Comment by s73v3r_ | Hacker News Reader

Comment by s73v3r_ | Hacker News Reader

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"I think it's a bit sad to be whinging at those good pieces of free software for lacking features, and just recommend proprietary software instead. Surely, it is also the developers of the proprietary software that are causing this lack of features by not sharing their code for those."

That is probably the most ludicrous statement I've heard today. Being "free software" does not shield you from criticism. And it is not Adobe's fault that the developers of that software do not have a feature. That's entirely on the developers of those programs.

And most people do not care one iota about whether a piece of software is "free" or not. They care if it makes their life easier, and allows them to get a task done. If free software isn't up to it, and a piece of proprietary software is, then the proprietary software is what gets the nod.

"It also suggests you are willing to give up your freedom for a few extra features."

No, it means I want to get my shit done. Just because you are willing to wait does not mean anyone else is.

> And most people do not care one iota about whether a piece of software is "free" or not.

Can "most people" afford paying $600 yearly fee to edit images? Are "most people" concerned if they fail to make a yearly payment and loose access to all their projects because of vendor lock-in with Adobe's products? Most people I speak to about this are very concerned about this, although they may not know that these problems are caused by Adobe apps being non-free. (But not knowing the cause of a problem doesn't mean the problem doesn't exist)

> Being "free software" does not shield you from criticism.

I agree totally. I just don't think that suggesting proprietary alternatives in this context is particularly helpful as they also lack features of freedom, e.g. sharing, privacy and absence of vendor lock-in.

> And it is not Adobe's fault that the developers of that software do not have a feature. That's entirely on the developers of those programs.

If Adobe freed the source code of Photoshop, how long do you think it would take for missing features to make it into Gimp?

> They care if it makes their life easier, and allows them to get a task done.

... except if the task involves working with other people who may not have access to that software, or may not want to run proprietary software, or may not want to give up their privacy or freedom.

> If Adobe freed the source code of Photoshop, how long do you think it would take for missing features to make it into Gimp?

If that were to happen, it stands to reason that Gimp would never get any new features, ever again.

"Can "most people" afford paying $600 yearly fee to edit images?"

Considering Adobe's Creative Cloud is pretty popular, it seems that yeah, they can. But that's irrelevant to whether a piece of software is FLOSS or not.

"although they may not know that these problems are caused by Adobe apps being non-free"

How dare those bastards ask to be paid for their work!

"I just don't think that suggesting proprietary alternatives in this context is particularly helpful as they also lack features of freedom, e.g. sharing, privacy and absence of vendor lock-in."

In this context, nobody gave a shit about that. They wanted the features that let them get their work done. If FLOSS doesn't have it, it doesn't get used. End of story.

"If Adobe freed the source code of Photoshop, how long do you think it would take for missing features to make it into Gimp?"

Irrelevant, cause that's not going to happen. If the Gimp developers aren't good enough to make those features themselves, without copying off of Adobe, perhaps they should work on something else.

"... except if the task involves working with other people who may not have access to that software, or may not want to run proprietary software, or may not want to give up their privacy or freedom."

So, nobody? Photoshop is the industry standard. If you're not using it, you're the one who's the odd person out, not them.

Harsh tone here on HN.

> How dare those bastards ask to be paid for their work!

Totally fine with people charging for their work. Fact is, however, that for half the population of the world, Adobe CS's pricing $50/month is at least 2/3 of their total earnings[1]. By that definition, it's just wrong to say that for "most people" it's an valid alternative to Krita or Gimp.

[1] https://www.dosomething.org/us/facts/11-facts-about-global-p...

Photoshop + Lightroom cost 12 euros. The CS price you mention is for all the apps in the creative cloud, not just the raster image editing bit, so that's unfair to compare $50/month to "alternative to krita or gimp". 12 euros per month is just 2 euros more than many of us here pay for lots of entertainment, such as music streaming services. It's well worth every penny spent just to not have to deal with the horror that's GIMP's UI. It's a lot cheaper to get access to Photoshop than it used to be before the monthly licensing scheme.

On top of that, the keys for all Adobe CS2 products have been openly released since they took their activation servers online. I would argue that most people don't need most or many of the new features added since CS2.

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