Questions on Canva acquiring Affinity

[hds]

11 hours ago, CM0 said:

There is no fixing Inkscape. Graphite is the future for open source media tools. https://graphite.rs/

Graphite looks cool. Some Rhino/Grasshopper, Blender, Houdini-style node based stuff are a great addition. I would also love to see a vector art program implement command line, variables, and the plethora of snapping options that are in Rhino3d. I'm not a fan of web apps for graphic, 3D, or CAD, but its nice for lower spec machines. Hopefully will be able to easily run it on your own hardware when it matures.

[OriolFM]

21 hours ago, VectorVonDoom said:

As far as vector I did try my best with inkscape but it was a fairly horrible experience, to be fair it's only been going for 20+ years, so early days lol. But there's not a whole lot of choice even with perpetual license commercial vector apps and of that there are none that I'd choose to use. Perhaps I'll do something different like try one of the natural media apps which at the moment none of which are subscription. Or for you enjoying open source that would be krita but I think that has the usual horrible UX too.

Krita is quite good, actually, but only for painting. It lacks the scope of Clip Studio Paint, so for me it falls a bit short. But for painting or illustration is far more usable than GIMP. And also has an Android version.

And yes, Inkscape is an absolute hell to use. I think most of the UI issues that plague Open source software is because the guys who program it already know how it's supposed to work, so they don't need it to be intuitive. But it is daunting and borderline unusable for design, non-programming-oriented users. The team behind Blender got a lot of good feedback regarding the UI, and they're getting to a point where their program is on par with professional software not only in function, but in usability.

[OriolFM]

21 hours ago, My1 said:

maybe not revoke in legal terms but basically make it EOL shut down activation servers etc is practically as close to a revocation as it goes, also I need to read affinity's EULA again but many of these EULAs in general kinda allow the company to revoke "for any or no reason", so not sure if affinity has that inside

The activation servers are the main issue. If they go for EOL but they make it so anyone with the license can keep using their programs, that would be fair. You paid a life license, after all. Even if they don't issue updates anymore, that is fine.

[OriolFM]

21 hours ago, CM0 said:

Graphite hopefully will one day be that tool - https://graphite.rs/

I'll DEFINITELY watch this. The UI seems promising, and the feature list they want to implement looks almost too good to be true. If they can pull it off, it'll definitely be something to take into consideration.

Maybe the "one tool to rule them all" approach is a bit too ambitious, I'd have split the project into a suite of programs, maybe one for vector design, another for raster, another for desktop publishing, a bit like Affinity did (animation could be part of either the vector or raster programs). That would allow to have finished programs out of alpha/beta earlier, but anyways... I'd say their timeline is solid.

[OriolFM]

17 hours ago, JCP said:

I hope this doesn't end up like Bluebeam Revu did. It was a perpetual license with optional "maintenance" for annual upgrades. Then it got purchased by Nemetschek. The next version (21) was subscription only and a massive price increase. We went from a $300 initial purchase with $80 a year maintenance per user to $400 per year. Do the math on 500 users, although they have "graciously allowed us to be grandfathered in on existing users at a 10% annual increase until we reach full price.

License agreement does allow us to use the older version forever.....however they have been shutting down the ability to activate older licenses. So you are fine until you want to move the software to a new PC, you can no longer deactivate and reactivate.

I will say the difference here is that Bluebeam is mostly superior to Adobe Acrobat in its toolset. We even considered going to Acrobat as it was now a cheaper subscription but we lost too many tools that affect productivity. Not certain that's the case with Affinity. I'm a casual/hobbyist user, if they go subs I'll keep what I have as long as possible. If I have to sub in the future, it better be much less than Adobe's subs.

If we're talking about paying a couple hundred € for a desktop publishing software, might as well pick Quark XPress. They're professional, they have a pay-once license, and the software is rock solid. Expensive, but rock solid, and with an option for a perpetual license.

[OriolFM]

26 minutes ago, hds said:

Graphite looks cool. Some Rhino/Grasshopper, Blender, Houdini-style node based stuff are a great addition. I would also love to see a vector art program implement command line, variables, and the plethora of snapping options that are in Rhino3d. I'm not a fan of web apps for graphic, 3D, or CAD, but its nice for lower spec machines. Hopefully will be able to easily run it on your own hardware when it matures.

They might be able to have a functional Android version too, if it's built like that.

Either way, if they can package it as a stand-alone app, has an intuitive UI, it's user friendly and does the job, it doesn't matter how it runs in the backend.

[Napkin6534]

Look into your emails—damage control has arrived. I cant fathom why THAT message was not the first thing they said, instead of that sad-CEO video and empty marketing phrases in the first email?

