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You can no longer reinstall CS 2 or 3 even if you have the original disks

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Re: You can no longer reinstall CS 2 or 3 even if you have the original disks

#331

Post by TheOtherHobbes »

CamperBob2 wrote: post #320
Silhouette wrote: post #305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As ever, this would be a more compelling argument if the state that granted copyright protections also provided meaningful enforcement. Setting copyright up in a way that often makes it prohibitively expensive to enforce through legal means and then objecting when the rights holders attempt to protect their investments through technological measures feels a little hypocritical.

There should be a choice: either the legal system protects your IP (copyright), or you do (DRM). You shouldn't get the benefits of both approaches, because they are mutually exclusive. Material that is protected with DRM has effectively been stolen from the future public domain. At the very least, key escrow should be required before copyright protection is granted.

This is like arguing that front doors shouldn't have locks because burglary is illegal.

Legal status and practical enforcement are unrelated issues. You seem to be attempting to conflate them because you just don't like the idea of copyright.

But that's a different issue. In fact it's perfectly consistent to enforce copyright through a combination of DRM and legal challenges.

Legally copyright is the default. Nothing is in the public domain unless it's explicitly handed over to the public domain.

So software items with DRM can't be "stolen from the future public domain" because the DRM is part of the product or item. And it's up to the rights holder to decide whether or not they want to free it. This is a deliberate choice on their part. (It's a little more complex with other content because the content is assumed to have an existence independent of its realisation or distribution model. Not so much with software.)

None of this justifies Adobe's actions, and a class action against Adobe would also be reasonable. (Realistically not likely to succeed - but hardly baseless.)

But it would be an argument about real/assumed/implied breach of contract with buyers/license users, and not over copyright terms or DRM.

Re: You can no longer reinstall CS 2 or 3 even if you have the original disks

#332

Post by pixelrevision »

henriquez wrote: post #98
egonschiele wrote: post #77

In the last month I've returned two pieces of Adobe software and canceled a yearly subscription. I've been seeing ads for the AI features in photoshop all over twitter this week. It's pretty clear what their business strategy is -- just keep working on the tech and assume people will buy their software because it's the only one with the hot tech thing. It's ironic that for a company that caters to designers, artists…

Speaking of UI, I’ve been using Photoshop since 1999 and it’s remarkable how little the UI has changed. Sure there are new panels and features, but the basic layout and most of the keyboard shortcuts are all the same. The consistency and familiarity is really nice but I’m sure they’ve sacrificed a ton of UX potential to keep old farts like me.

As someone who is trying to use pixelmator after 25 years of photoshop there is a lot of muscle memory to overcome.

Re: You can no longer reinstall CS 2 or 3 even if you have the original disks

#333

Post by potemkinhr »

hardwaresofton wrote: post #166

https://www.gimp.org https://krita.org/en If you donate anything near what you would have paid for Adobe, then these projects will be awash in resources.

Also a stellar Photoshop alternative is Paint.NET https://www.getpaint.net/

I wasn't happy with GIMP's interface since way back but this one fulfills pretty much my every need, and I gather would for most other users too (excluding heavy professional users). Give this one also a spin

Re: You can no longer reinstall CS 2 or 3 even if you have the original disks

#334

Post by user5994461 »

maxerickson wrote: post #157
tbirdny wrote: post #62

No one would still be using CS 2 or 3 if Adobe had reasonable prices on new products. I bought Adobe products since the mid 1990s, but I recently switched to Affinity Photo and Designer because Adobe priced me out. Elements wasn't powerful enough for me. I was surprised how good Affinity software is. It does everything I need and is a very reasonable price without a subscription. I may never buy another Adobe product…

$600 a year isn't particularly expensive (that's for Creative Cloud). Roughly $0.30 an hour vs whatever wage is being paid to click the buttons. It's not cheap , but it's not something businesses are going to balk at either. They are showing healthy growth in revenue: https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/ADBE/financials?p=ADBE So apparently lots of their users are not concerned about their change to the pricing model and…

It's expensive for professional users too, in a good chunk of Europe a designer might be looking at €1000 a month in income.

