Adobe faces criticism for change of upgrade policy

What a mess.

I first caught wind of Adobe's move toward subscription-based pricing when trying out Adobe Muse; then, when investigating the seeming hole in Apple's iPad, being lack of integration through Apple TV and iPhoto - and found Carousel, which is also subscription-based.

I use the professional CS suite at work and at home, though at home I'm at CS3. However - based on what I've been reading - while I may continue using Adobe products at work, I will likely end my relationship with them on an independent level and actively seek and use alternatives. The only piece of the puzzle I am truly uncertain about is InDesign - any suggestions?

cheers
Andrew

Here we go...I'll tell you now, this won't fly. Just like BOA trying to charge you $5 a month to use your debit card. The people that make these decisions are disconnected from reality. The result will probably be flat revenue/profit change with a bonus of lost goodwill. People will do the full upgrade even less often...will seek competitive solutions..move to Elements...procure the software illegally, etc.

Fortunately, the solution is simple: Charge more to upgrade from older versions, and do so in a logical manner. Current version upgrades $150 (nice! and reasonable enough to incent peeople to regularly upgrade) one version older, $199. 2 versions older, 250. 3 versions older? Out of luck, no upgrade available.

If they MUST stick with their new policy, then at least make it $150 vs 199.

BTW, this pricing model screams "we can't inovate enough to make you WANT to upgrade on your own..."

Almsot as annoying as Apple charging $100 for 16GB of storage...and 200 for 48gb

I have to use CS5 and TS3 at work, and I am distinctly unimpressed with each so-called 'upgrade'. They contain just a few headline 'features' for the marketing team to shout about, but still contain plenty of old, slow, and very crude tools (compared with Corel programs). If the immense prices meant slick applications and fast responses by Adobe, the prices might be acceptable - but that's not the Adobe way is it? Installation takes forever, uninstallation still worse, requiring cleanup programs to remove the mess. The suite's applications don't store their data in a consistent format, so if you need to use another workstation it's virtually impossible to take your customizations across with you. And my pet hate is Acrobat, which gets more bloated, badly laid out, and inconsistent on each 'upgrade' - but still has lots of basic bugs.

It's astounding Adobe manage to hold its market position when the open source alternatives and user experience are so much more rewarding.

FastStone Image Viewer (a Lightroom-like program) and Gimp are outstanding free alternatives once you get used to their interfaces -- not every interface needs to look like Photoshop's to be effective. There's also significant third party open source support such as a plug in that will allow Gimp to run many of Photoshop's plugins. Photoshop is a great program -- but putting that money towards a nice collection of fast primes will do far more for your images. I know that this may not be the best solution for many professional Photoshop users, but it's an alternative worth considering for some.

I've always upgraded on every other Photoshop release, all the way back to Photoshop 3.0. Adobe never seemed to offer enough improvements to make it worthwhile on their release schedule, but I've found value by waiting an extra release cycle. I suspect many others will agree. I don't think I'm cheating Adobe for paying for six releases of their software over that time.

Hey Adobe, how about this: Deliver a new version of Photoshop half as frequently with twice the improvements and maybe everyone will decide the upgrade is worth it. Today's product planning simply extracts money from customers without delivering real benefit for what we pay. Adobe also needs to do a better job communicating with their customers so we get the features we need rather than what the developers think is cool.

I had been an Adobe photoshop follower since PS4 up until CS3. I then realized that every other year, they'd bring a so-called upgrade and ask for more money. I think in all, that software caused me a lot of money. I now work mostly with Corel. I've had all their photo apps up to the latest and it works fine and it's a lot cheaper. All the fancy Mac users will have you believe that you're not a real photographer if you don't use Adobe. My clients could not care less!

I've always upgraded every other version over the years from PS2, got as far as CS4, and then realised there was no point in going any further as my dear old trusty dual-core fast-ish PC (cutting-edge in its time, about 5 years ago) simply wouldn't work with CS5 - so no need for it.
So the decision's made: Adobe, I am NOT going to buy an entirely new computer just to run your expensive software on, and by the way I think you've behaved appallingly to all the many loyal users of your products over the years with horribly cynical 'upgrade paths', especially the dollar-for-pound ripoff prices that we've had to endure here in the UK for way too long.
Actually I'm very happy with what my PS CS4 does, and I'll not be giving Adobe any more cash from here on in - so stuff it, boys, this time you've gone too far and I will not be purchasing anything with your name on it in the future: So long, and thanks for what was once a great product!

