Adobe Offering Photoshop CC and Lightroom for $9.99/Month to Current Photoshop Owners

[Will do good]

As a creative director, I told my suppliers they can not use anything above CS6 for my projects. I wanted to make sure whatever they creates my art directors can open and update.

We won't be using any of this Adobe rental crap.

 

[zapnyc]

Rental.....purchase... blah blah blah....
The REAL issue is that Creative Suite & its parts have been overpriced for several years now.

I'm not saying they should offer Photoshop for $19.95... far from it. But it's 2013 and despite Adobe's professional rep, they should find a pricing sweet spot and sell buttloads *more* software to *more people*. The iTunes store proved that people will pay for something they were "stealing" if the price is right and a legit purchasing option takes into account their modern needs. Scaling that up works here.

The subscription scenario is an attempt to sidestep this issue. Keep the purchase price high enough for respect, but certainly lower than the eye-popping prices it's been historically.... *and* offer subscription options. Attack all fronts with a bit of humility and foster the Adobe love. The money will flow.

 

[ChrisA]

There is a lot of mis information here... If you rent Photoshop for $10/month and then one day decide you don't want it. You CAN still read your files. Photoshops stores your images in ".PSD". Lots of other software can read these files, for example Apple's Preview can open PSD files, Almost all graphic images editing software can access your files.

Now if you place the file on a cloud server and then loose access to the cloud server, then you have a problem. But there is no reason even if you rent Photoshop for $10/month to keep files on their cloud with no local backups.

So please STOP the compllaints about not being able to open your files, just use Preview, or whatever you like.

That said, there are reasons not to rent software, for example you don't know the further costs, they could triple next week for all we know. BUt on the other hand. There is no other option if you use Photoshop other then living for the rest of your life.

For those who think they need a working copy of PS to open theor PSD files, what happens if yur old version of PS stops working after some upgrade to Mac OS X. Eventually you will buy a new Mac that CAN NOT RUN your old copy of Photoshop. Yes this will happen one day. Maybe next year, maybe in 10 years. So it is a goof thing you do not need Photoshop to open your PSD files.

----------

I guess Adobe have not heard of Pixelmator then?

Any Photographer can get the excellent Pixelmator for a £10 one time payment,..

And if that is to much money Gimp is free. The problem is that people have spent years learning the Adobe software and don't like to switch.

I'd also add that Adobe Photoshop Elements does everything a photographer needs to do. It is not for graphic artists as much a photographers. You can still buy "Elements" outright. Or even get it free bundled with a Wacom tablet.

And for those who fare loosing the abilty to edit their PDS files if they loose access to Photoshop, just get Elements. It can open and edit layered PSD files.

 

[iMikeT]

I bet the powers that be at Adobe internally refer to "CC" as "Cash Cow" knowing how they're making a killing off the users who are stupid enough to think that this lease is a great deal.

I'm taking a Photoshop class alongside a photography class at a local community college and there are too many students and a few instructors who think this is a good thing. They all have bought into marketing jargon of "always stay up to date" with Cash Cow. What they don't realize is the fact that proficient users can make do with versions as far back as Photoshop 7.

It's also a shame that so many users are not technically savvy, therefore, dumbed down software like Lightroom has to exist. People need to know their tools before abandoning them for the next shiny tool they see.

 

[educate9]

Enslaving consumers with rental software won't work.

I have no desire to rent any software. It's a trap I don't want to get into.

I completely agree and I am so glad to see that the VAST majority are against this attempt to further enslave the consumer.

Steve Jobs had it right when he called Adobe "lazy". This has been Adobe's MO for a long time: "How can we make everyone enslaved to our programs, & charge outrageous fees?" FLASH is a great example. It was a great program, but the video side of it was a form of slavery. No way the consumer should be paying to create web video content, and sure enough it now looks like a foolish thing to even learn FLASH. I was fighting against this, but now I understand it... HTML5 has changed the way we think of web content.

