Adobe Retreats from Bluesky After Massive User Backlash (petapixel.com) 56
Adobe has deleted all its posts on Twitter-alternative Bluesky after a disastrous April 8 debut that drew over 1,600 angry comments from digital creators. The software giant's innocuous first post asking "What's fueling your creativity right now?" triggered immediate criticism targeting Adobe's controversial subscription model, continual price increases, and AI implementation.
"Y'all keep raising your prices for a product that keeps getting worse," wrote one user, while another referenced Adobe's "subscription model" with "I assume you'll be charging us monthly to read your posts." Recent price hikes have been substantial, with one commenter reporting a 53.88% increase from CDN$14.68 to CDN$22.59 monthly.
"Y'all keep raising your prices for a product that keeps getting worse," wrote one user, while another referenced Adobe's "subscription model" with "I assume you'll be charging us monthly to read your posts." Recent price hikes have been substantial, with one commenter reporting a 53.88% increase from CDN$14.68 to CDN$22.59 monthly.
Not surprised (Score:5, Insightful)
Customers are rightly pissed. Just in general I.T. terms I think software as a subscription service is a Bad Thing. Forcing it on customers is worse.
Buuut, until the creative types and the I.T. guys that support them pull a mass defection to other software suites, nothing's going to happen. The money machine going brrr is louder than customer's complaints.
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I'd say they probably do well with the 30/70 rule. It's not near being replaced in the professional world. But as a piece of software that was oft pirated back in the days and was also pretty affordable for the prosumer set .. I get the wave of negativity. Will they get replaced? I'm not convinced. Autodesk has similar questions to deal with, but they do have competition which I've seen making inroads in the spaces I work in, in Blender. Photoshop? If you work somewhere which pays for you platform, I don't
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I've been using Adobe apps in one way or another since the late 90s. I started out with Photoshop version 4, Macromedia Freehand and Quark XPress and as the competition died out, shifted my workflow over to pretty much all Adobe.
I've recently taken a stance and I'm trying to shift myself away from using anything Adobe related – the one thing of Adobe's I will still continue to use is the free Acrobat Reader app as there are still some PDFs that require an Adobe app to open them in.
While it's not ever
Re: Not surprised (Score:2)
I still lament the loss of freehand. I have never been able to get the hang of illustrator and back then it was so bad I just gave up and switched careers.
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I've been using Adobe apps in one way or another since the late 90s. I started out with Photoshop version 4, Macromedia Freehand and Quark XPress and as the competition died out, shifted my workflow over to pretty much all Adobe.
I'd been using it since it was just Photoshop. I get an academic discount, and it's still pretty expensive.
But I use just about everything in the Creative Suite, so I continue. Especially Photoshop, Dreamweaver, Illustrator, Acrobat, and Premier. There really is nothing to compare to Photoshop, and the rest I could find alternatives, but I work the Adobe programs I use with muscle memory. So purchasing and dealing with the learning curve of several new programs - no thanks.
If you have the time to learn a new suite of apps, with new shortcut keys and limited interoperability with Adobe apps (i.e. you're not expecting to launch Publisher and work on an InDesign document as if it were the native app, but instead you start a new project and work with the Affinity apps from scratch) then you're a long way into ridding yourself of the continually increasing price of an Adobe subscription with a one-off purchase for a perpetual, multi-platform licence.
That's the rub. I don't really
Back when (Score:2)
Back when I was doing graphics, I always preferred Deneba Canvas over the separate Adobe products (PhotoShop and Illustrator). Canvas could mix bit-mapped graphics and vector graphics in the same document, and Adobe couldn't...not even as imports. (I,e, worse than Inkscape is currently.) But they didn't have a big ad budget.
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Autodesk, scumbags. They absolutely love having captured markets on subscription plans, and have a nasty habit of removing features from free/lower price tiers to encourage people to upgrade to pricier plans. Or buying makers of free/cheaper altenatives only to close them up a year or two later. (I've mainly been affected by their photogrammetry acquisitions, but they've eaten about 50 CAD and structural analysis/engineering companies since 1994.)
I truly wish OS co
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I moved to the Affinity suite, and for the core apps I used of Adobe, Illustrator and Photoshop, affinity works just fine. Better than fine actually, theres some things I actually prefer. And so far I havent come across many files I cant open with the combination of those two and affinity publisher. Combine that with Canva (which are the parent company) and its pretty much a full service suite.
Oh it doesnt have AI, but if I ever come up with a responsible usecase for AI imagery I'm sure I'll look for that o
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>"Buuut, until the creative types and the I.T. guys that support them pull a mass defection to other software suites, nothing's going to happen."