I would recommend to everyone to take advantage of the rebates and upgrade to CS5 and then lets boycott Adobe buy stop buying there products we need to let them know what we think and the best way is through their wallet

Photoshop is $699 new, no CS crap included. If you're charging standard rates for graphics design, that's about one day's worth of work. I'm kind of failing to see the problem here.

I lost interest in Adobe when I bought my last camera and found out I would have to upgrade to be able to open my raw files????? They can charge what they want because I'm out and don't plan on getting back in!

I don't mind paying for Photoshop each year IF the upgrades are really worth it. The problem is, they are not by far.. You can simply miss a couple of versions, and still you can do 99% of the stuff you want to do anyway. Hey, so now I have 'Puppet warp' in CS5, cool. Can I live without it? Of course, the essential ingredients are already inside Photoshop, no matter if you work with CS1 or CS5. Adobe knows this, and because they own the market they are getting lazy. Lazy to add options that really make a difference, lazy to update their filters; all are ancient with little clumsy windows, nothing new. But the alternative software makers are not lazy, and soon someone, somewhere starts adding CMYK and RAW workflow. We can all predict how things will work out for Adobe when this is starting to happen. Because as soon as someone is offering a serious alternative that don't force people to pay for each upgrade, I know what I will do.

I like it! It's very American; Apple's been making stuff in China, Banks now charge customers exorbitant fees for their mistakes, so why is Adobe so late in the game? With any luck, CS6 won't run on the new computer I bought a month ago. Gotta love corporate tyranny.

For my income, Photoshop is very expensive, and yet through the years I have purchased two different versions. I guess I missed a few too many upgrades, and changed platforms, thus was told I would have to once again purchase for my new computer.

Sorry I just don't have enough respect to once again be asked to purchase for a third time.

I'm on Photoshop all day at work - where I don't have to pay for it. Just upgraded to 5 at home. Unless it starts making me money again (went from freelance to working for in-house for an agency), I won't be upgrading soon. Most of the newer 'improvements' aren't worth the price of admission. Bye Photoshop - trying to be like Quark, huh? Remember them?

I have CS5 for a couple of days now, upgraded from CS3. I haven't found any serious changes yet. The interface is a bit different, some navigation is a bit smoother (loop) and an interesting option called 'puppet warp' seems very nice, kind of like 'Liquify' which is use a lot. Filters are the same, as always, little clumsy micro-windows, nothing new. And to think this is a 2 versions upgrade from CS3, I really have to search for new stuff.. It is an upgrade, but c'mon Adobe.
A couple of years ago I bought a 3D program called 'ZBrush', very professional piece of software. So far, every upgrade is free for registered users, and this program has changed A LOT since I bought it. That's what I call good support, and they won't make me feel bad when they decide to charge for a new version as they have done so much for free so far. And as said, when there is an upgrade, it is really worth it.......

A couple of issues come to mind for me (in addition to a company trying to get more money out of its customers). 1) if they were to go to an all cloud based product , how would this effect people whose ISP put monthly limits on data usage? 2) What happens to people like myself who use Topaz Labs plug ins with a cloud based product.
Topaz Labs take your plug ins and turn them into a stand alone product! BTW Topaz does not charge current subscribers for updates. Here that Adobe????

Then they wonder why people use their software illegally. Why not try making it affordable.

A Netfilix like death spiral?

This is the perfect time for another brand to come in and take all Adobe's business away. Most of their software is incredibly bloated anyway.

I'll use my licensed and paid for CS5 software for as long as I can before "upgrading" - but when I do - it won't be to Adobe as long as this "subscription" scheme in is effect.

A common sense approach would be to sell the full version for $250. More people would buy it and I think revenues would increase. Frequent and free upgrades would limit pirating. Instead they choose monopoly rent and high pricing. A good time for an open source alternative to come along, something like PT GUI.

Much good on Scott Kelby for doing this.
(btw, his books/stuff helped get me going in photography.)