Ok, two things:

"If we do offer a subscription, it will only ever be as an option alongside the perpetual model, for those who prefer it."
(I put relevant parts in bold) Not "IF" but when, and perpetual model will be sunset after several years and registration servers several years after that. We have seen this in the industry many times. Ah well, sad times.

 

"To kick things off, we’d love to learn more about what you’d like to see as we embark on this next chapter of our journey. What would you like to see in Affinity? What features have you been dreaming of? What would you love to achieve?"
Well, how about to clear the bugs backlog for starters, and see what was suggested so far in terms of features? I understand that you want to end your email on a positive upbeat note, that now everything will be peachy, but that is too on the nose.

[My1]

Better archive this E-Mail, this will be fun.

[Napkin6534]

2 minutes ago, My1 said:

Better archive this E-Mail, this will be fun.

Better start looking for (and supporting) the alternatives. There is a danger of having the affinity files that one can not open until one buys a canva subscrtiption. It will be Adobe all over again.

[My1]

of course, that too.

 

I am going even further I am trying to look for something that actually works on linux, would be neat

[Petar Petrenko]

Affinity, be cautious with your statements and actions from this point forward. Any deviation, even the smallest from the promises you have made to us in the past, could result in the loss of customers.
We all have had bad experiences with such alliances in the past, and this came to us like a bolt from the blue. We are all tense, nervous and this will be reflected in our work as well as in our everyday life. My personal opinion is that it will never be the same again for any of us.
I ask you once again to be careful what you do or your business may come crashing down like a house of cards and Adobe will win without investing a cent.

[mopperle]

https://affinity.serif.com/de/press/newsroom/affinity-and-canva-pledge/

[CM0]

2 hours ago, hds said:

Graphite looks cool. Some Rhino/Grasshopper, Blender, Houdini-style node based stuff are a great addition. I would also love to see a vector art program implement command line, variables, and the plethora of snapping options that are in Rhino3d. I'm not a fan of web apps for graphic, 3D, or CAD, but its nice for lower spec machines. Hopefully will be able to easily run it on your own hardware when it matures.

They should be able to target anything. With Rust/WebGPU as their base architecture they are building on the most modern and performant technology stack.

It is an extremely ambitious project, but if they can pull it off Graphite would be the "Blender" of 2d media editing. A professional level open source tool in that space. But it is just an Alpha for now. This is a multi year project before it becomes something usable.

[cybercrystal]

46 minutes ago, Napkin6534 said:

Look into your emails—damage control has arrived. I cant fathom why THAT message was not the first thing they said, instead of that sad-CEO video and empty marketing phrases in the first email?

Ok, two things:

"If we do offer a subscription, it will only ever be as an option alongside the perpetual model, for those who prefer it."
(I put relevant parts in bold) Not "IF" but when, and perpetual model will be sunset after several years and registration servers several years after that. We have seen this in the industry many times. Ah well, sad times.

 

"To kick things off, we’d love to learn more about what you’d like to see as we embark on this next chapter of our journey. What would you like to see in Affinity? What features have you been dreaming of? What would you love to achieve?"
Well, how about to clear the bugs backlog for starters, and see what was suggested so far in terms of features? I understand that you want to end your email on a positive upbeat note, that now everything will be peachy, but that is too on the nose.

They're still leaving the door open for turning to subscription model in the future. That means a pricing model like Clip Studio Paint will be highly possible.

However I don't like it, WE dont like it. If they do want those Canva users try and buy Affinity softwares, Serif/Canva should offer discount prices to them just like those who upgraded to V2 from V1. Obviously Canva just WANT a subscription model for future softwares.

Maybe someone would make concession to sub model, I can barely accept it.

[Napkin6534]

9 minutes ago, cybercrystal said:

If they do want those Canva users try and buy Affinity softwares, Serif/Canva should offer discount prices to them just like those who upgraded to V2 from V1. Obviously Canva just WANT a subscription model for future softwares.

Of course. Only naive users will believe all those PR stunts they are now pulling. It is clear as day to all that think about it and take into account all other mergers/aquisitions in the field. Follow the money and the ways (for Canva) of extracting projected value from the investment (for Canva). It is pure business and Excel spreadsheet from now on. The soul (and Affinity´s own mission/vision) has left the building. Serif can promise everything now, but being bought they are now longer in control what happens from now on. Canva can change management and render all those funny "pledges" ineffective on some technicality. These pledges are just mere words without ramifications, there is no binding agreement on Canva´s (Affinity is out of the picture now, so their words are meaningless and unenforceable) part, where they state that "we promise to never cut off you from your bought programs, here is an option to install V2 without ever needing us to do so, without registration servers -- so that we can not fool you in the future".

