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Buying Adobe Photoshop CS6

patdryburgh.com

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Re: Buying Adobe Photoshop CS6

#91

Post by kabdib »

cledet wrote: post #87
esbwhat wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is why I only buy software on CD, even if the option costs extra.

We're in a digital age. You shouldn't have to do this.

You shouldn't /have/ to. But I still do, at least for the important tools.

I've also stopped buying music digitally. I have a Zune pass, but the music I really care about, I buy on CD and rip.

I've utterly stopped buying audio books from Audible. While you /can/ burn CDs and so on, I've basically had it with that nonsense. The last audio book I bought, I had to "turn pirate" in order to listen to (the CD write borked, and I didn't have any apparent recourse other than to rip the audio stream directly).

Re: Buying Adobe Photoshop CS6

#92

Post by smalltalk »

sk1ppy wrote: post #81
ticks wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This happens in all sort of markets. You charge based on the cost of living. I don't like it, but it happens. It is usually linked to a contractual obligation in the locality, which means they have to charge higher to support the costs of their local representatives.

So photoshop is 2x the price in the UK (where I live) due to cost of living, but my colleagues in the states earn 1.5x my salary also due to cost of living? Does not compute.

It's not the cost of living nor the cost of technical support as one of the responses discussed, but the fact that EU law places so many additional constraints on businesses that the cost of doing business there is vastly higher than doing business in the US; accordingly, US companies make up for the difference by charging EU customers more for their products.

Re: Buying Adobe Photoshop CS6

#93

Post by mattmanser »

bobbles wrote: post #39
AJ007 wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This reminds me of Microsoft's "cloud" offerings. The last version of Office I bought, I bought online, its undownloadable. There is no CD key in the account. A few years ago I used Office Live. Its shut down and (may be) named 365 or you are supposed to use Office 365. I don't know. I once used "Microsoft Online" which was just a hosted Exchange server. The goal was to use the web based email, along with Outlook on…

I bought the student edition of Microsoft Office 2007 back when that was the current version and the entire process was simply: 1) Pay 2) Receive email 3) Use download link to get installer (1 .exe package) 4) Use serial included in the email during install

There are some parts of MS that work, some that don't. It's a roll of the dice every time.

Like my BizSpark ran out a few months ago and I only just realised. But I've not heard a peep from them about it. As I was clicking around the MSDN site the whole thing seem to be in two minds about whether I was an existing customer or not.

Or when my credit card was cancelled and they locked my XBox account from adding a new credit card and after two weeks they still couldn't figure out how to unlock it so I effectively lost that account because I couldn't buy gold membership for it. Good thing I care little for achievements.

Add to that the fact that all their sites are built on the very broken ASP.Net membership that means you should never attempt to change your username or your email address as you're likely to lose control of your account.

Re: Buying Adobe Photoshop CS6

#94

Post by replax »

smalltalk wrote: post #92
sk1ppy wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So photoshop is 2x the price in the UK (where I live) due to cost of living, but my colleagues in the states earn 1.5x my salary also due to cost of living? Does not compute.

It's not the cost of living nor the cost of technical support as one of the responses discussed, but the fact that EU law places so many additional constraints on businesses that the cost of doing business there is vastly higher than doing business in the US; accordingly, US companies make up for the difference by charging EU customers more for their products.

The EU does certainly not place restrains on vendors which DOUBLE their costs. Is Windows twice as expensive? Are apps on any appstore twice as expensive?

This is just Adobe trying to rake more cash in. They are betting that companies are not going to switch from Adobe products to something else because a licence is twice as expensive. So far, it seems to have worked.

Re: Buying Adobe Photoshop CS6

#95

Post by pasbesoin »

droithomme wrote: post #15

Many years ago the number one page layout program was Quark Xpress. The company decided to save money by firing all their employees who developed the program and were familiar with the code base and save money by outsourcing all development to a code team overseas who was not familiar with page layout software or the Mac platform Quark ran on. This outsourcing team would appear on development boards asking extremely…

No. These days, in these types of corporations, when you are asked to "mentor" someone, start looking for your next job.

Sorry, but that's the way it works. Especially if you are mentoring someone overseas.

It's not (just) a matter of spite. Particularly if you're a bit older, and you're staying in or locked into that sort of corporate environment: You are much more employable when you are already employed. (You need a job to get a job.)

This is all, of course, from a U.S. perspective. YMMV.

P.S. I am all for mentoring and have been the mentor more than once. But these days and in these types of organizations, it is often not fostered or rewarded. And it is not up to you to make up the difference with your own sacrifice.

