Adobe subscription - anyone getting tired of paying

[mollyc]

One thing I don't like about the subscription model is that if or when you decide to stop paying the subscription, you know longer have access to the software you "paid" for and you won't be able to open your files in older versions of software you may have bought such as CS6 (Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Acrobat, etc.). Am I wrong with this assumption?

I think you would be able to open them in a legacy standalone program (or even something like PS Elements for PS files) but not all the the filters/adjustment layers/etc. would work properly. I guess in theory there should always be a stamped layer to at least have a full rendering of the file if you can't make further adjustments to it.

 

[whiteonline]

One thing I don't like about the subscription model is that if or when you decide to stop paying the subscription, you know longer have access to the software you "paid" for and you won't be able to open your files in older versions of software you may have bought such as CS6 (Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Acrobat, etc.). Am I wrong with this assumption?

With regards to Lightroom CC: When your subscription ends, you still have access to your existing photos and edits. With that access, you can view and export images. However, you cannot make further changes. This all seems pretty fair.

Regarding the other applications, it would be best to export your work before ending the subscription. It seems Adobe does not allow for further access to CC apps. Obviously, newer file formats most likely wont work with older software versions.

To your point of software you "paid" for, CC subscribers are not paying for (purchasing) software. We are paying for access to the software.

 

[mavericks7913]

One thing I don't like about the subscription model is that if or when you decide to stop paying the subscription, you know longer have access to the software you "paid" for and you won't be able to open your files in older versions of software you may have bought such as CS6 (Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Acrobat, etc.). Am I wrong with this assumption?

Yup but the subscription price is really cheap that you just need to pay around $100 per year. I dont think pro users can not afford that amount of money since they are working as a professional workers. Even students can afford for Adobe subscription annually. Before CC, it was totally impossible to use adobe programs due to their prices over $1000 per each.

 

[Apple fanboy]

Yup but the subscription price is really cheap that you just need to pay around $100 per year. I dont think pro users can not afford that amount of money since they are working as a professional workers. Even students can afford for Adobe subscription annually. Before CC, it was totally impossible to use adobe programs due to their prices over $1000 per each.

LR used to cost about £100.

 

[robgendreau]

With regards to Lightroom CC: When your subscription ends, you still have access to your existing photos and edits. With that access, you can view and export images. However, you cannot make further changes. This all seems pretty fair.

Regarding the other applications, it would be best to export your work before ending the subscription. It seems Adobe does not allow for further access to CC apps. Obviously, newer file formats most likely wont work with older software versions.

To your point of software you "paid" for, CC subscribers are not paying for (purchasing) software. We are paying for access to the software.

Yes.

The only Lr modules that quit working are Develop and Maps (they have to pay Google for those). I've seen reports that develop presets still work, though. So you still have access to everything. In fact it might be worth it as a free option, since there are so many raw developers and editing programs you could use. Just keep Lr for organization. Or Bridge, since that's free.

Ps is a different matter. But OTOH if you had an older (and more expensive) perpetual license, and it no longer worked cuz you upgraded OSs or something, you'd be in the same boat. At least with Ps, as opposed to say Affinity, the file format works to a certain extent with lots of other programs. You pretty much lose layers, in that they're flattened. But hey, if you copy of Word no longer works, or Appleworks, or Filemaker, or Access, or whatever you've got a similar problem. Sometimes you get what you pay for...althought there's a lot of good free open source stuff out there for folks that are willing to try it, and learn how to use it.

 

[pwhitehead]

I only pay $249 a year.. One job pays for it x10, no brainer.. Creative Cloud is the best thing that has ever happened for me.

 

[EnderBeta]

I'm a big believer in paying for something that I feel I'm getting value from. This is one reason, I buy Macs, I feel the hardware/software offers some nice advantages.

With that said, I'm seriously re-thinking my decision to go all in on LR, after migrating from Aperture a couple of years ago.

While 10 dollars a month doesn't sound bad, but I'm not sure I'm getting value for my 120 dollars a year. When was the last major upgrade to LR? See, for some applications, I was in the habit of not upgrading annually, and so on. I'm not sure of the handful of updates that have trickled out of Adobe make it worthwhile. Doing some googling, I see that LR6 came out in April 2015, so that means I'll have paid 240+ dollars for LR7 if that rolls out in April of 2017 but if I didn't have the subscription, odds are high that I'd not upgrade anyways.

I like the ability of using PS as well, and that was the final straw that drew me into the subscription model, but truth be told, I don't use PS very much at this point.

I'm not sure what I'm asking other then if others feel the same, either as a current subscriber or deciding against LR subscription mode from the get go.

