Canva

[Altima Neo]

1 hour ago, Ash said:

To followup on some of my comments yesterday, we are today enshrining our commitment to the Affinity community in 4 pledges made by the Affinity and Canva teams.

You can read about them here.

We do truly believe the coming together of Affinity and Canva is only going to be a good thing for our customers, staff and the development of our apps. We very much hope you will all continue to be with us on this journey.

All the best,

Ash

Thank you! I appreciate that you've come together with canva to clarify the future of affinity. I hope to continue being an affinity customer, especially since an affordable perpetual license for some quality apps is what made me a customer in the first place.

 

[monzo]

10 minutes ago, LondonSquirrel said:

That scenario has been raised in the past (not specifically about Canva). I invite you to search the forum for the discussions and possible courses of action. There is no need to repeat it all again here.

Well there obviously is, since a lot of us are very concerned about our products now being in the hands of another company, and no details of how they will be protected has been provided. A 'pledge' means nothing if it isn't backed up with actual details of how this will be managed.

Have you got a link or details you can share that will put our minds at risk, so we don't have to search through hundreds of threads and posts?

[BarryHu]

12 minutes ago, VectorWhiz said:

https://communicats.blogspot.com/2024/03/canva-acquires-affinity-suit-programs.html

The alternative programme looks interesting for vector work. Will it handle my photo editing and multi-page publishining needs? Can I have one licence for Mac/iPad/Windows?

[AffinityMakesMeWonder]

1 hour ago, Ash said:

To followup on some of my comments yesterday, we are today enshrining our commitment to the Affinity community in 4 pledges made by the Affinity and Canva teams.

You can read about them here.

We do truly believe the coming together of Affinity and Canva is only going to be a good thing for our customers, staff and the development of our apps. We very much hope you will all continue to be with us on this journey.

All the best,

Ash

 

Strange - why should you (Serif) accelerate the rollout of features now after been bought by Canva??

It couldn't be the money that has limited Serif to hire people for a quicker development earlier - looking at Serif Ltd Europe and the figures for the three last year, there has been more than 45 million pounds in pure profit...

So, where have the money went? Not for stepping up your ability to make Affinity Suite adding features that we have missed the last six years...

[Teddy Ursadorable]

7 minutes ago, AffntyXara said:

Of course Serif was in business to make a profit but they had....affinity(ok bad pun) with their users. The investment people behind canva couldn't care less about users of Serif programs. And talk about macromedia I mean as a company who once had great products but eventually faded out. The macromedia users were not at all happy when they were aquired.

Everyone knew Adobe only bought Macromedia for two reasons.. 1) to acquire Dreamweaver and Fireworks (they didn't have a competing product), and 2) to kill off the rest of the competing product lines.

[kaffeeundsalz]

19 minutes ago, Bit Disappointed said:

As soon as Canva encounters turbulence, such non-binding promises will expire.

In what way is this different from the situation before? Serif as well could have encountered turbulence, letting them reshape their business model. It is perfectly legitimate for you to distrust company promises phrased this way. But I don't see what this has to do with the acquisition.

[AffinityMakesMeWonder]

56 minutes ago, LondonSquirrel said:

Who is this "we"? No need to answer, my question is rhetorical.

We is a summon on the majority - if you can't see tragic with this affair between Canva and Serif, it's your problem...

Some day you will wake up and discover the truth...

[R.I.P. Affinity 26.03.2024]

13 minutes ago, Pšenda said:

But panic spreads most easily through constant repetition of half-truths, assumptions and hypotheses 🙂

People can't believe what they say no more. There is no more Serif. Its just Canva. People have lives and jobs. People worked in Affinity. They can't wait 1, 2, 3 years to be sure Affinity stays. People don't want to invest their time in most likely a dead company now, with no future for professional designers.

[Chills]

What was said by Ash yesterday was, "There are genuinely no plans for us to remove the availability of our apps to purchase as a perpetual licence. I will say it is possible in the future there may be an optional way to have them via a Canva subscription plan (which could also include other integrations with Canva / cloud services which you would not get with the perpetual version). But it’s very early days and there isn't a firm plan on that."

So whilst those assurances by Ash  yesterday and today (presumably after Canva cleared them in Australia)  are what he believes today.... next month it may all be different.  The Worry for me is the suggestion of a two tier system, subscription with more features and integrations (with Canva) and the perpetual with fewer features.  Will the perpetual loose the integration with the Stock libraries. The [Canva] Pixababy and Pexel? 