The €50 a month is sizable. If you're working with it full time and the client requires it, well fine, otherwise it's €50 to save.

Re: You can no longer reinstall CS 2 or 3 even if you have the original disks

#335

Post by petepete »

porker wrote: post #286
diarrhea wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That, and Adobe Lightroom. I tried to switch and had a mixture of Darktable, RawTherapee, RapidPhotoDownloader and digiKam running. It was unpleasant and years behind Lightroom, unfortunately. Even more unfortunate is that I have a stand-alone license for Lightroom 5, but my camera is too new for it (no support for its RAWs).

Thanks for the feedback, I hadn't thought about replacing Lightroom yet. I do like Lightroom, but the catalogue speed with 100k+ photos is glacial on my PC. I tried importing 30 years of photos rather than having multiple catalogues, as tagging consistently across all would be useful ("Hey auntie Sally, look at the photos of you aging!").

I use Capture One in Lightroom's place and it really is an excellent tool, its raw processing capabilities are fantastic and the features mean I barely (if ever) have to reach for a more-powerful editor like Affinity.

Re: You can no longer reinstall CS 2 or 3 even if you have the original disks

#336

Post by II2II »

ShinTakuya wrote: post #244
pfranz wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of game studios release a final patch removing DRM. That would have been nice.

Even if Adobe were that generous, I'd argue the situation is different. All Adobe product releases are just evolutions of the same fundamental products, meaning making a previous version free diminishes the value of the newest version. For game developers, removing DRM can drive sales for the sequel since most games have a story and players want to see what happens next.

Removing DRM does not make it free. It simply means that customers will have fewer concerns about the product ceasing to function in the future.

I also doubt that piracy of older versions would affect sales. The pricing means it is pretty much only accessible to enthusiasts and professionals, who would be inclined to use more recent versions anyhow.

Re: You can no longer reinstall CS 2 or 3 even if you have the original disks

#337

Post by userbinator »

zakki wrote: post #152
userbinator wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's available in the web archive, among other places.

I tried yo search one of the link from CNET news in archive.org. It said archived is removed (per request)

You need to search for the filenames and direct links. I have an old comment here linking to a different archive that has the original direct links on the page with the serials.

(Adobe is certainly trying to make it hard to find, which I'm not surprised about.)

Re: You can no longer reinstall CS 2 or 3 even if you have the original disks

#338

Post by HideousKojima »

jeffbee wrote: post #167
hardwaresofton wrote: post #166

https://www.gimp.org https://krita.org/en If you donate anything near what you would have paid for Adobe, then these projects will be awash in resources.

That's a really interesting assertion. I have a feeling you could throw arbitrary amount of money at GIMP and it will still be almost useless.

As a (former) long-time GIMP hater, they actually fixed a lot of my biggest complaints with it a year or two ago. Definitely still far short of Photoshop in terms of a lot of features, but the UI doesn't make me want to stab myself anymore

Re: You can no longer reinstall CS 2 or 3 even if you have the original disks

#339

Post by kabcl »

porker wrote: post #254
prox wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I switched to Affinity completely, and I also slowly see some people in the industry change. And for video, DaVinci Resolve. There might be cases were you’re tied to CS, but the bulk of the work can be done in these apps.

What about a replacement for Adobe Acrobat Pro on (Windows)? That is the one app that keeps me having a Creative Cloud subscription. In a business setting I find it essential.

I've been using pdfstudio from Qoppa[1] for a while. It's been a good replacement for AcrobatPro for me.

1. https://www.qoppa.com/pdfstudio/

Re: You can no longer reinstall CS 2 or 3 even if you have the original disks

#340

Post by HideousKojima »

skohan wrote: post #193
Shared404 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or better yet, an open source alternative. I like both GIMP and Krita. The problem with piracy is that it still ends up with more people knowing the proprietary software, and thus helps it keep the position cemented.

I have tried to use GIMP, but in my experience the UI is just so unintuitive and hard to use.

When was the last time you used it? The UI has improved significantly in the last two years or so
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