[ljredux]

I wonder if it's technically feasible to let the operating system stores control activation of the product.  It's not a great solution to the activation concerns, but I can't see them releasing software without some form of activation.  It would give me some peace of mind to know that activation of V2 is tied to the OS instead of servers controlled by this company I don't trust. 

[Napkin6534]

6 minutes ago, ljredux said:

I wonder if it's technically feasible to let the operating system stores control activation of the product.  It's not a great solution to the activation concerns, but I can't see them releasing software without some form of activation.  It would give me some peace of mind to know that activation of V2 is tied to the OS instead of servers controlled by this company I don't trust. 

Why not simply release an "Activation server" as Open Source on gitlab? So that anyone skillful enough can run the server in case Canva closes the official one.

[walt.farrell]

24 minutes ago, ljredux said:

I wonder if it's technically feasible to let the operating system stores control activation of the product.  It's not a great solution to the activation concerns, but I can't see them releasing software without some form of activation.  It would give me some peace of mind to know that activation of V2 is tied to the OS instead of servers controlled by this company I don't trust. 

Only possible for those who downloaded initially via the Mac (or iPadOS) App store or Microsoft Store; not for those who downloaded from the Affinity Store.

And not needed for them, except for users who have the Universal License and use multiple OSes.

[walt.farrell]

17 minutes ago, Napkin6534 said:

Why not simply release an "Activation server" as Open Source on gitlab? So that anyone skillful enough can run the server in case Canva closes the official one.

Having the server code isn't the issue. You'd also need the Affinity Store Account info.

And that is very confidential/private info.

[Mukar]

2 hours ago, cybercrystal said:

They're still leaving the door open for turning to subscription model in the future. That means a pricing model like Clip Studio Paint will be highly possible.

However I don't like it, WE dont like it. If they do want those Canva users try and buy Affinity softwares, Serif/Canva should offer discount prices to them just like those who upgraded to V2 from V1. Obviously Canva just WANT a subscription model for future softwares.

Maybe someone would make concession to sub model, I can barely accept it.

I'm actually fine with subscriptions as an option for those who prefer it, so long as they don't balloon the price of the individual apps or dramatically cut down on the free update timespan to make subscriptions more attractive (ex. Version support going from several years to 1 year would frankly suck and is probably my primary concern with this model. Not a complete dealbreaker, but I personally would only buy a new perpetual every 3 or 4 years given that 1 year of updates isn't typically enough to justify a whole new version).

 

However, if they continue to offer the Affinity Suite at its current price and adopted a fractional subscription model...that would seem reasonable. For example, assuming each Affinity version from v2 going forward will have about a 3-year cycle or so, they could give a subscription option at $55/yr or $5-6/mo, which would amount to the full price after 3 years and roll into the next version. Is this likely? Probably not. But it would certainly incentivize people who are on the fence or can't afford to drop the whole $164 at once and supports their supposed mission of providing these tools at an affordable price. With this model, they'd also be undercutting Photoshop's lowest subscription price by $4-5, which would be fantastic for competition in that front.

 

Another option I see would be kind of like Adobe's creative cloud, where they incentivize a $10-15/mo subscription by giving subscribers an access to an Affinity Stock of sorts, which at the moment would be access to Serif's ever-expanding library of add-ons, and likely cloud storage and services.

 

Again, I'm personally not opposed to them giving subscriptions as an option. But they would need to make the subscription attractive and valuable in its own way without sacrificing the update timespan, price point, or license availability for those of us who want to adhere to their historically perpetual license-based business model.

Edited March 27 by Mukar

[Napkin6534]

11 minutes ago, Mukar said:

I'm actually fine with subscriptions as an option

Whatever Canva comes up with, be sure it will be with a goal of maximizing return on invesment. So, we will be sad pandas.

[garrettm30]

These two days have felt a little like an emotional roller coaster. It’s a little embarrassing to admit that the choices a software company has made could have that effect on some of us, but I guess it goes to show how we felt about it before, and how many of us have invested a lot of time not only in using it but also in participating with the users on this forum.

Today’s email from Serif/Canva has helped change my mood. Yesterday I was contemplating a wait-and-see approach with a very pessimistic feeling of keeping an eye on the emergency exits. Today I am still in a wait-and-see approach, but it has shifted to a more cautiously optimistic outlook. It seems the general mindset among the posters who have contributed to this discussion since the latest email is still rather discouraged. I admit that now we are on edge and fearing the worst, but supposing that they truly do intend to maintain Affinity as a stand-alone product always with a perpetual license option, and the future proves that to be true, I do not know how they could say anything different than what they have not said, so I am willing to give it a chance. Truly, I want it to work out since I like Affinity so well.