Apple is not moving in the direction of rent-by-the-month software. OSX is now purchased and downloaded online, but once you own it, you don't have to keep paying each month to continue using it. Logic X and Final Cut are purchased at reasonable fees. (I am not even a fan of these, however I respect the fact that they are low cost alternatives to others...)

Native Instruments has an online-service-center, which checks in every time you open it. It keeps the programs from being pirated, however once you purchase KONTAKT, you own it! That seems like a fair deal.

Adobe, on the other hand, seems to want to be like Cable TV! Make you pay by the month..., relieving the company's pressure for upgrading and improving what they provide. Adobe is not providing content like cable. They are providing software! It is ludicrous to pay by the month!

We can expect innovation at Adobe to rapidly slow, as their rental slaves will have to keep paying just to use the current version. I have owned the MASTERS Adobe series since CS3, & upgraded every time. But this slavery rental system, I won't do it, no way, never. I certainly hope that the competition notes the reactions of users like myself, and provide much stronger competition for Adobe, just like they did with FLASH.

 

[chrono1081]

I guess Adobe have not heard of Pixelmator then?

Any Photographer can get the excellent Pixelmator for a £10 one time payment, instead of paying Adobe £10 per month forever! They can also get FREE online synced storage from DropBox or Google Drive and if they are into sharing stuff there is always Facebook. How is this an "Offer"?

Looks like Adobes feet could have holes in them eh?

This.

Too many people brush off Pixelmator without learning its capabilities. Most of those people are the "I want to feel pro so I think that means I can only use Photoshop" crowd.

Pixelmator IMO is one of the best image editing apps out there and it does a lot of things better than Photoshop (realtime gradient tool, better filters, much better Pen tool, etc) and its a lot faster than Photoshop.

 

[zync]

I really do not understand why Adobe keeps telling in all their advertisements that their clients WANT a subscription service. Who are these masked people?!?

We're not masked, we're producing work all around you. Most agencies I work with, and most freelancer/small businesses I work with have jumped on the bandwagon too. I realize there's a large set of people out there (you guys apparently) that think renting sucks. And you know, it does if you're the type that isn't using this stuff for work. But when an hour of my time each month basically pays for almost all the software I use, it's worth it.

It's easier to deal with and cheaper for entry, which makes it great for freelancers and small businesses. It's harder to justify paying $2500 up front if you use most of the programs like I do. So I could just devote less than an hour each month to paying for CC, or I can blow the entire profit on a small project. In my case, that's a no brainer. I'll keep my own capital for now, thanks.

And if I chose to upgrade a retail version next year it would cost the same as a year of CC. So to get the same savings, I'd have to skip basically 4 or 5 versions—and pay and extra $1900 for the first year of software.

I could easily make work on CS/2/3/4/5/6 because I've been using this software forever. I don't need features to accomplish what experience has given me. But Adobe also optimizes the software. And when you're rendering, and charging on project rates, it's nice to get your work done faster and more efficiently.

I wish Cinema 4D would take the same route, and all of the other C4D users I know have said the same thing.

----------

I bet the powers that be at Adobe internally refer to "CC" as "Cash Cow" knowing how they're making a killing off the users who are stupid enough to think that this lease is a great deal.

I'm taking a Photoshop class alongside a photography class at a local community college and there are too many students and a few instructors who think this is a good thing. They all have bought into marketing jargon of "always stay up to date" with Cash Cow. What they don't realize is the fact that proficient users can make do with versions as far back as Photoshop 7.

It's also a shame that so many users are not technically savvy, therefore, dumbed down software like Lightroom has to exist. People need to know their tools before abandoning them for the next shiny tool they see.

This is exactly the issue. Yes, you could make do with Photoshop 7. I could still outproduce people with 4 or 5. But you still have to put more money up front to get the product.

I should also mention that, I've done limited things with Lightroom, and I can make the same looks in both tools, but it's quicker in Lightroom to get most of the same looks, especially if you want to batch things.

