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Author Topic: Michael's take on Adobe CC  (Read 38157 times)

johnvr

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Michael's take on Adobe CC
« on: May 09, 2013, 04:56:59 pm »

Michael seems to buy into Jeff Schewe's notion that PS was never developed for or aimed at amateur photographers. He also seems to believe that Adobe won't budge in its decision.

I think the rest of his piece is balanced overall, but I don't agree with those two notions.

I've always been an amateur and Adobe has marketed PS to me for years. This site, many others and numerous books have been written about PS for amateurs, with Adobe's consent. PS has an enormous amateur following. Instead of dropping all these clients, the company should have added the photography parts of PS to LR and leave the rest for the cloud.

Further, with Adobe's share price dropping since the announcement, the company must doubt the wisdom of its decision, or - at a minimum - the way it announced it. I actually think Adobe will backtrack on part of the cloud and, in the process, leave people like Schewe and Scott Kelby - defenders of mighty Adobe against us liitle people - alienated from their client base.
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Gulag

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Re: Michael's take on Adobe CC
« Reply #1 on: May 09, 2013, 05:05:51 pm »

From what I understand,  photographers represent very very small percentage in total Photoshop user base since the very beginning.  As the result, Adobe introduced Lightroom some years back exclusively for photographers, who don't do extensive retouching. In its total revenue pie, Photoshop has very small weight. Adobe's message is my way or highway. That's it.

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michael

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Re: Michael's take on Adobe CC
« Reply #2 on: May 09, 2013, 05:08:46 pm »

It isn't a question of my "buying into" anything. To my knowledge Adobe has never specifically targeted amateurs. They've been willing to sell to them, but they are not its target market for this product.

Adobe appears to be willing to sacrifice the non-pro market, and I seriously doubt that at this point they'll back-track. I could be wrong.

Michael
« Last Edit: May 09, 2013, 05:11:34 pm by michael »
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daws

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Re: Michael's take on Adobe CC
« Reply #3 on: May 09, 2013, 05:15:07 pm »

It's not just the amateur photographers and "little people" who are saying No to Adobe's CC (Captive Customer) strategy.

From Jeff Tranberry's Adobe Photoshop blog:

Quote
Dave Kendall says:

Jeff,
You claim to be a nerd. That’s great. I’m a comic illustrator and general illustrator. I know many professional illustrators in the comic market. I have some news for you. The consensus is that the product guys like you and me love will not be produced on Adobe software for very much longer. I haven’t encountered any which will start to rent the tools they use every day. That’s a fact. A successful Batman artist has just downloaded a painter trial to prepare for the future without CS6. This guy has bought dozens of updates from adobe. I’ve bought 3 out of 4 since I bought my CS2 creative suite. A friend who runs a concept art studio is also opting out of subscription.

I really think you should check out Corel’s recent statement. It’s getting a great deal of interest, and it’s a far fairer and inclusive deal than anything you are offering. I found your replies to some users, that they should be more than prepared to hire their tools for 33 cents a day, while pushing the introductory price as the norm, to be utterly patronising, and downright insulting. Don’t take us for fools. We all know the real cost of this subscription model.

Creatives will find a way to create with or without Adobe. Have no doubt about that. However Adobe will not survive without us.
Dave
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jwstl

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Re: Michael's take on Adobe CC
« Reply #4 on: May 09, 2013, 05:19:29 pm »

It isn't a question of my "buying into" anything. To my knowledge Adobe has never specifically targeted amateurs. They've been willing to sell to them, but they are not its target market for this product.

Adobe appears to be willing to sacrifice the non-pro market, and I seriously doubt that at this point they'll back-track. I could be wrong.

Michael

I agree. Photoshop and the Creative Suite have always been priced at a point that wouldn't appeal to the majority of amateurs. Sure, a large number of them (typically photographers with Photoshop) paid for it anyway but to Adobe that was just icing on the cake. I also suspect they believe the majority of amateurs using Photoshop are using pirated copies. They created Elements for amateurs, Lightroom for photographers, and the Creative Suite for graphic designers, web designers, video pros etc.
And, as Michael said, they appear to be sacrificing that icing on the cake for more of the cake itself.
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BJL

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What most Photoshop buyers are, and CC student pricing
« Reply #5 on: May 09, 2013, 05:24:04 pm »

As to the amateur photographers and PhotoShop: whatever the intent, the fact appears to be that the great majority of PhotoShop and CS customers are not photographers, but instead are graphic designers and other species of "imaging professionals". More so if one weight various customer groups by the percentages of revenues they generate, because those other PhotoShop professionals more often keep the software at the latest version, and buy other parts of CS/CC besides just PhotoShop. So in terms of revenue and profits, us amateur photographers, and people who only use PS weekly or monthly rather than daily, are just not as important to Adobe as we would like to think.

As to student pricing, some details have been announced at http://www.adobe.com/products/creativecloud/buying-guide.edu.html
In short: no discount below $20/month for PS only; a discount to $30/mo for the whole CC suite.

