I would be less upset if I got this from a small company or one uniquely focused on one particular type of saftware - such as photos, video editing etc. "BUT" we are talking about one of the richest companies in the world with huge available cash. So, it's not like it's running close to losing money. With it's hardware, music, apple tv and books profits they now have to scrape more of our money away. Right now it's just for the AI upgrade - how long before that becomes required and the current software becomes useless? Apple is slowly losing the creativity of Steve Job's and becoming more focused on money as opposed to innovation.
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Some Apple Apps Will No Longer Receive Every New Feature Without a Subscription
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Asus did make one that was the size of mini, but they stopped. Unihertz Jelly are an Android model are one that a lot of people mention; never seen one in person, but they are SMALL.
Here is one sitting on top of an SE 2022.
Wow, I have been using Pages and Numbers because they did what I needed and were included. I would never pay for them, especially since bug fixes barely happen every once in a blue moon and the feature set is barely basic. For free, they’re tolerable. For payment, they’re unacceptable. I wish LibreOffice had an iPad version.
Yes and no... If you want access to the AI or online image library features, you will have to pay the subscription and you get the apps included. If you have already bought it, or plan on buying it, and don't need the AI, then you can just buy the app you need. If you have bought it and need the AI, you will need to pay the subscription going forward.
For those that have just bought one of those apps, it is a negative, but if you use the AI regularly, it will quickly pay for itself, I would think - depending on how good those AI and clipart features really are.
You don't have to. They will continue to get fixes and new features. It is only if you want/need the additional server-side AI features and image library that you need to pay. So, if you don't need to add AI slop to your documents, carry on as you were.
As far as I understand it, no premium (server side) features.
I've read the article, too. I would also bet that plenty of people who you are referring to as having a Dory-level attention-span have actually also read the article. The objections aren't because of anything Apple has said. It is what Apple hasn't said combined with known history that is the source of these objections. Commenters aren't failing to read the article, nor are they failing to understand it. They are merely connecting the dots. You, on the other hand, are taking Apple's word at face-value. Time will tell which is the more reasonable line of thinking.
While I personally don't object to subscription software (I work with many business clients and the vast majority of them prefer subscription pricing for professional software for some very good reasons that are usually out of scope in conversations like this), I do understand why people do object to it.
Yes, the current versions of FCP, Pages, etc, are not going away, and users can continue to use their current versions of those programs forever*. And we know Apple are saying that there will still be updates to those programs in the future. But we've seen this movie before with both Microsoft and Adobe. In Adobe's case, it only took one major version update to move to a 100% subscription model. In Microsoft's case, Office is still available with a perpetual license, but new major feature updates now take several years to become available to users and require a new purchase (one major feature, for example, is the XLOOKUP function in Excel. Office 365 subscribers got that feature in 2019. Perpetual licensed Excel did not receive that feature until the release of Office 2021). Microsoft has many MS Office-adjacent products and services (for example, Loop and Planner) that are subscription-only, and they've completely stopped offering perpetual licenses for some of their large enterprise systems (ie, Dynamics ERP, CRM, etc.)
Apple want to be a services company. They see the massive profits that other services companies are bringing in, and they see the successful path that those other companies took to get there. I would not say that people who object to subscription software are wrong to be concerned by this.
(*forever actually meaning "until a security flaw, bug, or incompatibility with a future MacOS version renders it no longer safely functional")
Asking commenters to explain why they downvoted you is lame. Don't do this.
This is so stupid. I have never needed to and will never need to use FCP, LP, or Pixelmator. I only use Numbers and Pages (which are way more user-friendly that the M$ counterparts). Whoever came up with this idea should be openly mocked.
I would actually be okay with this setup. Let’s see if that’s what happens.
Yeah, the bundle makes sense from the perspective of users that actually use FCP, etc, in that it basically just means that some additional functionality is also included in the free iWork programs. For purely iWork users, though, this bundle is a bit head-shake-worthy.
I suspect that Apple are trying to find a price-point for the AI features that makes sense, and including FCP, etc. is meant to be more of an incentive for those users to get on board. I would not be surprised at all if Apple were to announce another "bundle" a couple of months from now that just includes the iWork AI enhancements for a "discounted" price of something like $9.99/mo or something like that.
This thread is 99% crying. Your statement that this path continues in a way you don’t like is pure supposition.
The Mac will continue to provide purchased versions for one reason at least: FCP is not popular enough to go subscription only.
Read the thread. They don't.
Again, see above.
Great crystal ball. Got any tips for this week's lottery?
On a more serious note: maybe you're right. But I've had a perpetual licence for the pro apps (FCP etc.) for over 5 years. Never paid a penny for updates. I've had my money's worth many times over. If I need to subscribe in future (which at the moment there is no evidence I will as I don't need the current AI features), it's going to cost me £129/year: equivalent of buying a coffee roughly every 2 weeks. If you are using these pro apps for work (and who is buying them if they're not?) then that's a pretty good deal, especially as Adobe charge around that for just Lightroom and Photoshop and much more than that for the full Creative Cloud. I don't really see the problem. YMMV.
Has Apple anywhere promised to keep the basic iWork apps free forever? If not, this announcement may just be the first step toward a suite-wide subscription model. And that uncertainty is a convincing argument not to start using the software.
Well see how it turns out with the future feature set.
That’s the real crux of the issue. As long as the basic iWork apps remain free and still get occasional updates, I think most of us would be fine. We still have iMovie, etc., so it would be fine.
If you need more than the basics, then you won’t mind paying, I guess.
Either way it is kind of a sad money grab.
Totally off topic, but have you seen the price of coffee lately? Just for the beans I brew at home, I'm paying around $30(CAD) a bag now, and that lasts about two weeks (literally brewing a single 8-cup pot a day). So in coffee terms, this subscription is pretty much a half-cup of home-brewed coffee per
Now, personally, I'll still take the coffee.
Edit: meant per day.
I'm calling it... Anniversary Special M10 machines will be subscription only!
Want to upgrade RAM? In App purchase.
Want to upgrade RAM? In App purchase.
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Many are claiming things that are completely untrue. It’s a failure to read no matter how much you deny it.
Aka inventing the dots. Adobe makes the leading tools for creatives. They can force a subscription. Ditto Microsoft for office software. Apple having thrown away most of the goodwill among editors, cannot. People are inventing a dark future that won’t happen in any foreseeable future.
Including the tool that most closely competes with Apple's flagship creative tool - Final Cut Pro. Adobe does not make a competitor to Logic, though, so Apple's subscription offering can be well positioned as a bargain from that standpoint.
Also remember that every tool in Apple's multimedia creative offerings outside of Quicktime itself were acquired from some another software publisher. With their current warchest, Apple could absolutely acquire one or more of the many competitors that users may try to flock to to avoid Apple's subscriptions and roll it into their own. Emagic and various Macromedia assets weren't too big for Apple to acquire when they were still in recovery mode, Avid assets are not too big for Apple to acquire now that they are a behemoth.
The closest analog to iWork. Except iWork offers some functionality that is better than two of Office's flagship tools (Word and PowerPoint), and a reasonable alternative to the third (Excel). So Ditto.
Apple has a loyal following, as always, and there are still plenty of users of Apple's flagship creator tools that this would absolutely be able to fly if Apple takes an incremental approach.
LibreOffice is pretty good--I use that in lieu of Pages.