Consider that yesterday’s statement was worded so carefully to make no promises other than that we can continue to use what we already bought with unspecific promises about updates in the version 2 cycle. There was no promise beyond that. It practically read like a promise that all would change after that. However, today, we have a promise that it will go beyond 2.0. The copy of the email says this: “We are committed to continue to offer perpetual licenses in the future.” Note that “in the future,” is there unqualified, so we could read it just as more PR to make us think they hear us all while intending “in the future” to mean for a set period of time. But in the infographic, we instead see these words: “Perpetual licenses will always be offered and we will always price Affinity fairly and affordably.” Notice the double use of “always.” That’s a big word, and remember that statements such as these are crafted very carefully. 

I know that we may be inclined to be skeptical even here, but at the very least, making a promise such as that means they are betting the goodwill and continued loyalty on their customers on their ability to keep that statement, because now if they ever take away perpetual license, they will have broken their word. And if they really mean it, what could they have said any different to make us feel better? I don’t know, so I think for now I will take them at their word, which is fair. And of course, we will hold them to their word, which also is fair.

That being the case, I am eager to wait and see what this might mean for the promised additional development resources. For example, variable fonts were mentioned in the examples of features that they want to bring in, and unless I have forgotten, that is the first time they have ever indicated they do hope to add it to the feature list. I am excited for that.

Quick question: formerly we were used to the name Serif as the company and Affinity as the product, but the current communication seems to keep referring to Affinity as the team behind the product. Does the name “Serif” as such still have any meaning or continue to exist?

[Mukar]

1 hour ago, Napkin6534 said:

Whatever Canva comes up with, be sure it will be with a goal of maximizing return on invesment. So, we will be sad pandas.

Not necessarily. Their acquisition track record actually isn't terrible from what I can see. The only "bad" results are really Zeetings and Smartmockups, which were both integrated into Canva and closed independently within two years...HOWEVER these were both browser-based products like Canva itself, so that integration is not only easier but was likely planned from the start. On the flip side of the coin, their other acquisitions such as Kaleido AI, Floursih, Pexels, and Pixabay did receive Canva integrations, but still seem to also operate their individual products. In the case of Pexels and Pixabay (acquired in 2019), the integration was as simple as making their images available directly within Canva much like they are already in Affinity. Their respective websites and stock images remain free under CC0 5 years down the road. They did create a premium stock library that was integrated into Canva Pro, but that had no real effect on either of the acquired websites. Flourish and Kaleido AI are available in Canva directly, but also seem to operate independently with no real business model change.

With this in mind, Canva seems to mostly respect the boundaries of its children companies. In the case of Serif/Affinity, I now believe we'll see some level of integration but nothing to the point of Serif's closure and complete integration into Canva--the claims about providing Affinity separately do have backing in Canva's acquisition history. I also feel a bit more optimistic about them keeping to the promise of retaining perpetual licenses...after all, it will be hard to "maximize profits" if you take away the product's largest selling point.

[CM0]

I can't find any useful energy at all in continuing to be pessimistic about this. Canva has stated they want to enter the enterprise professional market. This is a play at competing against Adobe in this space. In order for them to do that they will need to invest heavily into the Affinity set of tools to bring it up to being on par or better than what the professional enterprise clients expect from Adobe.

Yes, some acquisitions end badly, but not all. Many flagship products of companies were former acquisitions as well. Affinity was over extended with their relatively small team. The resources simply were not there for continuing ambitious ground breaking new features or simply keeping pace with competition or even attending to the enormous backlog of bugs that extend back years.

They have made commitments to the most important concerns people have raised. Will they keep them? Well even Serif killed their former product before Affinity so nothing is ever guaranteed in absolute terms, but it is the best we can expect. It simply is not helpful to demand they make a promise of a perpetual license and then when they do so to state, well I don't believe you.

Maybe it is time to focus on the features they could now deliver that wasn't possible before and how this could be beneficial to us all.

[pixelstuff]

2 hours ago, Mukar said:

(ex. Version support going from several years to 1 year would frankly suck and is probably my primary concern with this model. Not a complete dealbreaker, but I personally would only buy a new perpetual every 3 or 4 years given that 1 year of updates isn't typically enough to justify a whole new version).

This make sense until the software meets the needs for 99% of your users. Then what? I think the problem that Adobe had was their software had matured to the point that it contained all the features that a majority of customers wanted, so only a small percentage were paying for new updates every release. Without being able to attract customs with new features Adobe's other options were to scale down their workforce or try to force more customers to pay more.

It is a little bit anti-customer to make people pay for upgrades they don't need (also the cable TV model), but Adobe could only do that because they were the industry standard and had a virtual monopoly.