Subscriptions seem to be the trend these days, one by one each software company follows suit to phase out the out right ownership of a licence known as "Perpetual".
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I can see the Pros and Cons of this but for me the Cons out weigh the Pros. Lets look at some positives and negatives while generalizing across the board of Subscriptions.
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Anybody can get their hands on the software at any time, they choose without the large down payment of a perpetual licence. They can rent it one month and not the next right?, Unfortunately the common appearance of options often steer the customer in a single direction and that is to commit to a whole year by making the monthly rental too expensive if its even offered at all.
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From what Iv seen a monthly fee is just a break down of what it would cost if you where paying monthly, but in fact is a whole lump payment outright for a whole year. Looking at the current MD subscription its just that, $300 annually.
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The more expensive software which a hobbyist would never be able to afford can be rented but in them cases such as 3ds Max, Maya nobody who is a hobbyist can afford that unless he/she is in the right country to get the Indie, or very wealthy.
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Pay $300 and after that year you own nothing but to continue to pay $300 on and on and on until one day every bit of software will be subscription and then your faced with the fact that you cant have access to all the software you once had at your disposal because you cant afford too. If I had to rent everything in my home could I afford that, no? This would be assuming that I would constantly be upgrading everything to the latest and greatest every year and unless your pretty wealthy this is just not possible.
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So who does this effect the most? It effects the hobbyist, The hobbyist is not making money from it so its being funded by their own pocket. With the way things are going the Hobbyist will be pushed out altogether and only freelancers and studios will use the likes of Marvelous Designer, 3ds, Max, Maya, Modo, Cinema 4D, Substance painter, Photoshop, and render engines like Arnold, Vray eventually Redshift, Zbrush the list goes on.
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If like me I use many pieces of software which Iv purchased over a long period of time but then had to suddenly rent my software I would not eat, I would never afford to rent all my software. Eventually all my software will not work in the current version of Windows, the plugins will be locked to older versions of a DCC, and be left behind as being old tech because no upgrade options will be offered.
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There is the other issue that I see with subscriptions, lazy releases and buggy software. This I wont put to all software makers but Iv seen this happen. The merit of a upgrade with each major version is based on its solid feature set. The developer is working to entice the perpetual owner into purchasing a upgrade and the best way to do that is adding shiny new features that are complete and work out the box.
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With being locked into rental the user no longer has that power of choice as to if to upgrade or not, they get what they are given and you keep paying for it regardless of the features added are of use to you or not. If you stop paying, you simply stop using it.
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The second thing is always using a half baked feature set. A gradual implementation of features means you could wait some years until you get a complete robust feature, this means in effect means your a paying beta tester, yes you pay to beta test their software and one day it will be out of beta and complete in which by that time you paid significantly more for that feature you so much wanted than if you had paid for a one off upgrade that had that feature included.
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Your files are redundant.
Files you you own are useless without the software. When that day comes when you cant afford to keep paying the rental your files are suddenly useless, you cant access your own work. In order to access your own work even if its for one day you have to pay a whole month rental. Worse be the case if your eventually forced to pay for a whole year. What about if your files are made in another version of software and you didn't rent for a year or two would your files still open up, would you be given access to the older version?
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Who Benefits in the long run?
So who really benefits from rental? Well this should be obvious, the software company of course. Its a business model that rolls in constant revenue and never ends while you the customer owns nothing but the files they generated. Now much of what Iv said about this is generalizing about Subscriptions for all software, where this is going with Marvellous Designer is yet to be seen?
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Fair Solutions.
So the solution? Why not have both subscription and perpetual, thats what we already have why change it? The customer are always told that the majority of their users go the subscription route so phasing out the perpetual is a natural progression, I do not believe that at all, and if that is a reality then the users are digging their way into a deep hole where eventually they will not be able to afford it at all. Faster development is another reason, Iv not seen this to be the case so far. Over the years across all software sold perpetually Iv seen some great features being added each year.
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Rent to own, now that's a better option and more fair. You rent at a fair price and after a certain period you get the choice to pay a small fee to own the licence but will need to pay for upgrades. All bug fixes should remain free for the version you own, and you pay for the features added, not to fix something that shouldn't be broken in the first place. This is why I dont like the subscription model even for maintenance as the features are often tied in with the bug fixes. If you purchase something and its broken you dont pay to have it fixed if it came broken. Bug fixes should be separate and free.
