Has Adobe gone too far?

Last November, Adobe announced that they were going to stop "version-skippers" by not providing upgrade discounts except from the immediately previous release. Unsurprisingly, this brought a howl of protest. Scott Kelby argued that this change was made without warning, and in January Adobe announced that the policy change was being delayed until January 1, 2013. It's still going to happen.

http://www.dpreview.com/news/2011/11/22/AdobeUpgradeCriticism
http://www.dpreview.com/news/2012/01/12/AdobeUpgradePolicy

Tuesday, Adobe announced that there is a critical security issue in Photoshop CS5.5 and earlier. Their solution: "Adobe has released Adobe Photoshop CS6 (paid upgrade), which addresses these vulnerabilities."

Following another howl of protest, Adobe announced on Friday that they would create a fix for Photoshop CS5. Users of earlier releases will have to upgrade to CS6 to fix the security vulnerabilities.

http://www.adobe.com/support/security/bulletins/apsb12-11.html

Adobe Illustrator and Flash Professional also were announced as having security vulnerabilities, with the solution being to upgrade to CS6. As with Photoshop, Adobe back-pedaled and now is working on fixes for the CS5 versions.

For the professional, regular upgrades are a cost of business. But how much longer are amateurs going to stand for this? And is there any reason to trust that Lightroom and Photoshop Elements will be treated differently?

--

The LightZombie Project: volunteers providing support for LightZone. http://lightzombie.org/

Doug Pardee said:

Last November, Adobe announced that they were going to stop "version-skippers" by not providing upgrade discounts except from the immediately previous release. Unsurprisingly, this brought a howl of protest. Scott Kelby argued that this change was made without warning, and in January Adobe announced that the policy change was being delayed until January 1, 2013. It's still going to happen.

http://www.dpreview.com/news/2011/11/22/AdobeUpgradeCriticism
http://www.dpreview.com/news/2012/01/12/AdobeUpgradePolicy

Tuesday, Adobe announced that there is a critical security issue in Photoshop CS5.5 and earlier. Their solution: "Adobe has released Adobe Photoshop CS6 (paid upgrade), which addresses these vulnerabilities."

Following another howl of protest, Adobe announced on Friday that they would create a fix for Photoshop CS5. Users of earlier releases will have to upgrade to CS6 to fix the security vulnerabilities.

Click to expand...

If these users haven't had problems over the years they've been using these earlier versions, they are probably just fine. If you use a firewall and allow/disallow when a program like Photoshop to access the internet, you will be fine with a program with security "flaws". It seems like Adobe is telling you the sky is falling and you are running to higher ground without ever looking up!

Doug Pardee said:

http://www.adobe.com/support/security/bulletins/apsb12-11.html

Adobe Illustrator and Flash Professional also were announced as having security vulnerabilities, with the solution being to upgrade to CS6. As with Photoshop, Adobe back-pedaled and now is working on fixes for the CS5 versions.

For the professional, regular upgrades are a cost of business. But how much longer are amateurs going to stand for this? And is there any reason to trust that Lightroom and Photoshop Elements will be treated differently?

--

The LightZombie Project: volunteers providing support for LightZone. http://lightzombie.org/

Click to expand...

GIMP expected to release a 16-bit version with a new internal engine before the year ends. Very early developer versions ( quite unstable ) are available in the current git repository, I understand.

And Photoshop isn't the only game in town. Only people doing very heavyweight graphics work need full-blown Photoshop and I think Adobe are going to find a lot of people opting for alternatives, like GIMP or Corel's products. I'm surprised more people don't go for Aftershot Pro.

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StephenG

Photoshop isn't the only game in town, but it certainly is the best. Adobe have been refining Photoshop for many years now and it is hard to conceive any alternative coming close to providing the features and usability of Photoshop. The other big factor, and possibly the most significant, is the vast support for Photoshop in terms of tutorials, actions, and plug-ins. No other program comes close to the third party support Photoshop enjoys.