This does remind me of the Adobe pledges to keep Lightroom standalone.   Which technically they did.  V6.14 perpetual licences still work.  But they stopped all support for it a couple of weeks before google changed the Maps API and LR V6.14 maps stopped working.  The Fix was in the LR CC versions  before it happened. You can still move LR V6.14 from computer to computer, but if you hit the limit, it can take you all day to find someone at Adobe to talk to someone who will reset the installation count.  However, for all intents, the stand alone Lightroom is dead.  Adobe would not even discuss it in a face to face meeting a couple of weeks ago.

So  whilst the intent is there, I think that for many of us who have been burned by the likes of Adobe and are getting déjà vu, we are going to be somewhat sceptical until we see what actually happens.    The Good News is that for the foreseeable future by V2 Affinity apps will continue to work just as they did last week.

PS if that Affinity-Canva post means what it says about taking Affinity forward.... We do need a Lightroom replacement/DAM for Affinity. On perpetual licence to match the other apps.

[DarkClown]

11 minutes ago, Altima Neo said:

Thank you! I appreciate that you've come together with canva to clarify the future of affinity. I hope to continue being an affinity customer, especially since an affordable perpetual license for some quality apps is what made me a customer in the first place.

 

New account since yesterday .... praising the lord and instantly being given high-five by Patrick and Ash ... any questions anyone?

[Skeletor]

@Ash Well then, thanks for the very late reply (the Affinity Canva pledge could just as easily have been communicated yesterday with the merger announcement). But let's see what the near future brings (a lot has been promised in the past in similar situations and circumstances of other companies, and in the end it turned out differently), I remain cautious, my wallet remains in my pocket for the time being.

[R.I.P. Affinity 26.03.2024]

3 minutes ago, kaffeeundsalz said:

In what way is this different from the situation before? Serif as well could have encountered turbulence, letting them reshape their business model. It is perfectly legitimate for you to distrust company promises phrased this way. But I don't see what this has to do with the acquisition.

The difference is its Canva. Its a soulless corporation for amateurs designers moms to make some medias. Its not Serif anymore, we all trusted before. If Serif said they need money most people will buy suit again, or even except the subscription for reasonable price, like $9.99 USD/month easily.

[Benfischer]

1 hour ago, Ash said:

To followup on some of my comments yesterday, we are today enshrining our commitment to the Affinity community in 4 pledges made by the Affinity and Canva teams.

You can read about them here.

We do truly believe the coming together of Affinity and Canva is only going to be a good thing for our customers, staff and the development of our apps. We very much hope you will all continue to be with us on this journey.

All the best,

Ash

This makes me feel way better. Thanks. I’m still bummed that an independent company had to get gobbled up by the borg, but that’s life these days. 
is there any timeline for items 2 and 3?

wishing the best to the Serif team!

[Flynnsworth]

1 hour ago, Ash said:

Like many I was shocked at yesterday’s announcement. These pledges are reassuring and dare I say it, they give me a tiny bit of optimism for what might be possible with greater funding and different skillsets.

More than anything, I hope the Affinity suite stays lean and fast. I’m all for carefully implemented new features, but I hope we don’t get Adobe style bloat.

Congratulations on the merger. I will reserve judgement for now, but there’s a huge opportunity for ‘Canva’ to prove us all wrong and to empower a community that Adobe lost many years ago.

[Amontillado]

Canva can kick me around a little, I guess, but if I hear Affinity staff is getting a raw deal I don't care how good or how cheap the software is, I won't be part of hurting good people's lives.

Please honor these pledges and please respect the people that got Serif this far.

[pinchies]

1 hour ago, Ash said:

To followup on some of my comments yesterday, we are today enshrining our commitment to the Affinity community in 4 pledges made by the Affinity and Canva teams.

You can read about them here.

We do truly believe the coming together of Affinity and Canva is only going to be a good thing for our customers, staff and the development of our apps. We very much hope you will all continue to be with us on this journey.

All the best,

Ash

This is very reassuring. Thank you.

[AffinityMakesMeWonder]

40 minutes ago, monzo said:

I am absolutely not a willing customer of Canva, which is why I chose to spend my money with Serif.