P. S. This could be a good time for Apple to announce Aperture 4, with a tag line like
"Just $80 down and no monthly payments."
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davidgp

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Re: Michael's take on Adobe CC
« Reply #6 on: May 09, 2013, 05:24:57 pm »

Hi,

Well, while I mostly agree with Michael view on the topic, I just have an small disagreement, when Michael says: "It seems to me that Adobe has decided that leaving some folks behind in the process may not be a bad thing. For example, piracy has always been a huge problem. Now, that will be much reduced." My view is that piracy will be the same.

Someone will pay one month license, download the installer, crack the app so it starts without calling the "mother ship" (as Michael defined), and they will put it in one of the many pirate sites available around internet... you will not be able to use the Cloud features, but I don't think that will worry too much to pirate users. In the dPreview interview one of the Adobe representatives already comments the same as me about this... Adobe is aware they are not fixing piracy with this.

AFairley

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Re: Michael's take on Adobe CC
« Reply #7 on: May 09, 2013, 05:25:59 pm »

I believe Michael is right about Adobe not backtracking.  (Remember the Netflix debacle a while back when they unbundled dvds and streaming, effectively almost doubling the cost of getting the same service and people left in droves?  Netflix now has more customers and is making more money than every.)

However, I believe Michael is wrong about piracy.  As long as there is an app that resides on the the PC and can run without realtime connection to an activation server it can be patched, and it will be by the hackers who take pride in defeating Adobe's protection schemes.  The level of piracy will either stay the same, or increase as marginal/occasional users who want PS-only features, layer masks for example, resort to piracy rather than pay subscription fees incommensurate with their actual use.
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johnvr

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Re: Michael's take on Adobe CC
« Reply #8 on: May 09, 2013, 05:27:21 pm »

For what's it worth, I had this exchange earlier today with Jeffrey Tranberry at Adobe:

John says:
Got a question, Jeffrey, even though you have ignored me so far: on the Luminous Landscape forums, Jeff Schewe, a consultant to Adobe, says that Adobe was well aware of our coming anger, but that obviously Adobe doesnt care, because Photoshop isn’t now and never was aimed at us amateurs.
Now, I don’t know why you still have a job, seeing that you’re trying to placate an audience your company apparently couldn’t care less about, but since you are still here, is Jeff speaking the truth and nothing but the truth?
May 09, 2013 7:47 AM | Reply

Jeffrey Tranberry says:
Jeff Schewe’s views are his own. Photoshop’s strength is that is used by a wide variety of users – and I for one appreciate them all – and I know my teammates on the Photoshop and Lightroom development teams do as well. Most everyone on the development team are also users/avid photographers who use the products they create. They put a lot of love and hard work into the products they develop.
- Jeff
May 09, 2013 10:38 AM | Reply

John says:
Thank you, Jeffrey. I can only imagine the types of discussions taking place in house at Adobe right now.
May 09, 2013 11:12 AM | Reply
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daws

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Re: Michael's take on Adobe CC
« Reply #9 on: May 09, 2013, 05:38:15 pm »

I can only imagine the types of discussions taking place in house at Adobe right now.

Yep. And I can only imagine the number of creatives in house at Adobe who are seeing the continuing pushback from customers and another day of drop in Adobe's stock, and are thinking about updating their resumes.
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johnvr

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Re: Michael's take on Adobe CC
« Reply #10 on: May 09, 2013, 05:44:34 pm »

Yep. And I can only imagine the number of creatives in house at Adobe who are seeing the continuing pushback from customers and another day of drop in Adobe's stock, and are thinking about updating their resumes.

If it wasn't for patents and non-compete clauses, those guys could pack up right now and get VC funding to build a comprehensive photography workflow package. You combine LR, parts of PS and some popular plugins, price it at around $300-$400 and you'd make a killing. Just listen to all of us whining about the demise of CS, we are basically begging a company we now hate to give us a chance to pay them in the future.
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Alto

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Re: Michael's take on Adobe CC
« Reply #11 on: May 09, 2013, 05:50:04 pm »

Hi All

Michael if you sell to me I,m your customer regardless of who I may be .

Jon
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yaredna

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Re: Michael's take on Adobe CC
« Reply #12 on: May 09, 2013, 05:52:42 pm »

How about PROs who care about $20/month, and already own CS5.5 or 6, and usually upgrade once every 18 month for $199 ? Now it is going to be $360 every 18 months, why wouldn't they be upset with a price increase of 80% overnight, and removing a choice (they were able to DECIDE when to upgrade in the past, now they will have to pay the $360 every 18 months).

Why wouldn't they be upset ?

Michael Reichmann, for the record, is a professional: he makes money out of his photography work (website, training videos, workshops, selling prints, books). If he doesn't like it, many PROs also don't like it.

Yes, Adobe can make the same amount of money by charging twice and selling only to half of their customer base. Usually, this strategy backfires, and the few left customers resent this uncalled for "price increase" of 80%-100%.

