Adobe Announces Cloud-Based Lightroom CC

[LDS]

Do I need to upgrade my catalogs to the new version if I want to upgrade? If so, can you downgrade as well?

If you open a catalog in the new release, it will be upgraded (but the old one won't be overwritten). You can't downgrade a catalog - you need to revert to the old one.

 

[yeahright]

There is no 'moral obligation' for a company to keep customers happy - it is good business (yes, keeping customers happy is part of maximising revenue)

That's your point of view but that's not the only point of view there is.

. But you cannot keep everyone happy all the time and trying to do so is definitely bad business.

I am not saying that companies should try to satisfy *all* their customers. That won't ever be possible. I am saying however, that companies should not take advantage of their customers in an unfair way - by having them, and the market, over years maneuvered into a situation where there really is no alternative (because you have spent hours and hours on your catalog, perfected your workflow, use features frequently that are not present in alternative software, etc., have already invested in years of subscriptions not only to use the software in the very moment, but also to be able to use the results in the future), and then suddenly force everyone to accept completely different and in this respect immoral (yes, I think there is such a thing) terms and conditions.

 

[LDS]

It sounds really simple, continuing to support perpetual licenses - and the actual switch is relatively simple - but the level of QE testing and support was simply outweighing the revenue.

Sorry, but I believe that's just a lame excuse and PR damage control. I may be a lame photographer, but software development is my successful business. The two versions are not so different (it looks the perpetual has the new features simply disabled at the UI level - as some plug-ins to enable the dehaze effect shown), and unless the way Adobe tests software is really outdated and fully manual the effort to test the two versions can't be so expensive - unless in CC the real testers are the customers themselves....

It would be also more credible if Adobe didn't its best to hide the perpetual license on its site - it was very, very difficult for unaware customers to find and buy it.

I perfectly understand the Adobe decision - just, please, don't pull our legs...

 

[Mikehit]

There is no 'moral obligation' for a company to keep customers happy - it is good business (yes, keeping customers happy is part of maximising revenue)

That's your point of view but that's not the only point of view there is.

. But you cannot keep everyone happy all the time and trying to do so is definitely bad business.

I am not saying that companies should try to satisfy *all* their customers. That won't ever be possible. I am saying however, that companies should not take advantage of their customers in an unfair way - by having them, and the market, over years maneuvered into a situation where there really is no alternative (because you have spent hours and hours on your catalog, perfected your workflow, use features frequently that are not present in alternative software, etc., have already invested in years of subscriptions not only to use the software in the very moment, but also to be able to use the results in the future), and then suddenly force everyone to accept completely different and in this respect immoral (yes, I think there is such a thing) terms and conditions.

What advantage are Adobe taking of customers?
If you are using legacy Adobe perpetual license, you still have use of it. If you moved to CC you knew you had access to edits for only as long as you paid for the subscription. I am not sure what you are saying.
What features are not present in the new software that were in the 'old' software?
Are you saying that companies who discontinue products are acting 'immorally'? Does a camera manufacturer act immorally by stopping support for long-defunct lenses that are otherwise optically sound?

 

[cayenne]

When I see "modern cloud storage" I always read, for example, "ancient mainframe storage"... I'm old enough to remember when my data were on a remote system...

I'm right there with you!

As we observe the passing of the perpetual Lr license, I have to remind myself that there's a burgeoning generation (or two or three) coming up behind me that have never used / may never use a desktop, a laptop or an SLR camera. They live in a world of smartphones & tablets and still, streaming & social media of every kind, all stored in the cloud.

Yeah, but are they actually trying to make $$ from it?

C

 

[LightroomQueen]

I perfectly understand the Adobe decision - just, please, don't pull our legs...

I'm not trying to pull your leg. It's not just hiding UI bits in the program, it's all the installation/licensing/sales stuff that causes most of the complications. A huge amount of the support stuff I deal with are due to the dual licensing systems, and that's only me!

 

[suburbia]

If one finds that the main if not the only purpose of running a business is to maximize revenue, then you're right. If however, one sees a moral obligation of any business, to make customers happy and not hold them captive because they are really not as free as you suggest - after all, Adobe holds a near-monopoly with several of their software packages - then the rant is well justified. I see things quite similar.

There is no 'moral obligation' for a company to keep customers happy - it is good business (yes, keeping customers happy is part of maximising revenue). But you cannot keep everyone happy all the time and trying to do so is definitely bad business.
....

True but what I find distasteful here is that there seems to be little awareness or attempt to thank long-term users. For example I have paid and upgraded to every release since the first version and now I am being forced to pay the full amount every month, the same as a new user. Sure change the licensing model but why not acknowledge those long term investors who have helped get the product to where it is today.

 

[Mikehit]

If one finds that the main if not the only purpose of running a business is to maximize revenue, then you're right. If however, one sees a moral obligation of any business, to make customers happy and not hold them captive because they are really not as free as you suggest - after all, Adobe holds a near-monopoly with several of their software packages - then the rant is well justified. I see things quite similar.

There is no 'moral obligation' for a company to keep customers happy - it is good business (yes, keeping customers happy is part of maximising revenue). But you cannot keep everyone happy all the time and trying to do so is definitely bad business.
....

True but what I find distasteful here is that there seems to be little awareness or attempt to thank long-term users. For example I have paid and upgraded to every release since the first version and now I am being forced to pay the full amount every month, the same as a new user. Sure change the licensing model but why not acknowledge those long term investors who have helped get the product to where it is today.

