Up until 2 years ago I never paid for software. Having a MSDN subscription on Windows gave me access to all Microsoft stuff I needed, and on Linux things were always free.
But Adobe managed to fork $600 out of me for Photoshop CS3. After a few months their RAW converter stopped working demanding CS4 and my new SLR wasn't supported otherwise. So essentially I feel like they fooled me into renting Photoshop for $600 per year.
Needless to say, if I want to run my purchased copy on Windows (I paid for the Mac version), I'll have to pay for it again, the license covers only one OS.
Oh, and the only software that ever manages to crash my computers into must-be-turned-off-and-on state (I have Linux and a Mac) is Flash. Freezing the entire OS is hard, they surely have an engineering muscle to pull that off.
Photoshop is Adobe's Office that sits there and makes money if they don't change it too much. Meanwhile flash is where all of the resources are going. They have no real incentive to cleanup photoshop, users will continue to buy it.
Adobe Camera Raw (ACR) doesn't support raw files that come from cameras that are released after a new major PS/ACR release. The workaround is to use Adobe's free RAW to digital negative (DNG) converter. You can do this in a batch. Then process DNG files with your old release of ACR.
I got a new camera, Adobe said "oops, you have to upgrade to the latest RAW converter to get it to work", I ran the software update, the converter said "oops, you have to upgrade your 1-year old Photoshop".
I guess I wonder why you blame Adobe for not supporting your camera's proprietary format, but are giving a free pass to the camera manufacturer for not providing software or drivers.
But Adobe managed to fork $600 out of me for Photoshop CS3. After a few months their RAW converter stopped working demanding CS4 and my new SLR wasn't supported otherwise. So essentially I feel like they fooled me into renting Photoshop for $600 per year.
Needless to say, if I want to run my purchased copy on Windows (I paid for the Mac version), I'll have to pay for it again, the license covers only one OS.
Oh, and the only software that ever manages to crash my computers into must-be-turned-off-and-on state (I have Linux and a Mac) is Flash. Freezing the entire OS is hard, they surely have an engineering muscle to pull that off.