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Subscriptions, Licenses and Cost of Ownership

Comments

221 comments

  • Peer Mucks

    Nice naming :D "The Capture One Loyalty Program"

    Actually everything has already been said here. Compare your price for an admittedly good program with the price for the Creative Cloud. I love your program, but seriously, your price isn't right anymore.

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  • Michael Richter

    completely confused and in English .I think it's time to go.

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  • Lesley McEwan

    I love CO, I have updated probably every couple of years, retired and not a professional photographer.  It suited me perfectly.  Came  to CO after Aperture died.  I had no intention of doing subscription, so I ruled out Adobe.  Now I have to look at other options. This graph is as clear as mud and I used spreadsheets the last 15 years of my working life. 

     

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  • MARTIN BURKHALTER

    Well I guess you think along the lines: customers will scream and shout, but eventually they will just accept the new pricing. This is what mostly happened when Adobe changed their pricing. However, remember a few things:

    1. You are not Adobe

    2. Your software has not really been improved over the last couple of years 

    3. LR & PS have improved a lot over the last couple of years 

    4. Fortunately there are some other interesting options out there 

    I have upgraded to C1-23 but I have now subscribed to LR/PS and I have started to move all my work over to that platform. I have done some comprehensive testing in LR and I can easily match the outcome of my work with what I did in C1.

    C1 is history for me, unless you will change over to some more reasonable and competitive pricing in the very near future.

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  • BeO
    Top Commenter

    Well I guess you think along the lines: customers will scream and shout, but eventually they will just accept the new pricing. This is what mostly happened when Adobe changed their pricing.

    I am not so sure about that. There have been quite a lot of Adobe refugees who migrated to C1, some time ago, here in the forum, so I think people actually are willing to abandon software if they are upset with changed license policy or prices.

    For now, only perpetual license holders are negatively affected, and probably such users never upgrading anymore or only once every few or only after many years will not show up in C1 books very soon. Which means they cannot really verify the consequences of their policy changes now. Which means they need to rely on their current projections.

    But, they might possibly find themselves in the situation where revenue stalls or declines in 2023 or 2024 (compared to last year) and they have to give generous discounts at Black Friday sales or alike to increase revenue again. Who knows.

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  • Jonathan Knights

    Time to move to Darktable full time I think.

    Oh and it is free.  How good is that!

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  • Henk de Haan

    Christine M., I've noticed you've updated the tables but the data for the 'Perpetual License Upgrade with update program (Old) is still incorrect. You are forgetting the extra pre-upgrade discounts (20% for the last upgrade) and other 'special deals' (such as a 40% Black Friday discount on a full perpetual license).

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  • mhsch8

    Frederiksberg, you've got a problem.......

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  • Jouni Korhonen

    What a fucking mess! As much as I like this software, my ten years of loyalty to Capture One ends here.

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  • Wilfried Schoder

    mhm .... 
    the Loyality-Program means, after 5 years we will pay nothing for new updates (when staying in the subscription-modus)?

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  • Class A

    @Wilfried Schoder

    No, after five years one does not have to pay anything if one is happy with the features and bugs existing at the time. In other words, one only gets a perpetual licence for free.

    To keep getting updates, one will have to keep paying the subscription fees.

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  • Wilfried Schoder

    ok ... 
    now I understand:  this 20% discount per year is the price for a perpetual license if I stop subscription.

    THX a lot. 

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  • Joanne Diochon

    @Wilfred Schoder

    Yes, that’s how it sounds to me so, you have to decide if the updates that you think you will see in the next five years will be worth the cost of the subscription over that period of time. Or, you can just leave now, with the perpetual licence you already have and forego any future updates.  Of course, we have no road map for the updates that they expect to be offering even over the next few years.

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  • Jonathan Knights

    If they offered a future roadmap of enhancements then I would be more tempted but quite honestly this new pricing plan is more likely to drive me to another solution/software.

     

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  • Michael Parker

    Weighing up what you get from Adobe I’d say £5 a month would be a reasonable amount for C1 to charge

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  • Alessandro Feroci

    I don't want to criticise the decision taken by C1, for sure they must have a good reason to change their business model. However,  the explanation and the comparison tables provided are terrible, sorry to say that. Instead of explaining in a clear and transparent way, you are doing things more complicate. 