 

[JAT]

Wow. That "conversation" was a pathetic sales attempt. Do they genuinely think people are stupid?

Sales people? Yes, yes they do.

 

[zync]

Steve Jobs had it right when he called Adobe "lazy". This has been Adobe's MO for a long time: "How can we make everyone enslaved to our programs, & charge outrageous fees?"

This is a matter of perspective. For years I thought their prices were ludicrous. This made it cheaper. And I don't look at it like, they're enslaving me to the software. I look at it like this, these programs are my tools to make a great product and make a living. They've given me that, and I've given them money. It's a fair trade.

At $2500 that sucks. At $600 for it all, that's a deal—especially when the cost of it (and the initial cost) is less than an hour of time each month. It takes me 15 minutes just to drive to my office.

And to be fair, CC is a pretty good improvement over CS6 in terms of rendering speed and since I've been a member, they've transitioned those. And they've added Typekit. They're not exactly resting on their laurels.

Also, if you've owned every Master's collection since CS3 you've paid for 7.17 years at the cloud price but you've only gotten 6 years out of it.

 

[zync]

Unless you never plan on upgrading your software, you're effectively renting it anyway. The only difference is duration.

 

[Jessica Lares]

I'll stop giving money to Adobe as soon as there is comparable software to Photoshop. But until then, I'm still feeding the cow.

 

[jdechko]

You might want to know that I earn 100% of my income as a software developer. I absolutely guarantee that it does not take nearly as much effort to do an update as it did to create the application to begin with (a rewrite, yes, but that's another story). Yet some companies seem to think they somehow "deserve" to be paid ever-increasing amounts of money regardless of how little work they may actually be doing. I'm obviously in favor of developers getting paid for their work, but I'm also in favor of not getting screwed over in the name of greed.

--Eric

In the interest of driving the discussion, what kind of software do you write? Is it smaller applications or larger applications like Photoshop? How do you think it compares to doing something like what Adobe does, not only adding new features, but also working on a cross platform Application that spans multiple versions of those OS'es?

I'm not saying that companies should be greedy, but at the same time, Adobe is charging what the market will bear. Good, bad or indifferent, Creative Cloud is another business model that is being attempted, and the market will eventually decide how this experiment turns out. If, in a few years, Adobe starts offering full retail software, we will know the experiment failed. But it's nothing new either. Enterprise solutions also come to mind where corporations pay up front and also enter into a yearly service contract with the vendor.

The way I see it, Software as a subscription is just another business model for the software industry in addition to the traditional model (base price + upgrades) and the app store model (base price + either free upgrades or no upgrades).

 

[winglet69]

This is a matter of perspective. For years I thought their prices were ludicrous. This made it cheaper. And I don't look at it like, they're enslaving me to the software. I look at it like this, these programs are my tools to make a great product and make a living. They've given me that, and I've given them money. It's a fair trade.

At $2500 that sucks. At $600 for it all, that's a deal—especially when the cost of it (and the initial cost) is less than an hour of time each month. It takes me 15 minutes just to drive to my office.

And to be fair, CC is a pretty good improvement over CS6 in terms of rendering speed and since I've been a member, they've transitioned those. And they've added Typekit. They're not exactly resting on their laurels.

Also, if you've owned every Master's collection since CS3 you've paid for 7.17 years at the cloud price but you've only gotten 6 years out of it.

Except, you fail to explain why Adobe has removed the option to purchase their software as opposed to renting it. The two models could exist concurrently quite easily. I can assure you that the entire situation is engineered to be advantageous to Adobe, not the users.

Sorry, but I don't buy the statement that it's "a deal", just because you have convinced yourself that it is. Their mandate is to make money for Adobe, not to help you make money. That you can make a living using their products is incidental. Even if your cost analysis is correct - that CC is costing you less - you've still lost a measure of control. That obviously doesn't concern you. But it does many.