I'm not totally sure of the necessity to even keep upgrading. I have the CS5 creative suite, but I actually prefer to still use my old CS2 version especially Illustrator. There are many changes made to these latest versions I don't like- I don't actually feel at home with the new interfaces. I don't like having to go to the bother of learning some new and unecessary interface change.
I never upgraded to CS3 or CS4, but went from CS2 to CS5, but really for most work a photographer would do its just not necessary to keep upgrading and Adobe know this.

I've been a long time adobe customer and their monopolistic behavior has led to terrible customer service and absurd pricing schemes. It was a fiasco updating to 5.5, for which I paid considerably more for the upgrade than the one previously. Their CS also ignores complaints, or takes days to send pithy responses.

Frankly, the best way to hit Adobe in the wallet is the pirates. It takes an extra 5 minutes to install a well-tested trusted-source pirate version with easy step-by-step directions (and even youtube demonstration videos). And the pirates have better 'customer service' to boot!

I'd gladly keep paying Adobe, but only if the gouging ceased. And I was a customer of theirs for over a decade. But for now, I'll take the friendly pirate who likes sticking it to Adobe.

I am not a professional photographer by any means. I am a serious amateur who has been using Adobe Photoshop for over10 years. I start with version 5 and was hooked and used that version for years until I had to upgrade. Fortunately for me I could get an educational discount. I just upgraded to CS4 extended to CS5 Extended. The Content Fill and other features were worth the upgrade to me especially at 30%(Black Friday Sale). However that being said-in this economy-I cannot and will not feed this business or any other who insists on making a profit by picking the pockets of its customers. However the only way to stop this madness is not with our mouths but with our wallets. Just like with Bank Of America. If enough people open their mouths-close their wallets. I don't just mean amateurs but professionals in the industry like Scott Kelby and others and we all stand together and do not upgrade anything they will eventually throw in the towel.

Look at it this way. Adobe, Microsoft and probably Apple and the rest have learned a great lesson from Drug Dealers. They brought us in, got us hooked and now after they will tighten the screws. The idea is monthly payments, miss a monthly and you will be cut off, fined to reconnect, who knows how much that will be. I shoot a lot in remote areas where internet is sporadic. I am currently at a beach on the California coast, using Verizon wireless broadband. The connection goes in and out. Sometimes I cannot connect for hours, sometimes days. If I have to connect to use PS or possibly Microsoft it will put me and a lot of others back in the stone age of Photography. It may very well be that the last few remaining years of my life will be spent using Windows 7, CS5 and Lion.
Just wait until the Automotive industry catches up. OnStar can do it now. Miss a payment on your car, DMV or insurance, maybe even Income Tax and a Satellite will shut down your car or cars.......It's coming!

Here's what I think. Adobe isn't going to change their new upgrade policy until they see if it is making them more money than their current policy. If it does, it will stay, if it dosen't, well, we'll get an announcement about how Adobe listens to its customers and it'll be back to the old way. Forum comments, as much as they might relieve stress, are unlikely to have much effect. And as for Kelby's "open letter"..baloney! Kelby's business depends on Adobe and he'll do nothing to tick them off. If he really wanted to make a point, he could have told them not to change. What he did was just get a little free publicity in places like dpreview.com. I know that's cynical, but I'll bet a free up-grade, it's accurate!

I am putting this in because it didn't fit below. I was excited about Adobe's new template based web design software, it would have been a good replacement for iWeb. When I went to their site to download the BETA of Muse I found out that it would be a subscription based service. Adobe lost me right there. They lost a future customer before they even brought the product to market, stupid.
I hope someone comes out with reasonably priced versions of everything Adobe makes, I really don't think adobe really knows how much of a consumer product company they are (they are not Auto Desk they don't make products that only a hand full of people use in a professional setting). Adobe Cut the sh#t charge your academic price for the regular product and don't even think about selling subscriptions to your wares.

I have seen this trend to the monthly fee, and will avoid if at all possible buying products like these. Corel Paint Shop Pro & Silkypix offer excellent alternatives at a much lower price.

We also still need to hear why Adobe prices for downloads in Australia are much higher than the US prices.

I think we should boycott companies if we think they are trying to take advantage of us unfairly.