^^This
There are plenty of alternatives, many that are free and open source. Some are just as good, others almost as good, and others are behind but adequate. All would require the user to change something. But many users would rather howl at the moon rather than adjust their expectations or workflows. This also goes for the countless millions who continue to
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>"Buuut, until the creative types and the I.T. guys that support them pull a mass defection to other software suites, nothing's going to happen."
^^This
There are plenty of alternatives, many that are free and open source. Some are just as good, others almost as good, and others are behind but adequate. All would require the user to change something. But many users would rather howl at the moon rather than adjust their expectations or workflows. This also goes for the countless millions who continue to let Microsoft shaft them, but wouldn't dream of considering any other option.
Put your money and/or time and/or mindshare where your mouth is, or bend over and take it. Choose, but stop playing the victim. Your world does not have to revolve around MS-Windows, MS-Office, and Adobe-Whatever.
Tell me you don't use the Adobe creative suite without telling me you don't use it. Then tell me the creative suite that does everything I can do with the CS.
It isn't that I like the cost - who would? But I would love to hear the alternative that does everything. I'll switch in an instant.
And that's the problem. Some alternatives work well. I can switch to one of the free Office suites (and have) but there really is precious little Office 365 can do that the free one's can't. So going free is a go
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Buuut, until the creative types and the I.T. guys that support them pull a mass defection to other software suites, nothing's going to happen.
That's a bit unfair. As an IT guy, we hate this crap just as much as everyone else.
At the end of the day, my job is supporting the companies needs, it has nothing to do with supporting SaaS or adobe.
What is the crap associated with the creative suite? Honest question - I use it solo. And I'm my own IT. It is expensive, but it pretty much takes care of itself with updates. I've never had it stop working (I use MacOS, Windows might be different)
My job is to provide options for the employee to get their work done as best as possible, providing options to their management, ranked by many pro/cons.
"Fast, cheap, good - pick up to two"
It's not IT that chooses adobe, it's some manager choosing adobe due to "cheap" not being the primary concern (and usually with "good" being warped into strange ways, aka the employee already knows how to use it)
Personally, as my company is tech not art, I use and tend to recommend Paint.Net as it is perfectly suited to every need that's come up so far.
I never worked for people whose most important thing was cheap. The metric has always been quality. and if you do the quality we demand, we get you the tools you need. So here we have a suite of programs that interact with each other, and people familiar with the
Corporate Arrogance; New Profit Model. (Score:2)
Adobe trying to "solve" the problem of pissed off customers by sticking fingers in its ears and going la-la-la.
Customers are rightly pissed. Just in general I.T. terms I think software as a subscription service is a Bad Thing. Forcing it on customers is worse.
Buuut, until the creative types and the I.T. guys that support them pull a mass defection to other software suites, nothing's going to happen. The money machine going brrr is louder than customer's complaints.
Its the usual Corporate Arrogance stench that reeks off a mega-corp.
I remember when one of the major cellular carriers decided to add something like a 61-cent surcharge on every bill. We heard there were “outraged”customers because the provider basically didn’t have a good reason for adding the charge. Did some customers leave over that? Sure. Was it millions of dollars worth of customers, which was the end result of that charge? FUCK no.
This IS the new mega-corp corporate formula for
Adobe Alternatives (Score:5, Informative)
Some alternatives for Adobe Software in a GitHub ReadMe. [github.com] Start exploring alternatives or stop bitching. Once that cat is out of the bag there's no going back.
Sure, it's insincere corporate bullshit, but I don't think that warranted that reply. I pay individually for a monthly CC subscription, it's the ONLY subscription I have to ANY software, and I use it a lot so I feel it's actually worth it in my case. But for me it's a freelance business write off, and I understand not being able to afford it, I've been there.
On the other hand, people don't remember how much the individual standalone software pieces cost. Maybe $600 a piece for the big ones. With CC you can use anything you want at any time, even if you just need it for one project. The buy-once-use-forever concept works great if you plan on skipping a lot of versions, which I used to do. The upgade price was also lower than the full price.
As it stands right now, I feel I'm getting my money out of the subscription, I use Lightroom, Photoshop and Illustrator quite a bit, plus Media Encoder and a few others occasionally like InDesign. It would be nice if they had a pick-your-own-subscription, where the cost increments individually depending on what software you need to use. Most specialty media arts professions only need to use a few pieces of software out of the very large selection you get with a full CC subscription. They do have a photographer's special with Lightroom and Photoshop, but I also frequently use Illustrator so it's no good for me.
There is also a problem of re-training - I've been using Photoshop since the mid-1990s. That level of familiarity is hard to re-learn on a new piece of software when you've been at it that long and you're very comfortable at it as an expert. There is a cost for re-training in lost time if you're using it for business.
