I just got an email from Adobe asking me to take part in a survey regarding Adobe creative software applications. The survey presented several pages of pricing options for both suite and individual applications, in perpetual and subscription licensing options. I am not interested in the "Cloud", so I only responded to reasonably priced perpetual upgrades on the applications I use. One confusion was that they kept asking if I would buy (or subscribe) to Lightroom 4, and because I already use LR4, I kept saying no.
At any rate, the meat and purpose of the survey seemed to revealed in the last two questions. One was a checklist of reasons I would object to a subscription, and the last question asked if I would buy a subscription if perpetual licenses were no longer offered.
Now I am a relatively happy user of Adobe products and feel that they give me good value, especially since I am on the upgrade path. But I have ZERO interest in subscribing to Adobe's "Cloud" thing. I have posted here before on my belief that Adobe is hellbent on changing their licensing to subscription only and I take this survey as proof that that is their intent. But this survey got me thinking about something Adobe may not have intended: How could I change my workflow to avoid a reliance on Adobe products?
I'm kind of thinking they will leave Lightroom as a perpetual product. The reason -- competition. Aperture is a direct competitor to LR. We can thank the existence of Aperture for the new lower price of LR, AND the lack of that infernal Product Activation that plagues every other Adobe product but Elements. If LR escapes the cloud, I could use it as a RAW convertor. I could keep a machine that would run the last perpetual Photoshop version, and all would be well for a few years.
If LR becomes subscription only, I guess I would switch to Capture One. I would again keep a machine to run the last perpetual Photoshop. I imagine that new printers would pose a problem with this scenario, given the way that PS and LR interact with the printer drivers, so I suppose I would have to spring for a RIP, such as ImagePrint, which would arguably give me better print quality anyway.
I know I'm probably being a bit cranky about this whole prospect, but I really don't want Adobe to have a recurring charge to my credit card and I don't want to endure recurring mandatory Activation checks. I wonder if anyone else has any suggestions about becoming "Adobe Free".