My needs for photo editing are not as robust. I mostly have to make icons for buttons and other interface objects for Crestron and AMX panels. I make the best of Adobe Photoshop Elements 13 on my iMac. I'd love to have the full fledged software because there are times I have to work around the limitations of the gimped software. The truth is though I don't really need the full version of the software.

I personally feel that the subscription model invites laziness.

That said I have Office 2016 through work and I do see that it has been getting updated a little bit here and there. I don't use the software in a high end capacity though so I couldn't say what all the features really are for but I do know they just put out a update for the touch bar.

I guess if Adobe was a little quicker with the updates $10 per month wouldn't seem too bad to me. It really depends on if I see my issues being addressed consistently.

 

[Evil Spoonman]

There is no argument that the Photography Suite at $10/month USD, or the full Creative Suite at $50/month USD, is a great deal. If you are a creative professional and your day to day work involves 2-3 Adobe applications. This is cheaper than before, and you get access to more tools. It's a win.

The issues appear at the edges in the following forms (no particular order):

1. Subscription Fatigue
2. Long-Term Data Access
3. Casual Cost-To-Use Ratio

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1. Subscription fatigue is what happens when you start paying for many things monthly. It gets hard to keep track of, hard to ascertain the value per dollar. Backblaze, iTunes storage upgrade, other software services, cellular, personal costs like internet, utilities, car, mortgage... add Adobe CC. It starts to overwhelm. People will, rightly, look to minimize recurring monthly expenses.

2. What happens if you stop paying? Your data is now inaccessible. You can't archive an old version of the application along with your files. For an artist, the portfolio is important. Being able to reach back into your history of work is critical. All Adobe applications should offer graceful feature loss like Lightroom. When your license has expired with LR, you can still access and export your catalogue.

3. For more casual users, paying that $50/month for something you only use sometimes is hard to stomach. It would be great if it was possible to access in a more granular way. A daily or hourly price model would be much more serviceable. In the same way modern VPS company like Linode or Digital Ocean charges hourly up to a cap. This allows a lot of flexibility to dip into an application for making a resume, or a website, or accessing your work history. Pay a few bucks, but not $50.


My thoughts as a somewhat resentful CC subscriber looking to move to Affinity/Capture One/etc...

 

[mavericks7913]

LR used to cost about £100.

It comes with photoshop and they dont sell LR by itself anymore.

 

[Apple fanboy]

It comes with photoshop and they dont sell LR by itself anymore.

Still using my copy of LR 6. Does what I need. I'll upgrade to CC when I can see the benefit.

 

[someoldguy]

It comes with photoshop and they dont sell LR by itself anymore.

Sure they do .....

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/buy/Photo-Imaging-Software/ci/13290/N/3988161558

 

[robgendreau]

2. What happens if you stop paying? Your data is now inaccessible. You can't archive an old version of the application along with your files. For an artist, the portfolio is important. Being able to reach back into your history of work is critical. All Adobe applications should offer graceful feature loss like Lightroom. When your license has expired with LR, you can still access and export your catalogue.

3. For more casual users, paying that $50/month for something you only use sometimes is hard to stomach. It would be great if it was possible to access in a more granular way. A daily or hourly price model would be much more serviceable. In the same way modern VPS company like Linode or Digital Ocean charges hourly up to a cap. This allows a lot of flexibility to dip into an application for making a resume, or a website, or accessing your work history. Pay a few bucks, but not $50.


My thoughts as a somewhat resentful CC subscriber looking to move to Affinity/Capture One/etc...

I agree that it would be nice if Adobe let Ps continue to function at least to say export layers or do some other stuff, as Lr does. But Lr is working on files it doesn't change; Ps is making what are still proprietary files, PSDs, even though tons of other stuff can open them. And in any case once your copy of Ps no longer works (cuz you've moved on to newer systems, or changed platform, or don't work there, or whatever) you've got the same problem. My older version of Capture One died not long after I bought it, after I had upgraded my OS, and I didn't wanna pay the upgrade fee, and I couldn't even open it without going to an old clone with the old system. So it's a problem pretty common to all proprietary stuff.

I'd suspect that most who worry about the subscription probably, by definition, don't need Ps/Lr. I do wish they had some more breakdowns like the older creative packages; I don't need ALL the stuff in the whole shebang, but I would like to add Premiere to Ps/Lr; I'd subscribe to that.

 

[Padaung]

I do wish they had some more breakdowns like the older creative packages; I don't need ALL the stuff in the whole shebang, but I would like to add Premiere to Ps/Lr; I'd subscribe to that.