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  • Dirk Ziegler

    What a complicated system! C1 is history for me! Good bye!

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  • Paul Traynar

    Just thought you C1 marketing/accounting folks should know that DxO have just released version 6.3 of PhotoLab - that's three new version with new features I'm getting after I upgraded in November last year - just sayin'....

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  • Fitz Michael

    Can I use my captureone styles to DXO 6?

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  • Paul Traynar

    Hi Fitz - no, unfortunately not.

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  • Steve Miller

    I've watched a few yt videos on DXO Photolab 6, looks a compelling option, definitely worth a look when I think it's time to upgrade my C1 perpetual licence.

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  • Ralph Stutchbury

    You have a great product but seem determined to lose your customers. I have complained every year about the ridiculous cost of an annual upgrade that offers very little improvement to the programme. Why not one charge for outright ownership and then charge a reasonable price for major new features as they are released. Users can then decide if they want the the new extension or not. In the meantime I'm trying to learn Luminar Neo and Affinity to see which is best for me. 

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  • Bill

    Ralph Stutchbury. Exactly.

    I’ve paid roughly $200 per year (BF/B&H) for a full new license with all the features, camera and lens profiles, coding, fixes in the program, etc.  But now I am expected to pay nearly that amount again every year for very minimal improvements?

    Without a product roadmap I don’t see why I should commit to 5 years of subscriptions to get a ‘free’ license.

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  • Dariusz dariusz.pogorzelski

    O szok! O co tu chodzi? Mega słabo C1

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  • Steve Miller

    Well today I downloaded DXO Photolab 6 and had a good test trying different workflows.
    Result is I'm going to stick with my C1 23 and use for as long as I can without upgrading.
    DXO gives good results but just isn't a fast enough workflow for when I'm editing my sports photos. If I was just doing landscape and nature I'd probably go over to DXO, the Deeprime XD noise reduction is far superior to C1 noise reduction.

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  • Michael Parker

    If I subscribe for 5 years I can get a perpetual licence free.

    So why don’t you offer perpetual licence holders that upgrade every year for 5 years the next  upgrade for free as part of this loyalty program ?

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  • Michael Parker

    This disclaimer says it all

    No guarantee subscribers will continue getting 20% discount and eventuality a free copy after 5 years

    *Capture One may change the terms and benefits included as part of its loyalty program at any point in time. Capture One shall notify affected users in writing no less than 30 days before any change.

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  • Michael Parker

    I started my relationship with C1 when I bought a Fuji and tried out the free Fuji Express version.
    Decided to buy the full Fuji version, then upgraded to V11 Pro as I also have Canon cameras.
    Upgraded to V12 and each subsequent version to my current version of 23.
    Does this make me an un-loyal customer that has contributed nothing to C1 profits ?

    I can’t really see the loyalty program they have introduced for subscribers is particularly good either. If you are already a subscriber I guess you’ll carry on subscribing anyway and nit convert to a free or discounted perpetual licence.

    Surely a better way of rewarding a subscriber would be discounted future subscription fees
    as far as I see with this model a subscriber only benefits if becoming disloyal !

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  • Anne Burton

    I was one of your most loyal customers, having jumped off of the Adobe bandwagon due to my HATRED of subscriptions. I have happily promoted C1 to all photographers I meet as a wonderful, ethical alternative. Congratulations for stopping me in my tracks. I am beyond unimpressed at this turn of events and no, I will never be a born again subscriber. Biggest own goal I have seen a company commit in a while. Greed never ends well.

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  • Jonathan Knights

    Got to agree with  so many people who have responded.

    CaptureOne Pro was a unique product that I was happy to pay £150-175 per year and to support the beta test program. Most beta programs give a free copy to the tester as a thank you.  Not PhaseOne or CaptureOne!  Hmmm..  

    I dont like or do subscriptions but given the choice I will now use Adobe Lightroom as the DAM is faster and better.  

    I feel let down by CaptureOne.  I am sorry but this is very poor handling of customers.  

    Back to Adobe.

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