There is a lonnnnng animated video on YouTube which I can't currently find which goes over the history of consolidation and mergers in graphic arts and 3D software combined with subscription based models that points out how much it screws over small time creatives. If someone else knows where to find it please post a link. It mostly deals with Autodesk and Adobe. It's a little over the top and asks for things that those companies will never give, but it has some valid points.
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It's more possible that there isn't really a practical alternative. I've found the whiners tend to whine the loudest when they really don't have a good alternative (see: Windows, I guess?). Which isn't their fault, but also it's not up to Adobe to change.
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It's more possible that there isn't really a practical alternative. I've found the whiners tend to whine the loudest when they really don't have a good alternative (see: Windows, I guess?). Which isn't their fault, but also it's not up to Adobe to change.
There really isn't a practical alternative. The ACS is in a different world from those who demand free or cheap. I'd love it to be free, and I don't care for subscription models. But I work with it, the plethora of programs would add up far beyond th yearly cost (if there were appropriate alternatives.)
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I don't think one should underestimate the cost of retraining. People get good at using a particular program. While they could also get good at another program, they might suffer, say, a 10% loss in efficiency for a year or two... that adds up to a lot.
There is also often a requirement to hand off work to another. That handoff also has to be efficient. If you're using a program that is 95% compatible, maybe 5% of the time you'll have problem handing off the work to the person still using the old program...
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I don't think one should underestimate the cost of retraining. People get good at using a particular program. While they could also get good at another program, they might suffer, say, a 10% loss in efficiency for a year or two...
A non-ACS example of this. I've used Lightwave 3D since Amiga days. With my academic creds, I can use Maya 3D for free. Things I can do with my eyes closed and using muscle memory in Lightwave became a pain in the ass with Maya, so I ended up sticking with Lightwave, and paid the man.
The labor and time cost of unlearning Lightwave and learning Maya just wasn't worth it. Free ain't always the metric.
There is also often a requirement to hand off work to another. That handoff also has to be efficient. If you're using a program that is 95% compatible, maybe 5% of the time you'll have problem handing off the work to the person still using the old program... Photoshop is a very complex program that has tons of features that aren't necessarily available in other programs - and even if they are, it is done in a different way, which means there will be compatibility problems.
Exactly. Illustrator is compatible with Photoshop and all the other ACS programs. So the one suite to rule
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There is also a problem of re-training
The hide-bound behavior of Adobe customers is the root of the problem. They appear to believe that they are either a.) incapable of learning alternatives or b.) learning anything new is somehow unreasonable, and I can't tell which is worse. Regardless, I believe they deserve the self-inflicted misery they're "suffering."
Who is suffering? The people like you that spread all the hate on Adobe aren't customers. You're just pissed because it isn't free, and has a subscription model. And you need to tell us what can replace every program in the suite. You make the mistake of thinking that there is only one option - Cheap or free. the Creative suite is not even designed for you. Anyhow, tell us the free replacements for every program in the suite. But do keep on spouting your anger it is entertaining.
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Came to say basically *this*, but you've seriously upped the ante with that great list.
Bookmarking right away, thanks.
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Re: Adobe Alternatives (Score:2)
>Sure GIMP can do almost everything PS can do
You should try reading you own post.
> But you need to switch from thinking like an artist to being a software developer to figure out where that feature is buried
Adobe thinks like Artists think ?
Haha... you are drunk on Adobe kool aid.
Just admit you like what you know, and know what you like. And are willing to pay whatever adobe says so you don't have to learn anything.
I get you. I'm not different, I like
Re: Adobe Alternatives (Score:2)
I'm not an artist or photographer, I don't own photoshop, but even I could see right away that Gimps GUI sucks donkeyballs.
I really wanted to like it I still have it installed. But I actively avoid using it unless I absolutely have to.
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Sure, it's insincere corporate bullshit, but I don't think that warranted that reply. I pay individually for a monthly CC subscription, it's the ONLY subscription I have to ANY software, and I use it a lot so I feel it's actually worth it in my case.
I agree. But we have to remember, those people who spread the hate have almost certainly never used the ACS, and probably think that everything it does can be done by Gimp.
But for me it's a freelance business write off, and I understand not being able to afford it, I've been there.
It's a cost of doing business, like fuel and insurance. So many people today believe everything should be free. I kinda get that. And the idea of being billed every month sends them into a rage.
On the other hand, people don't remember how much the individual standalone software pieces cost. Maybe $600 a piece for the big ones. With CC
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" I pay individually for a monthly CC subscription"
Oh boy I got news for you. That's not a monthly subscription. It's an annual subscription, billed monthly. If you cancel, they still take your money, even if you only went in for one month, you get charged for time you didn't even use.
