Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Affinity Studio now free

affinity.studio

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 825 posts

Re: Affinity Studio now free

#111

Post by tensor »

codeptualize wrote: post #43

It's a smart approach imo. They had to get a subscription somehow to support AI features which they need to compete (just usage cost wise you can't do that on a one time fee license). But since they promised not to go subscription when they got acquired by Canva, making it free with AI as the subscription is a clever solution to not break their promise while still introducing a subscription model. I think their bet i…

I think there are a lot of people like me who use it occasionally and won't bother with AI nor a subscription. To me this is a bad sign, as free is unsustainable. It's only a matter of time before they look at their metrics and realize "oh look, we have all these casual users who only use the free stuff, that's a new source of revenue!" at which point either the subscription now covers the app, or worse, they steal your shit for "AI training."

Hell, has anyone looked at the EULA for this "free" product? Maybe it's already doing that.

Re: Affinity Studio now free

#112

Post by quchen »

johnhamlin wrote: post #101

Love to see this the day Adobe emailed to say it’s hiking my Photoshop/Lightroom subscription by 50% ($10/mo -> $15/mo)

One of the reasons I stopped doing photography was that I realized I’m locked to using Lightroom where all my previous pictures are, and without a subscription it’s such a hassle to gain access to them again. I miss the days when I just bought Lightroom and that was it. :-(

Re: Affinity Studio now free

#114

Post by thewebguyd »

achow wrote: post #58
glimshe wrote: post #54

Nooooooo! I'm a loyal Serif customer and paid for their software. I LOVE Affinity. And I HATE "free" commercial products because they need to extract revenue from subscription services, ads, data selling etc. This is the first step toward making Affinity become another rental application like Photoshop. Escaping Adobe's predatory business model is exactly why I became a Serif customer in the first place.

Look at it this way, this could challenge Adobe to make Creative Suite free and charge only for AI in their product (one can dream at least).

One could dream.

But hey, anything that puts pressure on Adobe and makes them sweat a little is a win in my book. Fuck them.

Now, if maybe Apple would actually do something with their Pixelmator acquisition and re-release aperture, both Apple and Canva/Affinity can start going after Adobe.

Re: Affinity Studio now free

#115

Post by rtaylorgarlock »

dannyw wrote: post #89
glimshe wrote: post #54

Nooooooo! I'm a loyal Serif customer and paid for their software. I LOVE Affinity. And I HATE "free" commercial products because they need to extract revenue from subscription services, ads, data selling etc. This is the first step toward making Affinity become another rental application like Photoshop. Escaping Adobe's predatory business model is exactly why I became a Serif customer in the first place.

I’m also a loyal Serif customer, love Affinity, and I work at Canva. This is not the first step in that. It’s not anywhere close to our plan. We want to make Affinity, and professional design, the default tool. And a huge part of that is free, forever. AI features; like generative fill, have COGS and incremental inference costs. Hence that’s an _optional_ subscription. I understand why you feel that way. Having being…

Respect the love and the vision, yet don't forget Pournelle's Iron Law of Bureaucracy <3 Available to consult with mgmt on how to fight the law ;)

Re: Affinity Studio now free

#116

Post by achow »

TechRemarker wrote: post #87

Been curious what the Oct 10 announcement would be. It seemed most likely an acquisition since they wanted enough time of not selling existing products to avoid dealing with a month of refunds. Appears Canva bought with it now being a single app that is "free" but paid for premium features. While many may rejoice at a solid free options it's certainly an unfortunate day for those who rely on it. As Canva makes money…

Canva acquired Affinity year and half back - Mar 2024.

https://www.canva.com/en_in/newsroom/news/affinity/

Re: Affinity Studio now free

#119

Post by sbarre »

tensor wrote: post #111
codeptualize wrote: post #43

It's a smart approach imo. They had to get a subscription somehow to support AI features which they need to compete (just usage cost wise you can't do that on a one time fee license). But since they promised not to go subscription when they got acquired by Canva, making it free with AI as the subscription is a clever solution to not break their promise while still introducing a subscription model. I think their bet i…

I think there are a lot of people like me who use it occasionally and won't bother with AI nor a subscription. To me this is a bad sign, as free is unsustainable. It's only a matter of time before they look at their metrics and realize "oh look, we have all these casual users who only use the free stuff, that's a new source of revenue!" at which point either the subscription now covers the app, or worse, they steal y…

> Free is unsustainable

This is not necessarily true when the free product is a sales funnel.

Canva's business model is not "desktop design application" but giving away these tools creates goodwill in the design community and gives them exposure and a lower-friction conversion funnel towards their actual paid products.

Since they're desktop apps, there's very little cost to them for the free users who never convert (unlike Figma or other cloud-based products that have operational/bandwidth costs for all users).

Re: Affinity Studio now free

#120

Post by thewebguyd »

turnsout wrote: post #20

As an Affinity user, I'm interested to try this out (just downloaded). I'm surprised they tried to put it all in one app. Affinity Publisher is quite different from Affinity Photo for example. Edit: Just checked out the app. They essentially put Affinity Designer, Affinity Photo and Affinity Publisher together in one app, switchable from a tab. Honestly, it's executed well. I hope it stays free—these apps are legitim…

I was skeptical about the all-in-one but it's executed really well, to the point that now I really want Adobe to do the same thing for Lightroom (Classic) and Photoshop.

Would be great to be able to switch between them on the same photo with tabs in one app. LR already uses ACR as the backend.

Post reply on HN