We want to help (again)

[HANDJOJO]

5 hours ago, Dan Brooks said:

I'd love to see the books available as digital. This would allow for easy updates as features are changed/added, lower pricing, and near instant delivery.

For some reason The Books available in Digital would be nice as some region not covered for the shiping, another to be dilema as the digital can easy to duplicat it. 

[TomM1]

On 1/21/2021 at 8:44 AM, walt.farrell said:

Perhaps you're not signed up for Serif's Affinity marketing emails?

Try visiting https://affinity.store/account/details and once signed-in click on "Manage your email  marketing preferences".

Indeed. Only one check box checked.

[Amon]

I bought Publisher and Designer when I got the email. Thank you for the promotion.

 

[Mark Freeman]

On 1/19/2021 at 10:01 AM, Patrick Connor said:

we do not need defending, thank you

Received loud and clear, apologies. Your statement is honestly debatable though. The guy above and admittedly myself were acting like kids.... however, when there are regular questionable management decisions and a reluctance to respond to repeated requests and comments about your (generally but not universally) awesome products, “feedback” like this is inevitable. Why don’t you attempt to defend yourself a little more and at least mitigate some frustrations aired by customers.

My own personal grievances include: No rulers in Designer ipad, no free transform or warp in ipad. I’m not alone. If you can’t provide the basics then you’re not charging enough for your products, simple as that. I’d pay more.

[dave7852]

i cant believe that anyone would complain about discounts for affinity  software ... go buy photoshop and then justify your moans  about pricing . Affinity is a bargain at twice the price .... If you dont like the fact they are discounting during a global pandemic stop using affinity and use other software

[westwind]

Hello,

I am currently using your generous 90 day trial for Affinity Photo 1.8. I am very impressed and will most certainly buy the software. I am wondering if there is a way to update to 1.9 to try these new features, text on a path being one for sure, while still in trial mode..

thanks,

marc

[HANDJOJO]

2 hours ago, westwind said:

Hello,

I am currently using your generous 90 day trial for Affinity Photo 1.8. I am very impressed and will most certainly buy the software. I am wondering if there is a way to update to 1.9 to try these new features, text on a path being one for sure, while still in trial mode..

thanks,

marc

My suggestion, grab this opportunity to get these products immediately as the price very more value.

[Patrick Connor]

@westwind

The 90 day trial is the full software running for just 90 days. The app should check for updates automatically when you restart. Does that not happen for you? Perhaps it's not doing it right in trial mode?¿

 

[Pyanepsion]

Hi, Patrick.

I read on the home page:

Quote

Our last major update is here.

Is this the ultimate update, or a new update?

[Patrick Connor]

Oh, interesting, not aware of that wording...seems like an admission to me. It's certainly a new update and I know of at least one more across the range feature so 🤷‍♂️

[Jowday]

2 hours ago, Pyanepsion said:

Hi, Patrick.

Is this the ultimate update, or a new update?

 

[Pyanepsion]

Wow! One of the best bands of the moment... in 1986.

3 hours ago, Patrick Connor said:

Oh, interesting, not aware of that wording...

More seriously, will there be a charge for the 2.0 upgrade?😁

[Patrick Connor]

12 minutes ago, Pyanepsion said:

More seriously, will there be a charge for the 2.0 upgrade?😁

Yes there will. It is optional and should only be bought if you want to and 1.X will keep working

[Pyanepsion]

Is the price and the date already known?

[Patrick Connor]

1 minute ago, Pyanepsion said:

Is the price and the date already known?

nope not in public (and not to me internally)

[Jowday]

(Especially) if Serif use the opportunity to re-think some workflows and to add some of the often requested features to especially Designer - and of course add more in the coming minor updates towards 3.0 - I think I can say that quite a few are standing by with their credit cards thinking "We want to help" 😀

If 2.0 is just a another minor step like the last many updates I'll wait - but a significant step up from 1.x to 2.0 would of course justify a paid upgrade. Nothing else would make sense. 🙂

And after listening to quite a few passionate fanboys arguing for years against new features, improved usability or higher ambitions in the 1.x lineup they can even stick to 1.9 and never look forward. Win win!

[westwind]

10 hours ago, Patrick Connor said:

@westwind

The 90 day trial is the full software running for just 90 days. The app should check for updates automatically when you restart. Does that not happen for you? Perhaps it's not doing it right in trial mode?¿

 

And so it did, thanks,

westwind

[78deluxe]

On 2/13/2021 at 9:25 AM, Jowday said:

.......