However, since I now have no say in the matter, some reassurance could be provided by removing the requirement to authorise new installations of V2 products online, and any additional online callbacks to be removed.

That would back up any pledges with real action and support, for those of us who have been loyal customers of Serif for many years, so we can continue to use our 'lifetime' products on new devices, and not be at the mercy of activation by a company we did not purchase our software from.

If Serif Labs has some guts they release an update of the Affinity Suite that let us just use our serial numbers to activate the software - no need for online activation...

[R.I.P. Affinity 26.03.2024]

8 minutes ago, DarkClown said:

New account since yesterday .... praising the lord and instantly being given high-five by Patrick and Ash ... any questions anyone?

Yea its funny a hell. I am happy 99% of people here aren't as dumb to believe in a "happy" Canva family future they are leading us to.

[R.I.P. Affinity 26.03.2024]

1 minute ago, pinchies said:

This is very reassuring. Thank you.

Another "Joined Yesterday" club member. 😁

[Pseudolus]

5 minutes ago, LondonSquirrel said:

And Sony Music, and Gucci, and other "moms". How condescending.

And sexist.

[Altima Neo]

13 minutes ago, DarkClown said:

New account since yesterday .... praising the lord and instantly being given high-five by Patrick and Ash ... any questions anyone?

I don't have a need post on the forum regularly. This isn't exactly a high traffic social media destination. So what do you expect?

But Im just a hobbist artist. If you see my first post I was pretty critical about the situation. I'm still cautious.

Edited March 27 by Altima Neo

[Bryan Rieger]

1 hour ago, R.I.P. Affinity 26.03.2024 said:

The difference is its Canva. Its a soulless corporation for amateurs designers moms to make some medias.

Can we please stop being so condescending and dismissive of others. I'm not a fan of Canva, but I know many individuals, business, non-profit orgs, and large brands who absolutely love it, as it enables them to create effective communications/media without having to hire (and wait for) a professional, which they often can't afford anyway. As for large brands, it enables their marketing departments to move at pace assembling their own brand assets and scheduling the publishing of social media campaigns in a much faster, and more coordinated manner than was available to them before.

[mehdy]

Here we go 

[VectorVonDoom_NoMore]

2 minutes ago, Bryan Rieger said:

Can we please stop being so condescending and dismissive of others. I'm not a fan Canva, but I know many individuals, business, non-profit orgs, and large brands who absolutely love it, as it enables them to create effective communications/media without having to hire (and wait for) a professional, which they often can't afford anyway. As for large brands, it enables their marketing departments to move at pace assembling their own brand assets and scheduling the publishing of social media campaigns in a much faster, and more coordinated manner than was available before.

It's weird that some people don't understand that not everyone is artistic even more weird when you see some of the efforts posted online, you would think they would understand!

[AffinityMakesMeWonder]

40 minutes ago, Mithferion said:

Hi, Ash.

As promised yesterday, I will share if this sounds good to me, and it sounds OK. Here is why:

• Pledge 1: The perpetual Licensing model is what attracted people in the first place, but I feel like if some kind of subscription appears, it will be seen as a Red Flag if offered from you. If Canva is the one adding the Affinity Suite with their current Pricing Plans, well, that'd be seen like an addition. Still, I've read some comments that the Canva Team has changed pricing policies and this will still keep us watching closely.

• Pledge 2: Keeping Affinity as it is also key: installed locally with no need of being connected to the Internet (except when activating the Product). Now, regarding the development and the speed in which new versions are delivered: we will see if more money brings that but I'm not sure that we'll see Features coming twice as fast or double of them in the same period of 3 moths (roughly) when new releases come out, as an example. 

• Pledge 3: I like this one. Hope it works great

• Pledge 4: This is a complex one, because as you know, people have been really vocal about demanding Features in the forums, so there are features (as the one you mention on Pledge 2) that you are aware that people want for yesterday. I will take y time to fill the form you provided as well.

We'll see if these pledges even last in the coming years.

Best regards!

Pledge 3 - why is this so good just now? Serif could have been giving away software to schools much earlier - it doesn't cost money for them to distribute software digital, if we compare how it was back in history with diskettes CD's and fat manuals...

Also, giving away software for free to kids that doesn't have the money, isn't a lost, it's just a win-win situation and has nothing to do with the ugly Canva dystopia...