Before switching to Photoshop I was a fan of Corel Photopaint. After taking time to learn Photoshop it became obvious just how superior Adobe have made their product. Gimp's interface and feature set were so crude at that time that it was not a serious competitor. Elements is a joke for anyone doing serious photo work, as it is terribly crippled and has a wretched user interface (I tried a current version not long ago).

I hope the new Gimp can compete, as Photoshop updates are just too expensive, especially on an annual basis. Nonetheless, I love my NIK plug-ins and custom actions. Guess CS3 can be my friend for a few more years.

--
-Gene L.
http://www.ttl-biz.com
http://www.studiography.blogspot.com

Doug Pardee said:

But how much longer are amateurs going to stand for this?

Click to expand...

If they are not happy they can write their own software. Elements goes for 80$ new and considering those same amateurs spend several thousand dollars to buy cameras to take snaps of their children and pets and birdies in the back yard I can't be too concerned when they get cheap regarding software to run it ...well, concerned at all actually.

The next post is invariably like the one above citing Elements (incorrect comparison), how CS whatever is so much better than anything else (for trained graphics professionals, you get no argument from me. For everyone else? even the brothers who created PS way back when publicly acknowledged how huge the program got, and so created LR), and on and on.

No one directly discusses the value proposition of a program approaching $1K used for general photography purposes. It's fascinating to me to see how LR's prices have declined, while its capabilities have grown and improved. Not so with CS.....

When you now have the founder and head of NAPP, and many others, howling about these proposed onerous changes, yet Adobe twisting and backtracking while all the while moving forward with these policies-----I wonder how long before Abobe winds up having a Kodak moment.
--
tex_andrews

"Photography is the product of complete alienation" Marcel Proust

"I would like to see photography make people despise painting until something else will make photography unbearable." Marcel Duchamp

I think the problem is that amateurs are expecting a pro product for an elements price. The same problem exists in hardware as well. How many times on this forum have you read someone saying, "well I'd buy a 5D 3 if it had 1D X fiocusing and FPS", or "I'll buy a D800 when it has D4 high ISO". PS 6 and PS6 Extended are pro products and are priced as such, the same as hardware is. There's this endless perception that software is somehow 'free'. The good news is that much like hardware, there is trickle down and high end features do end up in lesser priced products. For me, I do colour management and raw conversion in Light Room 3 and cropping and resizing in Paintshop Pro X. I will probably upgrade to LR4 sometime soon, but frankly I can do everything I need, as an amateur, in LR3 / Paintshop Pro X. I have used PS5 extensively, and whilst I like it, I can't justify it. I didn't get on as well with PS6 when I downloaded the beta and unless I start earning substantial sums from my photography (unlikely!) I won't be paying for it. As a professional in the IT industry I won't be pirating it either.

Perhaps Adobe should continue to provide critical fixes for a period after the release of a new product, but frankly, the possiblity of being caught by these is remote at best. You've had the flaw for a long time by now anyway!

Retired for two years now. Before that, as a multimedia designer for a fortune 100 company, I used old Photoshop 7 and new Xara Designer Pro for illustration work. Never saw any need to upgrade Photoshop, actually... and I dropped Adobe back at version CS when I opened a stock photo of a dollar bill and got this insane warning notice (pounds and euros, too).

Here's a professional's secret: you don't need the latest version. Because at work, it's not really about your art -- it's about selling the product, in marketing or advertising, and the art is there to enhance the product's features but never to be noticed for itself, as that would weaken the selling message.

Today, as an amateur photographer, I use Corel Aftershot and Xara. I shoot mostly JPGs with an XZ-1, and post-processing is easy -- lower brightness a bit, increase contrast a bit, maybe increase color saturation a little -- and -- very carefully -- sharpen slightly. Now and then, for RAW images, the Olympus software lets me easily change the color balance and gradation for tricky shots.

Sadly, Adobe's gone down the bloatware route for a long time now. I could easily buy at least one new XZ-1 every year, or perhaps a new DSLR, with what I'd have to spend on their upgrades.

Two bright spots, though. Adobe Acrobat Pro is excellent, and old versions work just fine. Also, a friend tells me that Adobe Premiere Elements is all you need to make great videos, but that one I'll leave for my grandchildren.

jon404 said:

Here's a professional's secret: you don't need the latest version. Because at work, it's not really about your art -- it's about selling the product, in marketing or advertising, and the art is there to enhance the product's features but never to be noticed for itself, as that would weaken the selling message.

