Are you renting, buying, borrowing?
This is the reason many people prefer Affinity apps over Photoshop, Illustrator, Lightroom, and so on.
Rent or Buy?
People using Canva on laptops.Canva
Before that, it came in boxes, and couldnt even get bug fixes.
Software is more accessible than ever, but have we lost something too?
The app-store model is hard to argue with from a convenience point of view.
Photo editing in Affinity.Affinity
You don’t need to buy Photoshop to do that.
Some might require payment upfront, but it’s unlikely if they actually ever want to get any downloads.
So how do these apps survive?
Affinity
Of these, the subscription is probably the best for everyone involved.
The other modelsgrow-to-sell, privacy invasion, or venture-capital fundingare all user-hostile for one reason or another.
So why don’t people like subscriptions?
Subscription Fatigue
Let’s take a quick survey.
I have friends running very old versions of Ableton on decade-old MacBooks, for example.
But with app stores, it all changed.
The app stores started with paid-up-front apps, but quickly went to a free model, with in-app purchases.
The problem is, app store prices are too low to support a developer like that.
There is no way to charge a user for an update, the way you might outside the store.
So many apps now require a subscription.
The Affinity suite has two big differences compared to Adobe’s suite.
One is that all the apps are fantastic on mobile.
This is a big difference, andCanva has pledgedto always keep a “perpetual license” available to buy.