That's a great idea. A 'Build your own bundle' sort of thing, allowing a subscriber to choose their favourite 3 or 4 aps for a certain amount of money per month would be great. More flexible than the current 3 options.

Any app
Ps/Lr bundle
Entire suite

I'd also like a Lr/Ps/Pr combo.

 

[Fravin]

Am I wrong with this assumption?

No you aren't. It's about the business. That's why it's cost is so low. You are paying for a license of all Adobe's product by a small fee.

It's a great business model for everybody and it works based on your point here. You have to pay, but it's an acceptable price. It's a fair business for you and Adobe.
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...but I would like to add Premiere to Ps/Lr; I'd subscribe to that.

Down Here, in Brazil you can "add" a single app in your Photographer plan. It cost twice the PS/LR price, but it will be less than All products. Check it out. It's In Brazilian currency, in US dollars it's about $9,99 for the PS/LR, $21 for a single app and $58 for all of then.

 

[mavericks7913]

Sure they do .....

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/buy/Photo-Imaging-Software/ci/13290/N/3988161558

Adobe does not sell them in their website. They only have CC version. Also, LR CC have more functions than LR 6 such as haze.

 

[Altis]

One thing I don't like about the subscription model is that if or when you decide to stop paying the subscription, you know longer have access to the software you "paid" for and you won't be able to open your files in older versions of software you may have bought such as CS6 (Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Acrobat, etc.). Am I wrong with this assumption?

You're right -- it's like a lease.

If you pay $600 to purchase software, you own it indefinitely (or until it's too outdated to function properly).

If you subcribe to it, you might pay $200 a year for the software.

After 3 years, you could have owned the full version, and if you stop paying the subscription, you have nothing.

I don't mind the idea of a subscription model entirely as it makes the payments consistent, effectively amortizing the upgrade costs to a monthly fee. However, I find software updates are becoming less and less beneficial, so you might get a long usable life by purchasing rather than subscribing (as it assumes regular updates).

I suspect that's part of why many companies are moving to subscription-based software: if people have to evaluate the need to upgrade, they might not see a point; so it's easier to have it automatic. People are also attracted to low-payment options, even if the overall cost is higher because it's less easy to determine.

Personally, I cut the subscription for PS and LR and just went back to PS CS3 and LR4 because I own them already and I only use them casually, and not very often at that. I'd prefer to have CS6 as a baseline, but for now it's okay.

I do think that people like the idea of having the latest and greatest, but most software is so mature these days, I'm not sure how many of the new features the average person would pay for.

 

[someoldguy]

Adobe does not sell them in their website. They only have CC version. Also, LR CC have more functions than LR 6 such as haze.

https://www.adobe.com/products/cata...er_sl_catalog_sl_software_sl_mostpopular.html

Just looked here , they're still willing to take my money for a perpetual licence, but it's a download rather than a disc .

 

[robgendreau]

https://www.adobe.com/products/cata...er_sl_catalog_sl_software_sl_mostpopular.html

Just looked here , they're still willing to take my money for a perpetual licence, but it's a download rather than a disc .

If you wanna go retro, several retailers still sell DVD copies. Not sure if you can get it on floppies or CD though

 

[mavericks7913]

https://www.adobe.com/products/cata...er_sl_catalog_sl_software_sl_mostpopular.html

Just looked here , they're still willing to take my money for a perpetual licence, but it's a download rather than a disc .

Still, it's not included in their website officially.

 

[FredT2]

Still, it's not included in their website officially.

What exactly is "unofficial" about selling it from a page with all of the other Adobe products listed for sale? Ya, they don't make it easy to buy, they understandably would like to steer everyone to CC. But it is still for sale and it is being updated with new camera profiles with Camera Raw as they are released. If I still used Photoshop I would probably be on the subscription, but I don't and the few LR CC updates that have been released don't tempt me into getting it.

 

[Ted13]

I'm running Lightroom 6 (outright), Photoshop CS6 (outright) and Mac OSX 10.8.5 (the last good Mac OS). I'll worry about it when it breaks. You guys that want to have the latest all the time amuse me.

That's funny in many ways - and I guess everyone has their favorite Mac OS: I always thought Snow Leopard, not Mountain Lion was supposed to be "the last good one " That said I am indeed a latest macOS person (and absolutely love Sierra macOS 10.12.4) - the 100% effective Apple Watch Mac auto unlock is the best thing ever... That said when it comes to photo editing I am still clinging to Aperture 3.6, but still stuck subscribing to Adobe CC for the dreaded day when Aperture bites the dust