Adobe editing software the most used in the world for a reason.

The trouble with sensing the vibe here is that all the people who were really unhappy are no longer Adobe customers, so you don't get to hear from them. It skews the picture a bit.

That’s funny.

I would guess that We read the same forums and my totally unscientific perception - as it relates to forum users only - is opposite of yours. I guess neither of us can talk about ‘most Adobe users” as we have no real facts. I do wish a credible source would do a detailed survey about this though - across the entire photo/video/creative user base — and see what the actual sentiment is. I, personally, don’t know.

You can't transfer your edits via XMP. You can transfer some metadata and one or two edits might be compatible with your new editor, but the option to transfer doesn't really exist. It would require some kind of catalogue translation program to do this and I can't see newbie vendors developing that to mop Adobe ingrates.

No reasonable person can possibly argue that someone should be fine with the prospect of starting afresh editing a back catalogue of 40,000 images. It's a ridiculous idea.

The idea my expectations are unrealistic is pure gaslighting. LR ran on a perpetual licence model for almost all of its existence. It didn't make Adobe poor, did it? Some accountants ran some numbers and figured out a way to gouge their customers. And as I keep stressing, I don't care about their pricing model. I care about only one thing, not having control over the thousands of hours of labour I have put into my image editing over the last 20 years, just to benefit Adobe shareholders, if I were to be foolish enough to sign up for the subs model. And I'm not, I still have my perpetual licence for images up to 2019 and still and always will have control over my edits. The same for post 2019 images which are processed in darktable and free of all this nonsense.

I do find it bizarre that people think it is ok to hand control over their own work to a corporation whom they will have to continue to pay forever. It really doesn't seem sensible or equitable to me. But each to their own; if you guys are happy with the situation there's obviously nothing else worth saying on the subject. I just hope anyone signing up has thought through the implications for their autonomy.

No, it doesn't. What's lost is your access to make NEW edits. You permanently retain access to your old edits.

I spent $149.50 USD on Capture One Pro 7, $49 USD to upgrade to 9, $182 CAD to upgrade to 12, so around $330 USD over 9 years. I would have to upgrade again if I get a new camera. Prices has gone up, but still way cheaper than subscribing to Lightroom.

Correct.

Rich

What does it even mean to say you retain access to your old edits if you can't change them, roll back to an earlier version or do anything with them?

I'd describe that situation as "your old edits are permanently frozen from the moment your subs lapses and you are blocked from accessing them".

That situation is not remotely what I would describe as "retaining access". Putting your stuff in a locked glass case under armed guard is not "retaining access", it's letting you look at it from afar whilst you ponder re-subscribing to get hold of the key.

You can access the edits for printing and exporting. However, you are blocked from doing any more modifications within the app.
My more significant concern would be whether you can still update Adobe's apps even if the subscription has lapsed. Ten years from now, none of my current apps will be compatible with my latest computer/OS.

It means you retain them. Kind of like picking a carpet color - you retain the carpet but not the ability to change its color.

Almost like hanging a print on the wall.

It means you can still view, print, export and publish your old edits.

I put stuff in a safe deposit box specifically so that I can retain access.

You retain access to the key. What you lose is the ability to modify what's inside.

I'm not sure why this is hard to understand. Losing access means not being able to view, print, export or publish your pictures with your edits in-tact. But that's not what's happening.

When you buy a painting, do you retain access to the artist's ability to apply new paint and thus alter the painting? Or do you just own the painting as-is? You're paying Adobe for the right to make NEW edits. You retain the old ones. And even so, I think you can still alter them to some degree with Quick Develop and you can always re-start your subscription if you want to make new edits.

Yeah, the subscription model sucks for users (but it's great for Adobe since they get to "fleece the flock"), but not for the reason you say.

That is also a concern with purchased software, and with the software that comes with purchased hardware. I'm looking at you, Hasselblad/Imacon.

Yes.
And for open-source, like Darktable, the main concern is whether there will be volunteers willing to contribute to the project (see issues with Mac port).

Yup.
I am a casual user in this hobby, just documenting my life along the way. I used to buy LR updates every 5 years or so, for new features and in response to upgraded hardware. $125 every 5 years is very easy to do. Now it would cost that every year with no upgrades that are really meaningful to me. That's about a 500% increase for a user like me. So, I have been hanging in with 6.14 for the last few years, and not sure where to go from here. My Z6 is a jpeg only camera now, which I am OK with, but this subscription leaves me wondering if I have any future with Adobe at all. I haven't really warmed up to the interface of other programs. I guess I am going to have to.

I realize with software you are only buying a license to use it, and that can be yanked, but it still feels like I own 6.14 rather than renting it. There are so many subscription based everythings out there...TV networks, satellite radio, Adobe, Microsoft, etc etc and I know shareholders love the guaranteed revenue stream but these really add up. When I am in fixed income retirement, all that stuff is gonna have to go. Subscriptions for software suck.

When we shot jpeg, we just used the magic of photos on the Mac.

Raw, I use DPP4 (free) and Affinity Photo ($25 three years ago).

That’s my lifetime photography software expenditure.

Does the free software from Nikon not work for you?
www.nikonusa.com/en/learn-and-explore/a/tips-and-techniques/nikon-capture-nx-d-software.html

I'm not sure why the distinction between losing access to your edits and losing access to your pictures seems to be causing so much mis-understanding.

Once your subscription lapses, all you can do is output RGB files like jpgs or tiffs and print. This is retaining access to your pictures. No argument there.

But it is not the same as retaining access to my raw file history stack. The only reason a raw file history stack exists is to provide you with a non-destructive means of making changes to your files. As soon as you lose the ability to make changes to the history stack, you have in effect lost access to the stack because it only exists to make changes. You can't use the stack for anything else. Stopping the subs effectively turns your history stack & raw file into the equivalent of a fixed RGB jpg.

If I wanted to do raster editing, I would never bother with raw in the first place. Adobe might as well say "if you let the subs lapse, we will convert all your raw files into jpgs and delete your history stacks".

It would be different if the history stack could be used in a different program, but effectively they can't because different programs have completely different processing pipes that are not compatible.

So, I stick to my point. Anyone who cares about their raw workflow and the power it gives you to revisit, rework and non-destructively play with your raw files, including allowing you to create virtual copies with completely different editing outcomes, has to accept before signing up for the subscription model, that they will be obliged to subscribe for a lifetime if they want to avoid losing access to this workflow and seeing all that work converted into a frozen RGB file. If you are happy with this deal, good on you, but I'm never going there.

Huh? I did lots of raster editing of raw files before Lr came out. It worked fine. There are lots of reasons to use raw other than to use proxy editing.

Then you wouldn't have the option of re-upping at some point in the future and being able to tweak your edits, which is an option now.

no - all raw converters are parametric... when you buy Adobe's tools ( or any other closed source tools ) you are locking yourself in the situation where you labor is not fully yours... you can't take your parametric edits ( not the output, but adjustments) elsewhere ... funny how Adobe & Co want camera manufacturers to fully document info in raw files and yet they don't want to fully documents their own parametric edits so you can take your work elsewhere.