I don't think I'm at odds with what the parent says (who is, I think, describing a different organizational attitude, as opposed to working differently within the one that actually exists). But, as someone who was brought up to "pay his dues" -- I'm not sure whether people even learn or believe that attitude, anymore -- I'm saying, "pay your dues" is no longer a general rule and is often used as a lever of exploitation.

No great surprise, my saying that. But it bears repeating.

Re: Buying Adobe Photoshop CS6

#96

Post by mattmanser »

esbwhat wrote: post #84
AJ007 wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This reminds me of Microsoft's "cloud" offerings. The last version of Office I bought, I bought online, its undownloadable. There is no CD key in the account. A few years ago I used Office Live. Its shut down and (may be) named 365 or you are supposed to use Office 365. I don't know. I once used "Microsoft Online" which was just a hosted Exchange server. The goal was to use the web based email, along with Outlook on…

This is why I only buy software on CD, even if the option costs extra.

The ironic thing is that until recently photoshop's was cheaper to buy on disk than it was to download. Madness. At least they seem to have fixed that little bug, though the difference is still only £7.

Re: Buying Adobe Photoshop CS6

#97

Post by kalininalex »

batista wrote: post #64

>And then, the nightmare began. I asked the support person when I should expect my serial number. Expecting an answer somewhere in the neighbourhood of 5-10 minutes, you can imagine my surprise when I was told “in the next 24–48 hours.” We really have trivialized words like "nightmare" to death in the first world.

LOL, yes we have.

Re: Buying Adobe Photoshop CS6

#98

Post by herdcall »

Actually, you can get started on Creative Cloud immediately (I did with CS6...just an online signup and confirmation through email), and in any case you can use the software for 30 days without a serial number.

Not saying Adobe support is great though. I had a nightmare experience some years back: my CS3 had license issues after installing trial CS4, and the good folks in India insisted I was ineligible to use my CS3! It was the single worst customer support experience for me EVER. A subsequent follow-up call resolved it easily though, so it's only a few bad apples IMO.

Re: Buying Adobe Photoshop CS6

#99

Post by mattmanser »

patdryburgh wrote: post #33
sxtxixtxcxh wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the color contrast might meet the criteria, but the font weight and font face certainly aren't helping.

Again, feel free to bump up the text size if it doesn't work for you. The site is designed to adjust its layout based on the font size, so the line length will never change. One of the best features of the web is it gives users the ability to adjust these types of things based on their own personal needs. All of that said, I do intend to redesign the site with a larger font size. But, in the meantime, a little CMD (o…

You're being a bit of an idiot telling people to bump the text size up. Just say 'Yes, I mean to fix that at some point'.

Re: Buying Adobe Photoshop CS6

#100

Post by pasbesoin »

jcromartie wrote: post #80
georgemcbay wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Adobe in the last 5 years has now let go many of the core developers of their critical products and outsourced their key products to development teams overseas who were not familiar with the product or the fields of graphic design and illustration." I don't know if that's true, but even if I take your word that it is, this really has nothing to do with the OP's problem, which is order fulfillment and not the actual…

I can assure you that every person he talked to during the order process was in an offshore call center somewhere. The order processing is probably outsourced to a third party too. I see no other explanation for something that should be: if (validatePayment()) { emailCustomer(generatedSerial); }

I went through the process of helping someone attempt to get license codes for the 32 bit, CS 4-ish versions of some programs that are included, for compatibility with older systems, with the CS 5.5 Suite -- it says so right on the tin that they are included, and the installation programs for them are right there on the DVD's.

The process was atrocious. Each phone call essentially started from scratch. One time, I actually got a U.S. representative, and while they were more coherent, ultimately they were no more help, insisting I go back into the other support "flow", which dumped my right back into an Indian (I'm assuming) support center.

It took a fucking month. By which point, the person's original deadline and need had passed.

At the end, I was explaining to the support staff what they needed to do. I finally got someone with a bit of initiative, and after they went to their manager once and received the wrong information, I convinced them to make a second attempt, again with my clarification.

These "managers" have access to a system that generates keys. All the manager had to do was look up and generate the right kind of key. Which they finally found, after my strong insistence and detailed description.

This was one of many support center "managers" consulted by staff during multiple calls, none of whom had a fucking clue about their own product.

If they had, and had demonstrated any motivation, let alone initiative, this month of purgatory would have been reduced to one 10 minute support call.

You can see why they "need" to shift support overseas. It must be the only way they can afford endless hours of utterly useless support staff time.

Fuck Adobe. I'm generally reserved on HN. But these bozos really deserve the outrage.

P.S. I've nothing against overseas (for me) staff. The staff were consistently polite and patient on the phone. They were just utterly untrained and unempowered to solve the problem. (The "managers", OTOH, were in front of the fucking key generation system. They merely had to actually identify the right product and generate a key for it.)

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