a lot of professional photographers who probably won't. As a user of Photoshop since its very first incarnation, I'm one of this who is very reluctant to move to a subscription model.

 

Ian

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