It comes down to choices. The ability to control one's costs by deciding when to upgrade, that once belonged to the end-users, has now been taken over by Adobe. Without consultation, without offering a paid license option alongside. As the customer who pays for the product, that's unacceptable to me.

For now, it will be CS6 and wait and see. The one good thing about CC is that it has forced many to more closely examine just how much one really needs the latest version. Sure, there will always be the diehards who will have to have what they perceive as necessary, and many studios or independents will write the cost off. But a different model for something as sensitive as pricing always has unintended consequences and it will be interesting to see how it plays out.

 

[educate9]

And to be fair, CC is a pretty good improvement over CS6 in terms of rendering speed and since I've been a member, they've transitioned those. And they've added Typekit. They're not exactly resting on their laurels.

Also, if you've owned every Master's collection since CS3 you've paid for 7.17 years at the cloud price but you've only gotten 6 years out of it.

No, not resting so much right now as the CC transition they want to sell everyone on is not working well. That is the purpose of giving the legacy users the $9.95 price which this article is about. But the act of trying to hook people into monthly or annual rental fees is never in the consumer's best interest in the long run. It is a drug dealer's mentality. Do you own or rent your residence? Which is better for you long term? Which one is better cared for & maintained, the rental or the owned house? It is the same thing with renting software.

2 years from now I can still work in CS6, even if it is outdated in many ways, I will know it on a much deeper level. It will still perform all the essential tasks. You will have paid thousands more $ and will continue to be at ADOBE's mercy. You will have to pay them the next month's rent to EVEN OPEN YOUR FILES. You will not be able to quit, because it will be the program you are best at... They will be able to update their program when they want, how they want... and the updates will begin to radically decrease in frequency. If they find another opportunity to extract more money from you, they will do it. How many times will they have raised their monthly prices by that time? How many accessories will they come up with to pay extra for?

This cable company mentality is what we are all railing against. I have about 30 different softwares, including ones more costly than Adobe Master's... If every company started doing this kind of policy, our productivity as professionals will plummet. It's not affordable, we have to upgrade as projects allow us to... Many times the upgrades are just not necessary, so you wait a cycle or two... Rentals like renting your space, is a primary reason for failure: zero flexibility.

With every software (and some have hardware attached), the progression to the next version is usually something you take a deep breath, hesitate,... and then finally go for it. No one wants it forced upon them, it just isn't necessary or practical in normal business cycles.

Like with FLASH, the community as a whole is fighting strongly against this mentality of holding people hostage. Pretty soon you will find a lot of REAL alternatives to Adobe. Remember they are not inventing anything that another company would not, or could not... Of course Adobe could offer pricing that is much more reasonable, and follow the Native instruments concept I mentioned earlier which is much more friendly and does not involve monthly fees. That is the choice, to be greedy, or not...

 

[Zaqfalcon]

I don't get this Creative Cloud lark; what's cloudy about it aside from some online storage?

I can't find a description of what this actually does or is for on the Adobe website just vagaries like 'tools re-imagined' and 'this will change everything' (sounds as bad as Apple!)

I was interested to know if these are web apps like the online versions of office? Will I be able to edit Raw files using my iPad basically?

Or is this just a way of cutting you off from the software when you stop coughing up?

 

[roadbloc]

I questioned Adobe's choice to make Photoshop subscription based. But now I'm beginning to see it could save a lot of users a lot of money.

 

[shinji]

I don't get this Creative Cloud lark; what's cloudy about it aside from some online storage?

I can't find a description of what this actually does or is for on the Adobe website just vagaries like 'tools re-imagined' and 'this will change everything' (sounds as bad as Apple!)

I was interested to know if these are web apps like the online versions of office? Will I be able to edit Raw files using my iPad basically?

Or is this just a way of cutting you off from the software when you stop coughing up?

They aren't web apps. They're just desktop apps that you have to pay a subscription for instead of buying them outright, and Adobe decided to hop on the 'cloud' bandwagon and call it that. You do lose access to the software when you stop paying.