Click to expand...

Many of us who use Photoshop are not using it in a professional way but purely as a tool for expressing/playing with artistic impression. In that regard...it is the best out there IMO. I just upgraded from CS4 to CS6 and find it well worth the cost of upgrade.

jon404 said:

Today, as an amateur photographer, I use Corel Aftershot and Xara. I shoot mostly JPGs with an XZ-1, and post-processing is easy -- lower brightness a bit, increase contrast a bit, maybe increase color saturation a little -- and -- very carefully -- sharpen slightly. Now and then, for RAW images, the Olympus software lets me easily change the color balance and gradation for tricky shots.

Click to expand...

I too am just an amateur photographer but only shoot RAW and can't see downgrading the capability I've gotten used to with CS4 and now CS6. Even if they go to a $200 every 18 month version....it's still way cheaper than my cable bill and gives me much more enjoyment Your take is just as valid though and should be respected. Good Luck

Most people on this forum would be fine using Paint Shop Pro. It is far more easier to use and at a fraction of the price. GIMP is a joke since it can't do 16bit.

Yes, but most will put up and shut up as changing the workflow would be more expensive for most people who really need powerful software. Alternatively, those who don't need the "latest and greatest" can use cheaper solutions. I am not defending Adobe as my wife deals with another software company - Autodesk. And Adobe seems to be Autodesk's apprentice for some time, now they finally mastered it. AutoCad is usually released annually, no free upgrades and if there was a bug in release - no excuse, no sorry. The solution - release new version (2013 has been out for a while, I guess 2014 will come out by September this year). Of course, "upgrade" means going only from the previous version....

But these "vulnerabilities" with Adobe products are quite symptomatic IMO....luckily they don't write anti-virus software (paid, of course). Just imagine how popular would be any OS if "vulnerabilities" require paid upgrade (instead of free updates for both Win and MAC OS). Luckily, Adobe or AutoDesk don't write that either...

if someone can tell me I should buy a package of a dozen environments,
to deal with a few happy snaps, and somehow master them all,
I'ld be interested.
Photoshop Suites are what the boss pays for,
the rest of us have alternatives.
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Their 0.5 upgrade to CS5. As far as I'm concerned a CS5 to CS6 upgrade is upgrading to the next version - CS5 to 5.5 was not, ESPECIALLY since Photoshop was not upgraded. But since I didn't 'upgrade' to 5.5, I get to pay $750 for my Design Premium upgrade instead of $375 that CS5.5 owners get.

Doug Pardee said:

Last November, Adobe announced that they were going to stop "version-skippers" by not providing upgrade discounts except from the immediately previous release. Unsurprisingly, this brought a howl of protest. Scott Kelby argued that this change was made without warning, and in January Adobe announced that the policy change was being delayed until January 1, 2013. It's still going to happen.

http://www.dpreview.com/news/2011/11/22/AdobeUpgradeCriticism
http://www.dpreview.com/news/2012/01/12/AdobeUpgradePolicy

Tuesday, Adobe announced that there is a critical security issue in Photoshop CS5.5 and earlier. Their solution: "Adobe has released Adobe Photoshop CS6 (paid upgrade), which addresses these vulnerabilities."

Following another howl of protest, Adobe announced on Friday that they would create a fix for Photoshop CS5. Users of earlier releases will have to upgrade to CS6 to fix the security vulnerabilities.

http://www.adobe.com/support/security/bulletins/apsb12-11.html

Adobe Illustrator and Flash Professional also were announced as having security vulnerabilities, with the solution being to upgrade to CS6. As with Photoshop, Adobe back-pedaled and now is working on fixes for the CS5 versions.

For the professional, regular upgrades are a cost of business. But how much longer are amateurs going to stand for this? And is there any reason to trust that Lightroom and Photoshop Elements will be treated differently?

--

The LightZombie Project: volunteers providing support for LightZone. http://lightzombie.org/

Click to expand...

