13
« on: May 08, 2013, 12:13:40 AM »
Adobe is just following a trend. Stock prices perform well when you smooth out the quarterly revenues with subscription services. The people this won't affect are the professionals as they will pass that cost along to their clients. Amateurs and enthusiasts will have to make a choice, but understand that the other vendors will follow Adobe's lead. I know Corel is already entertaining this as well.
the issue is what adobe will do when the honeymoon is over. After the subscriptions normalize, so will the stock price which means adobe will be pushed by investors to seek new ways to increase revenue. My concern is the same as expressed earlier - what happens if adobe decides that they will hold your work hostage. It wouldn't take much for them to push your files to an online only organizer where you could have access to your originals only, but have to pay to get to the edited versions. Have you seen adobe revel? This platform is well suited to do just that. If I were them, I would make the service free, but in some way painful like giving you a low storage amount, or only allowing x number if uploads a day. Then I would allow you to upgrade your service, etc. Oh, wait, they are already starting to do that. Again, the professionals will pass the costs along to their clients, but the people like me whom are becoming tired of being nickled and dimed will have a problem with this. What if adobe writes their license agreement to where you only have rights to your originals, but have joint or sole ownership of the edits - especially in exchange for a service for free. This is somewhat the model google uses. Would it piss you off to see one of your pictures used in an advertisement and you weren't paid a royalty or given credit?
now this is some serious forward speculation here but it isn't that far fetched. The millennium babies are used to a rented life style and services for free in exchange for giving up intellectual ownership to the data they produce using these services. Companies today are positioning themselves to take advantage of that market. They make money by upselling you services, or by capitalizing on your intellectual property. interesting thing to watch will be the companies like Corel, serif, google, Microsoft, etc. Google and Microsoft are already kings in the cloud services market and they are in a position to actually steal some of Adobe's business away by offering "close enough to adobe" apps. Ever wonder why google bought nik software? Microsoft has photo software too though they aren't using much of it yet. The other lesser used software companies now have a shot at a level playing field as each company will scramble to provide the best service at the best price. Even though it is adobe we are discussing, every software company is on the ground floor when it comes to cloud services. By leveling the playing field, adobe is vulnerable to actually losing marketshare as this new generation of buyers is used to cheap/free and jumping between services for the better deal. What could happen is that adobe may end up with professional customers only, where as Corel and google provide you with free apps for any of your devices that can do the same thing. Guess how many professionals there are compared to hobbyists or ppl who think they are professionals.
Do you really need adobe to do your photography work? Think about that before you answer.
Show Posts