 

[pmjoe]

"Since introducing Photoshop CC, we've listened to feedback from a spectrum of our customers"

Uh, yeah, if they were listening to feedback, they'd have figured out by now that people don't want to rent their software. Also, they don't like to be tricked by introductory rates.

 

[Kebabselector]

It's also a shame that so many users are not technically savvy, therefore, dumbed down software like Lightroom has to exist. People need to know their tools before abandoning them for the next shiny tool they see.

Someone obviously doesn't understand what Lightroom is.

 

[zync]

Except, you fail to explain why Adobe has removed the option to purchase their software as opposed to renting it. The two models could exist concurrently quite easily. I can assure you that the entire situation is engineered to be advantageous to Adobe, not the users.

Sorry, I thought it was obvious. They're trading cost for volume. I know plenty of people who were pirating their software before who now happily pay this subscription. It's advantageous to all. Adobe makes more money because the user base is larger and paying, and the price is lower because there are more users paying.

Sorry, but I don't buy the statement that it's "a deal", just because you have convinced yourself that it is. Their mandate is to make money for Adobe, not to help you make money. That you can make a living using their products is incidental. Even if your cost analysis is correct - that CC is costing you less - you've still lost a measure of control. That obviously doesn't concern you. But it does many.

Sorry, I'm not an idiot. You don't have to buy anything. Run the numbers. I'm arguing about this in general. I use programs in production premium and design premium, so I'd need to buy the Master Collection. It used to cost $2500 upfront. Now I can get that same value for an initial investment of $50 and monthly payments of $50. Yes, if I NEVER plan to upgrade ever, it'll cost me more in just over 4 years. In that span of time, I'd have lost all of the cheaper upgrade options. Even if I didn't, it'd cost me $600. So it'd be the same as a year anyway. It's only if you have very strange upgrade patterns that this could cost you more. When I originally calculated it, it would cost me over 18 years to pay a penny more. But in that span, I'll have had most of the capital on hand to do other things with (upgrade machines, pay rent, etc.).

It is a drug dealer's mentality. Do you own or rent your residence? Which is better for you long term? Which one is better cared for & maintained, the rental or the owned house? It is the same thing with renting software.

Think of it this way. Leasing a car sucks, because you never own it, right? But if you're buying a new car every few years it's a better option to lease because lease payments are generally lower.

As for which is better maintained, if you rent a house, the landlord is supposed to cover most things within it because they own it. If you own it and it breaks, it's yours to deal with. If you're talking about upkeep of the yard etc., that is dependent upon the person. This analogy makes no sense.

2 years from now I can still work in CS6, even if it is outdated in many ways, I will know it on a much deeper level. It will still perform all the essential tasks. You will have paid thousands more $ and will continue to be at ADOBE's mercy. You will have to pay them the next month's rent to EVEN OPEN YOUR FILES. You will not be able to quit, because it will be the program you are best at... They will be able to update their program when they want, how they want... and the updates will begin to radically decrease in frequency. If they find another opportunity to extract more money from you, they will do it. How many times will they have raised their monthly prices by that time? How many accessories will they come up with to pay extra for?

First, you can stop and start the subscription at any time, which is perfect for people who only rarely use Adobe products (like people who edit in FCP for example).

In two years my software will still work, be newer, and I'll have paid $1200 instead of $2500. How is that more expensive? As I said, the only difference between paying for this and paying with the traditional model is if you don't ever plan to upgrade.

And unless you're an island, you need to work with other people. How long until you can't work with anyone else's files? If there's anything you should complain about, it's that, not pricing that works out cheaper.

This cable company mentality is what we are all railing against. I have about 30 different softwares, including ones more costly than Adobe Master's... If every company started doing this kind of policy, our productivity as professionals will plummet. It's not affordable, we have to upgrade as projects allow us to... Many times the upgrades are just not necessary, so you wait a cycle or two... Rentals like renting your space, is a primary reason for failure: zero flexibility.