--
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Even if you can't donate, please help spread the word.

I don't think they've gone too far. They have to right to test what the market will bear just like any other company. If it's a bad gamble, then maybe they will pay. If it succeeds, they will make more money. Isn't this how business always works? If enough people don't want to pay for it, there will be another product to come up and take its throne.

It's typical behavior for them - they jacked prices way up when they were the only source for PS fonts, back about 20 years ago.

When the encoding was cracked and clone fonts could be had, the price plunged.

Right now, they have LR4 for $175, and CS6 for $700. And nothing in between. There's a bit of price gouging going on, even if CS6 is a fine product.

If a serious competitor to PS arises, and they start losing customers, their prices will moderate.

Doug Pardee said:

For the professional, regular upgrades are a cost of business. But how much longer are amateurs going to stand for this? And is there any reason to trust that Lightroom and Photoshop Elements will be treated differently?

Click to expand...

I think this is a fair question.

I have been using Photoshop since long before Adobe bought it and know it fairly well (for an amateur). I am on PS CS4 now but I only use it for a few percent of my photos.

I will try to stay with CS4 and hope when it becomes is obsolete that I have found other solution. I know that the biggest problem is the learning curve for a new relatively sophisticated product.

And for the little use I have for PS, the upcoming move to Adobes cloud based solution with a monthly cost is not an option for me.

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slappo

The trend will probably be to jack up the price for the desktop software to strong arm encourage people to go with the cloud subscription. However, at $50 per month the subscription makes no sense for those of us who only need Photoshop. For those who use several Adobe Creative Suite applications it might not be so bad.

$600 per year is a lot of money for something that turns to dust if you stop paying the subscription fee. At least my CS6 will continue to work for the next few years (even though Adobe support told people they would have to upgrade in order to work on Win7-64).

I'm all for competition. By the way, anyone who hasn't tried Corel AfterShot Pro should give it serious consideration before handing money over to Adobe. This is the first time I've seen a software product bought (Bibble) and then actually improved for the rebrand.
--
-Gene L.
http://www.ttl-biz.com
http://www.studiography.blogspot.com

???

Adobe released version 1 back in like 1990. You were an original developer I assume?

slappo said:

I have been using Photoshop since long before Adobe bought it and know it fairly well (for an amateur).

Click to expand...

pocketfulladoubles said:

???

Adobe released version 1 back in like 1990. You were an original developer I assume?

Click to expand...

Sorry - you are right, my mistake.

I have been using photoshop since version 3 - but didn't remember it as an Adobe product :-(

--
slappo

TrapperJohn said:

Right now, they have LR4 for $175, and CS6 for $700. And nothing in between. There's a bit of price gouging going on, even if CS6 is a fine product.

If a serious competitor to PS arises, and they start losing customers, their prices will moderate.

Click to expand...

A serious competitor will also have to charge quite a lot. While Adobe charges all the market will bear, there is a problem with the traditional business model for software. It takes quite a number of expensive people to keep something like Photoshop working efficiently over time as the specific algorithms likely need upgrading to get the best out of successive generations of processor and OS upgrades. Intel makes some processor architecture yearly with significant changes every couple of years with no end in sight. Microsoft and Apple periodically change their operating systems. Keeping something like Photoshop current takes a significant cash flow.

Software companies have long had the problem of how to have a relatively constant cash flow to pay wages and expenses. When a product is new, new purchases solve the problem but when a product becomes more mature, the cash flow problem is more difficult. Periodic updates at some cost has been the old solution but that model has not seemed to work all that well. Too many folks use older versions for extended times. Forced obsolescence is sometimes done but that really irritates customers. The newest solution involves subscribing for a capability at some monthly or yearly cost. Time will tell how this all works out.

Competition may or may not help with pricing as driving the price too low may mean that Photoshop may not survive. I would be very unhappy with that. Yes, I will pay whatever they charge. A little perspective helps, though. If I add up what I invest in computer hardware, displays, printers, cameras, lenses, etc., it is hard to get too worked up over Adobe's update pricing.
--
Leon
http://pws.prserv.net/leons_pics/landscapes.htm