Is there a reason why Mac and PC version requires separate licenses?

[BAndy]

Hello,

Thanks for the great piece of software and thanks for great license. I am grateful it is per person not per PC seat. But because of that I don't understand why I need to buy separate license to install Affinity Photo on my Mac. Have you thought at least about some discount for Mac version if one has PC license already?

[StevenS]

Hi @BAndy,

Welcome to the Affinity forum.

There isn't really a specific answer to this other than it being the route we decided to take. If you look across the software industry there are many developers sat on either side of the fence. Since 1987 our apps have always been a perpetual licence, offering users the option to only need to pay for what they need, and you aren't being forced to purchase a dual licence they only (for example) have a Mac. If we were to have offered a dual licence, we would have only doubled the price anyway because we think they are excellent value for money.

Which takes us to the question of a discount. Unfortunately, we do not offer a discount for additional purchases for the same reason we gave above but we do have promotions from time-to-time, and they are well worth hanging on for if you're looking to save a little from the regular price.

[Patrick Connor]

Yes there is. Affinity software was initially sold on the Mac app store. Those sales are Apples customers. Serif have no idea who those customers are and it breaks the store rules to have a way to find out.

Affinity software was then sold on Windows, directly from our website, for the same price as on the Mac app store as we don't want to discriminate based on your choice of OS.  If we give customers who buy directly from us both operating systems (for the same price as our first customers who bought from the Mac app store) that would be very unpopular and unfair. Now we have added selling the Mac version from the Affinity store and the Windows version from the Microsoft store (where customers information belongs to Microsoft and is again invisible to Serif so there is no way to offer an equivalent Mac download to those customers). All sales are at the same one price.

So by charging per operating system we can treat all our customers fairly no matter when they adopt our software.

[BAndy]

Ok, thanks for the answers. Anyway finally we have a good alternative to a Photoshop so I am still grateful you created Affinity series :-)

[dolunaykiz]

17 hours ago, Patrick Connor said:

Yes there is. Affinity software was initially sold on the Mac app store. Those sales are Apples customers. Serif have no idea who those customers are and it breaks the store rules to have a way to find out.

Affinity software was then sold on Windows, directly from our website, for the same price as on the Mac app store as we don't want to discriminate based on your choice of OS.  If we give customers who buy directly from us both operating systems (for the same price as our first customers who bought from the Mac app store) that would be very unpopular and unfair. Now we have added selling the Mac version from the Affinity store and the Windows version from the Microsoft store (where customers information belongs to Microsoft and is again invisible to Serif so there is no way to offer an equivalent Mac download to those customers). All sales are at the same one price.

So by charging per operating system we can treat all our customers fairly no matter when they adopt our software.

i have to disagree here. i had a PC and just switched to mac. none of my licenses are usable on the mac. DxO on the other hand lets me download no matter what OS i am using. if it's about $$, just up the price a little. you're making me buy this software all over again, and i am not happy about it.

[Alfred]

1 minute ago, dolunaykiz said:

just up the price a little

How much is “a little”, and why should tens of thousands of users be forced to pay for the ability to install the software on a platform that they may never use?

[Patrick Connor]

To clarify. We cannot offer those who buy from the Mac app store or Microsoft store an alternative license as we do not know who they are, so swapping is not an option. We are not going to charge a different price for our Affinity store version. To allow customers of the Affinity store version to swap but not Mac app store owners to swap would be unfair on our early adopters who had no choice of how to purchase. This is a fair system.

[dolunaykiz]

You can of course "do you". But if DxO and others can give me a downloader via their website, there's no technical reason not to do it. 

On 4/21/2019 at 10:33 AM, Alfred said:

How much is “a little”, and why should tens of thousands of users be forced to pay for the ability to install the software on a platform that they may never use?

And that would be true for how many programs out there? SMH

[cimerio]

Separate charging for licenses is valid because they are different architectures.
not giving a second purchase discount is an amateurish business attitude and has no justification.
the same way it has no justification does not offer both products on the site. unless there is some scam of the company with the apple store. various companies sell two downloadable versions on the site. and you can download both files.

for God's sake, would the above citizen be so naïve to believe that we bought this bull talk of "unpopular and unfair"

[Patrick Connor]

@cimerio

Welcome to the Serif Affinity forums.

Sorry that you don't approve of our business model.

[Alex000]

Hello,

Sorry for my English.

In this case, when I don't use windows anymore, am I allowed to sell my license?

Edited October 26, 2019 by Alex000

[Patrick Connor]

@Alex000

Welcome to the Serif Affinity forums   your English is great.

On 10/26/2019 at 5:15 PM, Alex000 said:

when I don't use windows anymore, am I allowed to sell my license?

The license does not allow for it to be sold on, no sorry.