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Conclusion
So all in all as you can see I do not like subscriptions, I see too many issues with it especially for the future as more companies go that way. I rent a movie for the night, not my software that I use through out the year.
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Let me know what you think?
PS: what do I need to do to get the post to respect my sentence structure and spacing?
Dan
Why all CG software have to be on subscription only ?
I agree with all I have read as a hobbyist with few time to do 3D and of course to use my softwares.
Please keep the perpetual license for all your little people, all your basic users.
@Frederic Please keep the perpetual license for all your little people, all your basic users."
this is not only for you guys, but for contractors, freelancer and indies as well....we can't stand sub it cost us more....
Some people said MD won't notice freelances, contractors and others who do this for fun... IE Hobby...
Tell this to Unreal and Unity, Unity most of there user base is just this..... I worked in this industry nearly 3 decades as I stated, and I can tell you I been a developer, and contractor, today more than ever, more are going freelance, contractor..... in the US, most studios are on the West Coast, and I been on the other side of the country and people are out of the country, I get more work from contract than I ever did as a developer at a studio and I can make my own hours and have for decades now... I see more friends, and people I work with at that studio, they see me as a contractor and are fed up of moving, and having family issues......this industry has been shifting this way for awhile now..... Now due to this pandemic, I get so many darn, offers and I had just three friends this week leave there studio jobs to go contract....... Indies are the features, contractors.... period, sure some studios will be around.... but most of us are NOT at the studio anymore... and you have more people doing this for fun..... Some of them may be ok with this, Sub nonsense or they can just use Steam version.... Which works the same way...
But they could offer a sub if they liked....still, but no way in hell, do any of us want to pay more for software than we already do and get ZERO investment out of this..... when you SUB, there is no investment.... this would make it harder for developers to contract as it was in the old days...and indies as I said in my other post, due to having to pay for software every darn month, which is more than MD, if everyone was a SUB........ Even Substance backed off of a full Sub, because they got a ton of back lash for it.....as MD will....but now that Zbrush added this new features I may put MD to rest anyways........ by this move, this would make this do this after many years of using MD...I would say good bye to it....... as most of my work is in Modo, Maya, Zbrush anyways as it is........ and now that Zbrush added new features, I have no reason to use MD or buy it anymore.....
Now If they want to SUB, more the reason to say good bye and good luck after all these years...... MD, people want a CHOICE...... this control nonsense don't work for people...forcing one way or no way...sure its your company, but we have a choice to say for get you...and use other software... I hate to say this to MD as I always bought every version nearly but I won't support this behavior..... if the cost is an issue as I said before raise the license a bit...... problem solved.... people want an investment, and software is JUST that.......... this is why people don't Rent homes, NO investment......when running a business, investments keep us successful as well..... So for your own sake, I would strongly see the HUGE cons to this for your own sake......
im gonna stick with MD 9 for a very extremely long time
i cant afford
and now they made it 490$ to upgrade to MD 10 if you dont want to pay monthly
You are right I just noticed. Are they out of their minds or what? First they state that it's possible to upgrade to version 10 and the version after that and then they silenty increase the upgrade price with 400 pct. without telling that there would be this price increase. What a crappy customer policy.
Full price would be $490, the upgrade is $122 from what I've seen
Well it seems like there might be a problem with their shopping system. No matter what I do I have to purchase 2 upgrades at a time. i have two licenses, one upgrade from version 7 and one for version 8. Then its like the system thinks I want to upgrade from both instead of the latest one. Then I get a 60 pct. discount from two licenses and end up with $392
As can be seen on this page, MD you are morons and this is going to destroy your company. People don't like being exploited and you've done it at the worst possible time as there are now so many alternatives to your software when, for years, you have been the only player in town. Good luck with your failed business model, you won't be getting a penny from me. My steam version 9 will just have to do until it no longer works. Zbrush's new cloth system is amazing and blender is becoming so powerful, what makes you think you can thrive by becoming less competitive in a rapidly filling marketplace?
Looks like I missed the last chance upgrade my perpetual, no email notice, and with the crazy year its been, I would not have remembered.
So long Marvelous Designer, you lost another customer to your subscription plans.
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