“As you know, when you buy an app, you don’t actually own it. You own the license to use it for as long as you like. And that can be a pretty long time, although new computers and new operating systems may make it impossible to use,” Gene Steinberg writes for The Tech Night owl. “So if you have Word 5.1a, released in 1992, which some consider to be the absolute best version of Microsoft’s word processor ever, don’t expect to have it work on your spanking new 2012 27-inch iMac.”
“In moving to OS X in 2001, Apple included a ‘Classic’ environment that allowed you to run all those old apps in a separate window. There were some limitations that wouldn’t apply to Word, though Classic itself disappeared by 2006 with the advent of Intel-based Macs,” Steinberg writes. “The main point, however, is that, without having to have an old Mac serving standby duty, you were able to use Word 5.1 on a reasonably current Mac for approximately 14 years. Nobody from Microsoft threatened to take your license away. It was yours to keep.”
Steinberg writes, “This week, Adobe announced that they will not deliver a direct successor to Creative Suite 6. There will be no Creative Suite 7. Instead, they are moving to Creative Cloud apps. What this means is that, beginning in June, you’ll be able to download the newest versions of Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator, Dreamweaver, Premiere Pro and all the rest for monthly fees. For the first year, users of Creative Suite 3 or later will be eligible for discounted monthly fees for the new Creative Cloud suite, beginning at $29.99 per month; students pay $19.99 per month. The fees will go up next year to $50 per month for a regular user (which means $600 per year). But if you miss a payment, prepare to lose access to your software… Has Adobe considered possible lost business as a result?”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Since we got PixelMator, we just haven’t missed Photoshop – the only Adobe software we were using with any regularity, so Adobe’s death wish doesn’t phase us. Now, if this were Apple, we’d be screaming bloody murder, so we can understand why Adobe CS users are having some issues with this news. Are you an Adobe CS user? What do you think? If Adobe stick to their plan, will you be a CS user this time next year?
Related article:
Adobe goes subscription-only, rebrands Creative Suite as Creative Cloud – May 6, 2013