Adobe cornered themselves. Why not leave the option and let the market decide ? What was wrong with that approach ?
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bjanes

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Re: What most Photoshop buyers are, and CC student pricing
« Reply #13 on: May 09, 2013, 06:05:31 pm »

As to student pricing, some details have been announced at http://www.adobe.com/products/creativecloud/buying-guide.edu.html
In short: no discount below $20/month for PS only; a discount to $30/mo for the whole CC suite.

I just committed to a one year subscription to Creative Cloud Student and Teacher Edition for US $19.99 per month. This for the whole creative cloud suite. I thought it was a good deal since it also includes Lightroom as well as the storage space on the cloud. Also the Photoshop is the extended version.

I am a photo enthusiast who also uses photography in medical work where the extended version has some useful features.

Digital photography at the enthusiast level is not inexpensive. A few years ago I paid $5000 for the Nikon D3 and another $3300 for the D800e, which requires a couple of Ziess lenses at $2000 each. By comparison, my outlay for the CS cloud is modest, but I would not have paid the full price, since like most on the forum, I use Lightroom for the bulk of my work.

Regards,

Bill
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ButchM

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Re: Michael's take on Adobe CC
« Reply #14 on: May 09, 2013, 06:20:54 pm »

For what's it worth, I had this exchange earlier today with Jeffrey Tranberry at Adobe:

John says:
Got a question, Jeffrey, even though you have ignored me so far: on the Luminous Landscape forums, Jeff Schewe, a consultant to Adobe, says that Adobe was well aware of our coming anger, but that obviously Adobe doesnt care, because Photoshop isn’t now and never was aimed at us amateurs.
Now, I don’t know why you still have a job, seeing that you’re trying to placate an audience your company apparently couldn’t care less about, but since you are still here, is Jeff speaking the truth and nothing but the truth?
May 09, 2013 7:47 AM | Reply

Jeffrey Tranberry says:
Jeff Schewe’s views are his own. Photoshop’s strength is that is used by a wide variety of users – and I for one appreciate them all – and I know my teammates on the Photoshop and Lightroom development teams do as well. Most everyone on the development team are also users/avid photographers who use the products they create. They put a lot of love and hard work into the products they develop.
- Jeff
May 09, 2013 10:38 AM | Reply

John says:
Thank you, Jeffrey. I can only imagine the types of discussions taking place in house at Adobe right now.
May 09, 2013 11:12 AM | Reply

FWIW Tranberry is right ... he and the great team of engineers that create Adobe software do care about their products. Those of us who are unappreciative with the CC licensing model don't have any issue with those folks. Unfortunately, they don't to make the call on how their efforts are licensed.

Now, when Tranberry can assure us that the executives that do make these sweeping and vast decisions really do care about ALL of their customers, THEN, I'll take his consolation a bit more seriously.
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BJL

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CC student pricing, and professionals who cannot afford $1/day
« Reply #15 on: May 09, 2013, 06:29:05 pm »

I just committed to a one year subscription to Creative Cloud Student and Teacher Edition for US $19.99 per month. ...
Oh yes, I omitted that first year discount, after which it goes up to $30/mo. And I agree that for a sufficiently frequent user, $1/day is very manageable: remember what film and processing used to cost! Frankly, I cannot really envision people who make their living from photography being distressed by an expense of $20/month, or about $1 per working day, for an important tool --- most working people spend more than that just on the daily commute. Netflix is a great example of where this will likely turn out for Adobe.
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BernardLanguillier

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Re: Michael's take on Adobe CC
« Reply #16 on: May 09, 2013, 06:37:15 pm »

This debate is getting wrongly biased.

The protest against the CC model is not coming from amateurs vs professionals, it is also not coming from photographers vs graphic designers/other types of PS users. The current reaction is coming from individual users vs corporate customers.

I know many freelance pro graphic designers in Japan who use PS and Illustrator are just as outraged as I am by the decision of Adobe.

I know for a fact that those users were core targets of Adobe, and although I Adobe will probably not be willing to share their customers stats, my guess is that individual users represent a significant chunk of their user base.

Cheers,
Bernard

Gulag

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Re: Michael's take on Adobe CC
« Reply #17 on: May 09, 2013, 06:40:01 pm »

What Adobe didn't reveal in the first place is that they know they're running out of fresh new customers. Of course, stock market took notice  .
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plugsnpixels

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Re: Michael's take on Adobe CC
« Reply #18 on: May 09, 2013, 06:57:02 pm »

Re: Adobe stock. Indeed it is currently headed downward, but if you look at the wide view, it's right near an all-time high, and it has seen much deeper lows. FWIW.
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Dave (Isle of Skye)

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Re: Michael's take on Adobe CC
« Reply #19 on: May 09, 2013, 07:05:53 pm »

Instead of calling it 'Photoshop', perhaps we should now call it 'Photostop' - yes folks, you heard it here first  ;D

Please forgive my corny humour during this moment of collective agony that we all seem to be going through.

::)

Dave
« Last Edit: May 09, 2013, 07:09:10 pm by Dave (Isle of Skye) »
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