Re: (Score:1, Funny)
Yes. They should stick to marketing to Nazis and Musk simps. That's where the money is.
Adobe ... (Score:4, Interesting)
I ditched Adobe for Affinity Photo. Industry insiders tell me that it is no substitute for Adobe Photoshop and that there cannot be a substitute for Adobe because Adobe is an 'industry standard'. That may be true (in their minds), but so is the fact that this is what happens when you allow monopoly to be created and if you never give the monopolist's competitors any business you are actively encouraging and nurturing the growth of the monopoly.
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thats a bunch of people just to lazy to learn so they use words like that to cover there own laziness.
"It's just mouse clicks and button pushes!" - every middle manager and computer n00b
Using _any_ program well takes practice. Photoshop can have multiple paths to achieve the same thing, but users can paint themselves into a corner (pun intended) with the wrong approach. Photoshop has multiple forms of automation that power users would need to rebuild, plus an ecosystem that -might- work with other programs. Adobe is usually fairly quick to support RAW formats from new cameras, while other software companies
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Using _any_ program well takes practice.
I experienced this with NXP's MCUXpresso, their IDE for their chips. I didn't want to "buy in" to their system, because I used a bunch of different chips, and didn't want to develop tunnel vision for one brand, or one IDE. But, at some point, dancing around their SDKs and the toolset just enough to get things done without actually digging in to be proficient with them got annoying, so I said fk it, and bit the bullet to learn as much as I could. Now, development seems so much easier: odd stumbles are, "
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Lol, if you think Bluesky is an echo chamber on the topic of Adobe's turn to AI... I can't think of any topic that more evenly divides the site's members than AI.
(And for the record, Bluesky is an Umberto Eco chamber, where we discuss semiotics and the latent characteristics of fascist movements ;) )
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And on that subject... if you're in a movement that (1) has a "cult of tradition", longing to go back to an imagined former greatness and seeing progress as backtracking; (2) "rejection of modernism", which views the rationalistic development of Western culture since the Enlightenment as a descent into depravity (but NOT rejection of industrial potency); (3) "cult of action for action's sake", such as attacks on modern culture and science even when the attacks are self-defeating; (4) "disagreement is treaso [x.com]
Re: WRATH OF THE BLUESKY WOKE MORONS! (Score:2)
Oh, the irony of the extreme right wing claiming nazis were left wing because left wing bad.
I knew schools in the USA were bad, but this is really rock bottom lobotomy level thinking.
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Yeah, lol. You'd certainly be in the camps.
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I don't think Bluesky is a good site, but people already said this about Twitter and Mastodon. I think some even claimed there are people trading such stuff on Facebook. Probably there are some on each of these services, but in the end there are a lot of normal people just posting images of their lunch that are unaffected by that.
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I have never seen any hint of CSAM on Bluesky. By contrast, Musk has *personally reinstated the accounts* of people who were distributing CSAM, like Dom Lucre.
Toxic community (Score:3)
Bluesky is just Twitter 2.0.
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Maybe, but the Adobe situation doesn't prove this. Adobe deserves the criticism they got.
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I am no fan of adobe either. Still there is a difference between criticism and hate posts.
Also it is unlikely that hating on their first post in bluesky will affect their business practices at all.
"Backlash" (Score:3)
Real backlash would be to stop buying their products.
Keyboard bloviation ... well ...
Still use Photoshop 5 (Score:1)
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Ever since i got Photoshop 5 to work on wine i moved to linux and still use Photoshop 5. though i am slowly moving to GIMP. P5 fails to load some newer photoshop images ( unlike gimp which can) i still like it and it does everything i need.
I'm going to assume you mean Photoshop CS5... which was released _literally_ 15 years ago. That's a pretty unreasonable comparison.
The bigger question is whether or not GIMP _correctly_ renders those difficult files...
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GIMP is pretty good about supporting Photoshop files. That's saying something, considering there are no open source programs that can open InDesign files and .esp support is pretty much nonexistent. Inkscape support for Illustrator is pretty weak (better hope they save 'em as svg) and if you want to manipulate a PDF with open source software GIMP is actually your second best bet behind LibreOffice Draw.
GIMP is actually the most comparable thing to Photoshop even when you consider other proprietary options.
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I'm glad to hear GIMP is improving!
I used it ~20 years ago, and GIMP's UI (at that time) was poor. The Photoshop ecosystem (plugins, documentation, and training) was a lot more accessible. When I switched to Photoshop (CS5 I think), it was moving towards a non-destructive workflow, which was appealing to a beginner.
Photoshop isn't perfect. While I don't like the subscription model, $120US/year is a reasonable price for professional-grade software.
bluesky is not business friendly (Score:3)