[numerobis]

Adobe's Project Mighty and Project Napoleon



combined with a wacom tablet without this incredible input lag it could be quite useful...

[simmsimaging]

That lag is ridiculous.

[JDHill]

I don't follow Adobe, so I'm not sure if this was a surprise (from the CC FAQ):

• -------------------------------------------------
  
  What happens if I decide to stop my membership?
  
  • You will continue to have access to free Creative Cloud member benefits, and if you saved your work to your computer you will continue to have access to those files. You will no longer have access to the Creative Cloud desktop applications or most of the services that are components of a Creative Cloud membership.
    
    If you purchased an annual individual membership plan and you cancel after the first 30 days but before meeting the 12-month commitment date, you will be charged 50% of the remaining amount left on your contract.
  -------------------------------------------------

While the benefits to a subscription model are pretty obvious, it is nevertheless a pretty jarring idea that your software should literally stop working immediately upon termination of your membership. Seems pretty risky to me.



[ edit: I guess I should've mentioned I'm writing in the context of this news ]

[tokiop]

Really ridiculous, it looks like a parody, even the evangelist has hard time not to laugh...

thanks for the info !

[Hervé]

That lag is ridiculous.

PoS

[Polyxo]

While the benefits to a subscription model are pretty obvious, it is nevertheless a pretty jarring idea that your software should literally stop working immediately upon termination of your membership.

To me there is just one obvious advantage of this rental system: For Adobe's revenue stream.
Every other advantage mentioned is invented Marketing BS.

Their Software already in the past had a very unfair international pricing.
As a matter of fact their products get more expensive nearly everywhere in the world, at least after the introductory offer is over.
One could write a lot about alone on the grotesque cuts of customer rights they already have introduced with licensing servers
but the web is already full of long articles on what CC means to Customer Rights.

I only hope that the shitstorm they harvest does not only consist of words but that people effectively keep their wallets closed.
That would likely mean that this sympathatic guy had to look for a new job soon.

If they succeed others will try this licensing scheme soon.

[Half Life]

I stopped using Adobe CS stuff a few years back -- gave up my mainstays Photoshop, Illustrator and After Effects... it hasn't always been easy to find replacements but Adobe's policies make me motivated to try.

As it stands now, I only use tools from them that I got for free (eg Edge products)... so I doubt I will ever use the Mighty/Napoleon combo.

Best,
Jason.

[JDHill]

To me there is just one obvious advantage of this rental system: For Adobe's revenue stream. Every other advantage mentioned is invented Marketing BS.

Yes, but everything a company does is designed, ultimately, to increase its revenue stream. Anything else can only be called suicidal. The question is what any given strategy actually achieves.

For the pro customer, meaning one who has kept, and who would have continued to keep, up to date on their license, the increase or decrease in revenue is tied directly to whether the cost of membership matches the previous license costs.

The casual customer has greater latitude to reject the change, and I think this is where they've made a blunder. Taking myself for example, I have never had any of the CS products, and the lower barrier to entry of the subscription model would've been very attractive, were it not for the idea that I'd be investing work into a set of files that become unusable on the day I decide to stop paying the membership.

In other words, they are operating by an implicit threat, designed to produce continued membership, which instead kills new membership before it's begun. I think they would have been wiser to include in the model a "stepped ownership" mechanism, whereby a person who pays membership for x-number of months gains a permanent license for the version they currently have, with the month counter then being reset.

That would essentially be a financing mechanism, which as with any type of financing, should be expected to result in substantially greater sales. The unique advantage would be that unlike an actual financing option, it would not expose the company to credit risk -- if you quit paying prior to completing a cycle, everything just stops. That is only possible with a non-physical product like software, and I think they miss a major opportunity by failing to recognize this.

[Half Life]

Actually I see this as more of an effort to kill piracy.

Best,
Jason.

[Polyxo]

To me there is just one obvious advantage of this rental system: For Adobe's revenue stream. Every other advantage mentioned is invented Marketing BS.

Yes, but everything a company does is designed, ultimately, to increase its revenue stream. Anything else can only be called suicidal. The question is what any given strategy actually achieves.

Well, I come a tiny tad more from the idealistic side.
Serving the customer as well as possible and doing something truly relevant is something which should drive business
activities apart from all financial considerations.

Thing is that these days through strategies utilized by Autodesk and now even much more consequently by Adobe
these old school preconditions for success - namely "be relevant, treat your customers right" become far less important.

People seriously hate you but they still purchase the product. One just has to watch some graphics forums or the Adobe blogs...
I've seen many hundreds of post of customers who try hard to behave but where one can feel that they are very upset.
I am sure that many of them still will join the "cloud".

I think they would have been wiser to include in the model a "stepped ownership" mechanism, whereby a person who pays membership for x-number of months gains a permanent license for the version they currently have, with the month counter then being reset.

That would be a totally different story and far less people would complain.
I am sure that they have seen that opportunity - but this would have made the user less dependent of their service.

[Polyxo]

Actually I see this as more of an effort to kill piracy.

Best,
Jason.

I don't think so.
One can crack the CC-Software just the way one can crack the perpetual licenses.
There's nothing running remotely, you have the full Software on your local machine.
It will not take long and there will be mechanisms in place which mimics the required things
when the Software wants to phone home.

I think Adobe wants to reach people who find paying for software ok generally but do it too
seldom for Adobe's taste -customer who skip every other version. There's still many people who do
absolutely professional work with licenses of Adobe software which are several years old.

Everybody who now is on CS6 should be well equipped for the next 5 years at the very least.

[JDHill]

Actually I see this as more of an effort to kill piracy.

Perhaps, but it won't work:

Do I need ongoing Internet access to use my Creative Cloud desktop applications?

• No. Your Creative Cloud desktop applications (such as Photoshop and Illustrator) are installed directly on your computer, so you won't need an ongoing Internet connection to use them on a daily basis.
  
  You will need to be online when you install and license your software. If you have an annual membership, you'll be asked to connect to the web to validate your software licenses every 30 days. However, you'll be able to use products for 3 months (99 days) even if you're offline.

As with any software (and as Holger pointed out as I was retrieving that quote), they should expect the executables to be cracked within a matter of days.

[Half Life]

That's why I said "effort" -- I suspect they will offer "updates" on a very regular basis to keep the crackers busy.

Best,
Jason.

[JDHill]

Serving the customer as well as possible and doing something truly relevant is something which should drive business activities apart from all financial considerations.

I guess I see these as being as two sides of the same coin.

[Polyxo]

Serving the customer as well as possible and doing something truly relevant is something which should drive business activities apart from all financial considerations.

I guess I see these as being as two sides of the same coin.

Konrad Zuse did somewhat relevant stuff and was known to be gentle to customers and employees.
He went bankrupt though.

I know what you mean, cheers!