Actually, this would be great. Instead of having to figure out when to upgrade and why, I get my software slightly cheaper, amortized over time, and I have a constant that I can plan for. I don't have time to compare the merits of upgrading from AECS6 to AECC or from AECS4 to AECC.

Like with FLASH, the community as a whole is fighting strongly against this mentality of holding people hostage. Pretty soon you will find a lot of REAL alternatives to Adobe. Remember they are not inventing anything that another company would not, or could not... Of course Adobe could offer pricing that is much more reasonable, and follow the Native instruments concept I mentioned earlier which is much more friendly and does not involve monthly fees. That is the choice, to be greedy, or not...

I find this to be untrue out in the real world. As I said before, most everyone I work with is ecstatic that this exists because it's easier for everyone to stay current (we have to work together). And I work with a varied group of people. Every freelancer loves it. Big corporations are using it for their internal marketing groups because they don't have to worry about people requesting upgrades. Now it just happens and they can pay a known quantity.

And the pricing is more reasonable as I've explained.

I don't like the idea of "renting software" but it's what I was doing before anyway. And this is cheaper.

 

[iamgalactic]

As a creative director, I told my suppliers they can not use anything above CS6 for my projects. I wanted to make sure whatever they creates my art directors can open and update.

We won't be using any of this Adobe rental crap.

What? This is the most ridiculous post so far on this thread. Do you also still only accept artwork on Zip drives???

I too am a creative director and my CLIENTS are using CC, so should I tell them "sorry, I can't work with your files can you downgrade to CS6 please?"

If you're a professional then CC subscription is buttons and makes financial sense (I've posted on this previously, so can't be assed detailing costs again).

Good luck with the business, you'll need it with that attitude...

 

[zync]

What? This is the most ridiculous post so far on this thread. Do you also still only accept artwork on Zip drives???

I too am a creative director and my CLIENTS are using CC, so should I tell them "sorry, I can't work with your files can you downgrade to CS6 please?"

If you're a professional then CC subscription is buttons and makes financial sense (I've posted on this previously, so can't be assed detailing costs again).

Good luck with the business, you'll need it with that attitude...

Haha, I was thinking that. They won't need luck with the business. If they maintain that attitude they won't be in business because Adobe isn't going to drop this. It's going like gangbusters.

 

[Jessica Lares]

The funny thing is that most of the people complaining subscribe to Netflix, Spotify, and whatever else. How can you justify "renting" a movie and TV service, along with a music streaming service, but not software?

I don't see how people can justify Parallels/Boot Camp/additional partitions with older versions of OS X/ and all the other visualization apps that can be a fix to getting an old version of Photoshop to run either.

 

[Lone Deranger]

The funny thing is that most of the people complaining subscribe to Netflix, Spotify, and whatever else. How can you justify "renting" a movie and TV service, along with a music streaming service, but not software?

Because one is consumption. You watch a movie and that's it. Don't need to ever access it again really. It's like going to the cinema, except without leaving the comforts of your chair. If I stop paying subscription nothing changes, nothing's lost really.

The other is creation. I create a digital painting with PS either for personal or more likely professional ends. Once I've created it, I'll have need for it time and again in any number of scenarios. I stop paying subscription fees I lose access to my own creations. In effect, my work is held hostage.

I hope you understand the difference here.

(from somebody who does not subscribe to anything beyond than a gym membership)

 

[zync]

The other is creation. I create a digital painting with PS either for personal or more likely professional ends. Once I've created it, I'll have need for it time and again in any number of scenarios. I stop paying subscription fees I lose access to my own creations. In effect, my work is held hostage.

Except you can save it out in any number of different formats when you're done with it and use it in other programs, including Pixelmator if you really still need the layers.

Your output—your creation—still exists and you still have access to it.

What if you want to watch the same movie again later and you've cancelled service? The same thing happens. You have to subscribe again.