If 2.0 is just a another minor step like the last many updates I'll wait - but a significant step up from 1.x to 2.0 would of course justify a paid upgrade. Nothing else would make sense. 🙂

........

Talk about speculation.  

Who's to say they don't offer extremely low price upgrade costs to encourage the entire base to upgrade (even if the new feature set seems minor at launch), which would generate a ton of revenue and help fund larger updates over the next phase of development.

 

[Jowday]

2 hours ago, 78deluxe said:

Talk about speculation.  

Who's to say they don't offer extremely low price upgrade costs to encourage the entire base to upgrade (even if the new feature set seems minor at launch), which would generate a ton of revenue and help fund larger updates over the next phase of development.

I am not speculating - I am just ready to pay even a significant upgrade price if the step up from 1.x to 2.x is interesting. If it is not I will loose the last faith in the product I have. How many tiny increments and years before the product is - or is not - significantly improved?

If they only now seek to fund the future with low upgrade prices and a small feature set ONCE AGAIN how would they motivate the entire base to follow them into a slow uncertain future with more minor upgrades and finally lagging behind. A promising version 2.0 upgrade of all three Affinity apps would encourage, inspire and assure bigger fish than the current massive mass of hobbyists and small entrepreneurs that the products will indeed mature into something truly professional.

A major update is also a unique chance to clean up the mess and mistakes and build a better and more user friendly interface.

"Generate a ton of revenue" - THAT is speculation.

[Sam Neil]

11 hours ago, Jowday said:

I am not speculating - I am just ready to pay even a significant upgrade price if the step up from 1.x to 2.x is interesting. If it is not I will loose the last faith in the product I have. How many tiny increments and years before the product is - or is not - significantly improved?

If they only now seek to fund the future with low upgrade prices and a small feature set ONCE AGAIN how would they motivate the entire base to follow them into a slow uncertain future with more minor upgrades and finally lagging behind. A promising version 2.0 upgrade of all three Affinity apps would encourage, inspire and assure bigger fish than the current massive mass of hobbyists and small entrepreneurs that the products will indeed mature into something truly professional.

A major update is also a unique chance to clean up the mess and mistakes and build a better and more user friendly interface.

"Generate a ton of revenue" - THAT is speculation.

I hear what you are saying but there is a huge difference with Affinity team and Adobe. First of all they are a very small but capable team who have started from ground up and this has been a "catch-up" with the rest of the usual offerings. Second of all due to the complexity of the software it has had its fair share of bugs and regressions which have been continuously fixed and updated by Mark, Andy, Adam & Matt which has (I think) left them with no time to start on the version 2.0 road map. Unless I am very much mistaken and they have working secretly in a cave on version 2.0 as a "Major version" I am not seeing it to be on the horizon. For example RTL support which has been lacking from day one is still not added and will require a major re-write or retrofit which I doubt will make it to the next version.

So in short It's a catch up game at the moment and make it 1.9.X stable with the existing features before offering the next "Major Version".

[Jowday]

4 hours ago, Sam Neil said:

I hear what you are saying but there is a huge difference with Affinity team and Adobe. First of all they are a very small but capable team who have started from ground up and this has been a "catch-up" with the rest of the usual offerings. Second of all due to the complexity of the software it has had its fair share of bugs and regressions which have been continuously fixed and updated by Mark, Andy, Adam & Matt which has (I think) left them with no time to start on the version 2.0 road map. Unless I am very much mistaken and they have working secretly in a cave on version 2.0 as a "Major version" I am not seeing it to be on the horizon. For example RTL support which has been lacking from day one is still not added and will require a major re-write or retrofit which I doubt will make it to the next version.

So in short It's a catch up game at the moment and make it 1.9.X stable with the existing features before offering the next "Major Version".

I work with software complexity in huge projects. What really makes a difference is business decisions. The rest follows, good or bad. Expand stroke fx. New features were more important for years. Stopping up for a moment and stabilizing was not. We are currently in our fourth major revision of our product. Lets call the current version v4.5. Every major revision WAS a revision of architecture, platform and user interface. What made us invest in a major revision every time was a business decision based on what was expected from us. Every time we kind of could continue as before with the features, platform and user interface that served us well for some years, but a radical change would simply be a much better platform for the future. Every time we got the chance to rethink many features and much of the architecture. Pull the plug on inefficient code and features. Every major update took 1-2 years of intense non-stop work but was totally worth it. Looking back at the previous version I always felt relieved we did it. We had to pause many initiatives while these huge projects were underway - the world had to wait - but still worth it. All is forgiven when you give the masses what they were waiting for or something that impresses.

