Post #1473301

2026-04-20 22:44 UTC

I'm a creative. I've used InDesign since version 1.0. I've built my career with Adobe tools. Adobe Creative Cloud peaked around ten years ago. Since then, it's totally jumped the shark. I'm not even talking about the company, just the software and its features. When I open InDesign, Photoshop, or Illustrator I'm trying to work. It's software I've used for, in some cases, 25 years. My point is, *I know it inside and out.* The past few years, every new "feature" gets in the way of my work. Adobe has been changing things that already worked very well, or has added extra steps to do something that used to be easy. Even worse, Adobe has started to fill its software with *notifications that can not be disabled.* Invasive blue dots. Invasive blue buttons. Invasive blue overlays that stay visible on the screen even when the software is minimized. Rich tool tips that aren't disabled by the option to disable rich tool tips. Adobe has lost me as a devotee. It's been taken over by venture capital. The company only cares about adoption of new features. Now, I use it out habit. Because my workplace provides it. Because it's what folks on my team are used to... but because they've come to the ecosystem so late, they only know a fraction of its capabilities. If Adobe faces demise, I will mourn what if once was. But not what it has become.

Replies (7)

@mojofrododojo@lemmy.world 2026-04-21 00:00

Been using Photoshop since 3.0 released on windows. I knew when they went cloud that shit was going sideways, but it was the acquisition of substance painter that did them in for me. Even though CC was kind of a mess, instead of building on the value proposition and including substance, they decided to have it as a separate charge. Fuck adobe. Fuck subscription software.

Open ##1473304
@wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz 2026-04-21 00:36

Have you tried Gimp and Inkscape?

Open ##1476517
@Solrac@lemmy.world 2026-04-21 09:25

We can always use older versions. I stayed in cs6 until I migrated full FOSS

Open ##1663012
@StillAlive@piefed.world 2026-04-21 03:24

> Adobe faces demise, I will mourn what if once was What wait? You can mourn what it was even now. 🤷‍♂️

Open ##1663017
@Strider@lemmy.world 2026-04-22 07:23

Interesting to read. Since I never used Adobe products much (aside from PDF) I can only notice the parallels: it's not only there. It's everywhere. Even excel is a hot mess when doing basic things like scrolling and it redraws a. Simple worksheet. Everything has degraded to total inefficiency.

Open ##1663019
@stickyprimer@lemmy.world 2026-04-22 01:08

A software giant like that can only go two directions: 1) suck the installed base tit for paychecks while cutting costs as much as possible 2) grow, innovate, expand They are still trying to be 2 when a lot of people would like them to be 1, and they *have* to show new feature adoption statistics to prove that all their expensive employees are still worth paying.

Open ##1663020
@architect@thelemmy.club 2026-04-21 02:41

I agree. Try telling them this. They just gaslight you. “We can’t replicate this issue.” Always blaming your device.

Open ##1663021