[sharkman]

Man o man.

Is it me or is Adobe really showing signs of monopolistic muscle flexing with it's CS release? Consider this:

• Rumour has it, if you buy one of their software "Suites", your license is for Suite and future upgrades will be for the suite you are licensed for. "You will not be able to upgrade future products individually from a Suite license".

• InDesign CS documents are not supported in InDesign 2! (I thought it was becoming a no-brainer to toss Quark for InDesign but now I'm not so sure.)

• Overheard Sebastion of Adobe on Friday saying that Illustrator CS doesn't readily save documents to Illustrator 8.

• No printed manuals with Suite licenses. Printed manuals come only with individual software upgrades, or, manuals can be purchased for $70.00 U.S. (I'm assuming that's for a "Suite" of manuals.)

• No upgrade to Acrobat from versions earlier than 4. (This is more of a personal peeve. I didn't upgrade my version 3 to 4 or 5 as it seemed to me that both 4 and 5 were riddled with problems and version 3 worked great for me, thank you very much.)

(Deep sigh.) Thanks for the rant.

 

[groovetube]

Ah. They're taking their lessons from Macromedia. All Adobe has to do now is add phone product activation to the mix, and they will be in line with Microsoft, and Macromedia.

 

[jtmac]

Activation will come to the Mac platform, no doubt.

I'm a little perturbed at the recent tests by OWC which show Photoshop CS significantly slower than PS7.

Whoa. Maybe Adobe and Apple have some arrangement to get us to buy their software and new G5s?

 

[Kardnal]

Groovetube,

Someone can correct me if I'm wrong here, but I ws under the impression that more recent Adobe apps 'phone home' your serial number and machine information when you're connected to the web. This could just be a rumor, but it looks like they're already 1/2 way there to your phone activation nightmare....

Kardnal

 

[Bolor]

Adobe does check your machine every time you start up if you have DSL, cable or dial-up and checks your license number. They have some scripts in their web folder (In the application support in the library)that sends signals back to them. I just chucked everything in the web folder into the trash. I'm not concerned about anything other than "Big Brother" looking over my shoulder

 

[sharkman]

Adobe product activation is defintely happening as we speak, I just can't recall where. Oz? U.K?

Moscool, you out there?

 

[groovetube]

Wow. I didn't know that. I own PS 7 and Illus 10 and hadn't planned on upgrading yet. Macromedia introduced one serial # with studio MX, and now with MX 2004 there is phone product activation on PC and mac platform. I think it's a little annoying for honest users. Because when studio MX 2004 came out, the same day a hack was released to crack it. In fact, a lot of legit users were apparently using the hack because there were some problems in some cases.

 

[JAMG]

Adobe is far from a benevelent corporate citizen.

They are just as greedy and corrupt as any other...
In fact some of there forum regulars are actively telling Quark users on other boards how they will be welcomed with open arms in the Indesign Forums, where, in fact, there is a constant stream of abuse directed at anyone who has not seen the light and groveled at Adobes feet begging for upgrades...

That being said Photoshop CS and Illustrator CS look fantastic... Indesign is still not the Quark-killer it claims to be...

Sebastien is actually pretty straight up as far as Adobe people go... What got me on Friday was Colin {Smith, i think} showing off Indesign tricks and comparing them to how hard things were in Quark 3... ten years ago....

Corporate politics, to be sure, but the crowd was a mix of Student excitement and old guard scepticism....

The truth is some where in between... as usual...

 

[MacGenius]

For some reason I cannot fathom why some of you think that InDesign is not worthy as a DTP program.

I've seen Adobe's comitment to InDesign over the last 3 or so years and the constant improvements and integration they add while Quark just sits there in 1989.

Quark has its place but in today's technology it is hopelessly behind compared to what InDesign can do. If you think that Quark is going to stillbe around in 5-6 years based on the current rate of their improvement rate, customer service and adoption of new technologies you are deluding yourself.