Fx the user interface - the panel concept - Publisher is flooded with panels after its birth and just a few releases - it begs for a revision of the interface and panels before it ends in chaos. They can't just add layers and layers of panels.  

I do not expect 2.0 to be in the horizon. It would be worth waiting for. Much more than small increments that doesn't lead anywhere real. Serif worked on Affinity for a long time now - I am sure they have a long term vision and a revised backlog and a lot of revised plans. It takes a lot of effort to make a major update and I can patiently wait for it. They need time and space for such a task. 

If the team continues to add complexity in near yearly releases without fixing many old issues and never REALLY revising the platform and just adding layers of features, then we have a new Xara. I can't even in my wildest dreams imagine that Serif wants to go there.

[78deluxe]

16 hours ago, Jowday said:

I am not speculating - I am just ready to pay even a significant upgrade price if the step up from 1.x to 2.x is interesting. If it is not I will loose the last faith in the product I have. How many tiny increments and years before the product is - or is not - significantly improved?

If they only now seek to fund the future with low upgrade prices and a small feature set ONCE AGAIN how would they motivate the entire base to follow them into a slow uncertain future with more minor upgrades and finally lagging behind. A promising version 2.0 upgrade of all three Affinity apps would encourage, inspire and assure bigger fish than the current massive mass of hobbyists and small entrepreneurs that the products will indeed mature into something truly professional.

A major update is also a unique chance to clean up the mess and mistakes and build a better and more user friendly interface.

"Generate a ton of revenue" - THAT is speculation.

The generate revenue comment isn't speculation.  We know Affinity has over 2M users across the apps, a figure they shared a while ago.  As I said, even with a small upgrade cost to get the majority to upgrade, that would mathematically generate a ton of revenue.  

 

If you work in software development as you claim.  Kind of shameful you propose any upgrade cost wouldn't be worth it to you, even to maintain and receive modest new features for a few years.  (they haven't had an upgrade charge in over 3 years)

[Jowday]

3 hours ago, 78deluxe said:

If you work in software development as you claim.  Kind of shameful you propose any upgrade cost wouldn't be worth it to you, even to maintain and receive modest new features for a few years.  (they haven't had an upgrade charge in over 3 years)

Rubbish. If I see no future in the software for serious use, I won't upgrade. That goes for software as well as any other product. Serif is not the Red Cross. We are not crowdfunding anything either here for a poor or struggling company. Serif is doing very well. Probably better than ever before. Not asking for an upgrade fee for years is part of a BUSINESS STRATEGY that indeed works very well for Serif. You do not owe them a favor or money.

I do not work IN software development - I am a product owner that directs one, occasionally two development teams in one or another direction. I am the customer. They develop what we need now and in the future. The end users... well, their choice to use our product or leave it. We go out of our way to make them choose our stuff. Our choice is to actually meet their expectations and always important to deliver more than that. And communicating that we will also be a wise choice in the future is key. That's why the BUSINESS DECISIONS I implement make the difference between what end users choose now and in the future. And that is why these BUSINESS DECISIONS are underway for years.

Shameful... you GOTTA be kidding me. That's a new low. Even for this forum.

I won't comment further on this.

[Dan Brooks]

This is not a promotion for Agenda, just a promotion of their pricing model.

I strongly encourage Affinity to consider adopting the Agenda pricing model:

Buying (Premium) includes:

• 12 months of all new features
• Keep all of that “Forever"
• Includes all basic upgrades forever (ie it also keeps working through OS changes)
• After that year, pay again whenever Premium features are worth it to you. Or just stick with what you already have if you don't want new features.
• No lock-in to use what you already paid for.

Thus, no subscription, but the incentives are perfect. Developers can just keep adding improvements and features without waiting for the next big version to ask again. They are incentivized to improve significantly continuously, or folks won't pay again. Modest pricing (like Affinity's) so low barrier to entry and same level to buy new updates. But you can wait 18 months, or two years (if you aren't enticed by new features) or never upgrade past where you bought in. 

 

More details here: A ‘Cash Cow’ is on the Agenda

 

Again, this is really just me promoting the pricing model. Like Affinity Designer, it is also an Apple Design winner, so they don't need promoting.

[p_mac]

Nope

Please don’t consider changing the way you do things Patrick.  

Sounds like a promotion to me Dan Brooks.