What 'full amount' are you being expected to pay? LR Classic+PS is the same price it was before. If you want 1TB cloud space then you either sacrifice PS or pay another $5 per month for PS+1TB

 

[chasinglight]

Happily I can say that because I bought LR6 perpetual in April of 2015 and bought PS CS6 on a student license back in 2011 I have saved money by not moving over to CC yet. Unfortunately for me it's just a matter of how long I can hold out on LR6 before moving over to LR classic, but for as long as I can hold off upgrading, LR6 will continue to pay dividends.

Does anyone know if in recent history Adobe has done special offers (black friday deals, etc) to move people to the cloud? Perhaps a discount on the photography plan for buying the year all at once?

 

[LDS]

I'm not trying to pull your leg.

I didn't mean you, I meant Adobe. I apologize for not being clear, sorry.

It's not just hiding UI bits in the program, it's all the installation/licensing/sales stuff that causes most of the complications. A huge amount of the support stuff I deal with are due to the dual licensing systems, and that's only me!

Installation, again, doesn't seem so different - after all it's the same application, although the installer may be different, true, still is a very simple installer. Having to support several platforms, and two desktop applications on each now, is far more complex and expensive.

Of course the trade-off with being able to capture user data in the cloud, and find a way to monetize that (Adobe Stock? Image processing and data mining?), is deemed advantageous - Adobe clearly thinks about some of the same revenues sources Facebook and Google have. And to make it work, you need to push users towards a cloud subscription.

Licensing/sales/etc. are not testing. Having two license model surely complicates things on both sides (and handling a subscription is more complex than handling one-off sales) - as I said I understood perfectly Adobe, no excuse needed to justify the dropping of the perpetual license - especially if they can't really stand scrutiny.

 

[jthomson]

I perfectly understand the Adobe decision - just, please, don't pull our legs...

I'm not trying to pull your leg. It's not just hiding UI bits in the program, it's all the installation/licensing/sales stuff that causes most of the complications. A huge amount of the support stuff I deal with are due to the dual licensing systems, and that's only me!

Now there are two different versions of "Lightroom" with different features to support. That makes it so much simpler.

 

[yeahright]

What advantage are Adobe taking of customers?
If you are using legacy Adobe perpetual license, you still have use of it. If you moved to CC you knew you had access to edits for only as long as you paid for the subscription. I am not sure what you are saying.
What features are not present in the new software that were in the 'old' software?
Are you saying that companies who discontinue products are acting 'immorally'? Does a camera manufacturer act immorally by stopping support for long-defunct lenses that are otherwise optically sound?

Yes, partly I am saying just that (except, we are not talking about long-defunct products). If Canon decided they'd discontinue the EF mount and switched to a completely different mount designed so that it were impossible to design an adaptor, and if they did that not for technical reasons but solely because they wanted their customers to buy all new lenses from them, many people would be seriously pissed, and rightfully so. That would be another example for 'immoral' behavior. It might well be that in this case pressure from the market (probably people would switch to another brand of camera in this case) would prevent such a move, but I feel that pressure from the market should not be the only source of motivation for any company's policies.

 

[LDS]

If Canon decided they'd discontinue the EF mount and switched to a completely different mount designed so that it were impossible to design an adaptor, and if they did that not for technical reasons but solely because they wanted their customers to buy all new lenses from them, many people would be seriously pissed, and rightfully so.

You mean like when they switched from the FD to the EF mount? <G>

Ok, there were some sound technical reasons... yet Canon for several years didn't get any money from me

 

[Talys]

...another example for 'immoral' behavior.

I'm totally ok with immoral behavior, as long as it didn't hurt anything small, cute, furry, or feathered in the making ;D

Just make what I want at a price I'm willing to pay, then take my money, please and thank you!

 

[Hector1970]

Anyone finding Lightroom running any faster. I'm not. No quicker than before which was slooooow!.
My catalog may be too big regardless.

 

[bitm2007]

I've just realized that there is a slider on the bottom of the histogram in the new version of LR CC, that works like the mid point slider in Photoshop's levels pallet.

 

[bhf3737]

Anyone finding Lightroom running any faster. I'm not. No quicker than before which was slooooow!.
My catalog may be too big regardless.

My first empirical impression with the updated version of Lightroom Classic was that it is faster when importing and browsing through. But almost the same slow speed as before when converting CR2 files to DNG after importing. Export original size seems to be faster though. I'm using Windows core i7 machine, 64G Ram, NVIDIA 1080 GPU.

 

[Mikehit]

Anyone finding Lightroom running any faster. I'm not. No quicker than before which was slooooow!.
My catalog may be too big regardless.

Import and browsing - definitely much faster. Editing - not sure yet as I have not had chance to do much.

 

[Talys]

"If you are interested in checking out our cloud-based mobile-first software, Lightroom CC, click on Learn More."

I think, mobile-first says it all for me. Really, no interest in a product that puts mobile first, since my mobile photos are mostly of stuff at Costco sent by text message to my wife to see if she wants it.

 

[Talys]

First of all, the new range mask is AWESOME. In the past, in order to adjust exposure on just a range, I would create export, snapshot, create a second export, combine them in Photoshop, and mask them there. Now, that's so much easier to do directly in LR.

Second...

Anyone finding Lightroom running any faster. I'm not. No quicker than before which was slooooow!.
My catalog may be too big regardless.

Import and browsing - definitely much faster. Editing - not sure yet as I have not had chance to do much.

The browsing speed -- that is, time to open a 30MB CR2 with processing and have it ready to view -- is WARP SPEED compared to before, which was only a touch faster than DPP. It's essentially now instant for me.