Look how long they took to add proper PDF creation and import. They still don't offer native PSD and AI import, no transparency support and the list goes on and on.
I won't deny that Quark is efficient at what it does but as a complete layout solution it it terribly lacking. Flexibility is terribly lacking as well.

Anyhow, this just might start a flame war so go ahead but in the end the industry is starting to change and unless Quark does something radical and rewrites their code from scratch then they are doomed just like PageMaker.

P.S. I'm not the only one who thinks this.

 

[JAMG]

Without starting a flame war.. {I have survived enough of them}

Indesigns's major problem is that it is different....
It may be better... but that is overshadowed by the fact that it is different...

Fickle designers who are always looking for something new and improved will always jump on the latest fad.

Publishing companies and newspapers and print shops need reliable tools that work hard and make money...

There is a much larger trained pool of users for Quark.
Indesign is growing, but it has no where to go but up right now.

Quark Inc is making incredibly stupid PR moves lately, but all they are doing is stalling any movement to QX 6..

Indesign is a fresh approach and an interesting alternative, but it has not yet moved the masses away from QuarkXpress 4.11...

Check the ads in Marketing Magazine or the Toronto Star or Workopolis...

 

[jonmon]

Adobe does check your machine every time you start up if you have DSL, cable or dial-up and checks your license number. They have some scripts in their web folder (In the application support in the library)that sends signals back to them. I just chucked everything in the web folder into the trash. I'm not concerned about anything other than "Big Brother" looking over my shoulder

Thanks, got rid of that! Stick it to 'em LOL

 

[Bolor]

It's a good idea too not to be connected to the internet when installind Adobe products either. That really screws them up

 

[sharkman]

No argument here MacG. I'm looking forward to putting Quark out of my misery someday soon. My own reluctance to go to InDesign is a combination of:

a) most of my clients are still using Quark
b) my film guy doesn't use InDesign
c) even if my clients and my service bureau were using InDesign, chances are they couldn't use my CS files because they aren't compatable with their InDesign.

Throw in some unnecessary licensing issues and make product activation a requirement and then jeez, next thing you know you're dealing with another Quark again.

 

[gordguide]

The best thing about Adobe is they are very, very committed to developing software, rather than sitting back and milking it.

Although they definitely want your money, and lots of it, they do answer the phone when you call.

The new ugrade issues with the suite are a bit of a concern; I know it prevented me from buying it (all I really need is PhotoShop, although the suite offers good value if you're in a position to upgrade from PS).

If you do buy or u/g to the suite, you may want to consider picking up an unregistered, full apllication (not an upgrade) old version of PS and registering it with Adobe. That way you could use that license to continue with plain PhotoShop ugrades and the CS license to upgrade that when you feel it's worth it in the future.

The major caveat in that strategy is there's no guarantee Adobe will continue with it's longstanding policy of allowing upgrades to PS from any previous version. Still, my gut feeling is the change won't be sprung on users without some warning if it ever comes, and also that a change isn't in the works in the first place.

The comparison to Macromedia is valid to a point, but MacroMedia is really taking a page from Microsoft more than Adobe is from MM (where Macromedia & Microsoft disallows upgrades if you have something 2 or so versions behind current).

I think Adobe's upgrade policy on the suite is really driven by the loss in California in a court case about a year ago. It involved resellers (a lot of them selling on eBay) who would buy the suite and then sell the components (unregistered CDs of each application) individually.

Adobe sued, saying the license disallowed it; the court found (more or less; it was actually a bit more complicated) that since the components were sold without ever installing them, and therefore the EULA was never agreed to, then the license didn't apply.

Thus the suite-only upgrade policy; although I haven't seen one my guess is they come with a single EULA and single registration key. If that's the case, then it doesn't follow that they will change the single application upgrade policy, because the suite license solves the actual problem by itself.

 

[groovetube]

Having dealt with both Macromedia and Adobe quite a bit, I would have to agree that Adobe is easier than Macromedia on upgrade issues etc.