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Affinity Studio now free

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Re: Affinity Studio now free

#411

Post by ezfe »

mns wrote: post #157
carlosjobim wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The complaining is off the charts! Nothing in your life would have changed if you hadn't heard about this free product. Now you rest sleepless and grind your teeth because other people get to enjoy free high quality software.

Yes, it did change: I want to use the old apps and I don't want to use a Canva account. I can still use them, but will never get any updates any more.

Nothing changed: you can still use the apps you purchased, as they were when you purchased them? That's the whole point of one time purchases.

Re: Affinity Studio now free

#412

Post by carefulfungi »

sbarre wrote: post #119
tensor wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 (…

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

In my experience, senior sales/revenue/whatever leaders see the free version as competing with the sales motion, not as a funnel (regardless of the reality). And argue to limit it more and more for short term conversion improvements.

Re: Affinity Studio now free

#413

Post by ezfe »

nirava wrote: post #243
carlosjobim wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The complaining is off the charts! Nothing in your life would have changed if you hadn't heard about this free product. Now you rest sleepless and grind your teeth because other people get to enjoy free high quality software.

bad take. your perpetual license was swapped under your nose for a freemium thing designed explicitly and specifically to get you to start paying subscription. that's the exact opposite of why I bought this software in the first place. also remember, v2 is now NOT getting all the features people have been requesting for years like image trace. it seems basically calculated to get people to make an account and get the…

Your perpetual license is still valid for the v2 suite. Nothing was swapped - the product you paid for is no longer getting updates.

Just because people have been asking for features doesn't mean your perpetual license is owed those features??? That's an incredible amount of entitlement.

Re: Affinity Studio now free

#414

Post by ezfe »

gspencley wrote: post #134

I switched to Affinity as part an ongoing effort to "de-Adobe-ize." I had no idea that they were owned by Canva. This could be good news, but as someone who paid for a perpetual license, I'm worried that some of the features I paid a one-time license for will eventually move to a Canva subscription model :( The reason that worries me is that when I look at the feature chart, you've got "Affinity" compared with "Affin…

> I'm worried that some of the features I paid a one-time license for will eventually move to a Canva subscription model

> to be able to use certain Affinity features that I've PAID FOR then fuck them

Your license is perpetual for V2, so I wouldn't worry that you'll lose access to it?

Re: Affinity Studio now free

#415

Post by [deleted] »

dangus wrote: post #309
pentagrama wrote: post #143

I used Affinity for several years, so to add some background here: Serif is the company that originally built this software. -------- 2014–2024 Serif developed the Affinity suite, a collection of three independent desktop apps sold with a one-time payment model: - Affinity Designer: vector graphic design (Adobe Illustrator equivalent) - Affinity Photo: digital image editing (Adobe Photoshop equivalent) - Affinity Pub…

I realize that money rules everything but I find it so confusing that so many companies will spend a decade building a great product and then just exit with full knowledge that it will be the inevitable end of the relevance of their work. You might think that some founders somewhere out there would be motivated by some level of ego to say “no, I won’t sell out, I built this amazing thing and the highest bidder owner…

[deleted]

Re: Affinity Studio now free

#416

Post by blackqueeriroh »

alt227 wrote: post #258
indiantinker wrote: post #76

So did they buy Affinity and all their tools and gave it for free? https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/about/

Yep, but dont expect the level of quality development that was there before. These'free' tools are to attract you to buy ai. They are now only selling tools. Serif were pushing to beat Adobe at their own game and make the best designer tools available. Canva are just trying to sell you ai.

So why has Canva been giving massive amounts of their quality development away for free for over 10 years?

Re: Affinity Studio now free

#417

Post by nkq2g »

mwkaufma wrote: post #117

Many comments here that this "makes sense." Free does not make sense! If I'm not paying for it I'm not the customer anymore.

Makes sense to whom, exactly?

Free makes business sense when monetizing through business customers and AI subscriptions.

Conflating "this doesn't align with my preferences" with "this is objectively bad business strategy" assumes personal consumer expectations should dictate corporate viability. Those are different frames of reference.

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