I’ve been a developer for close to 20 yrs but I’ve never reneged on a deal.
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You should remove your mail ID from your name in preferences as this is a public forum and anyone can pick it up.
Thank you!
I just looked up Affinity’s history because of your post. Serif began developing Affinity Photo in 2009, and worked on it for over 5 years before bringing out the first version for Mac’s in July, 2015. The Window’s version was released in October, 2016. They are still on version 1.X.X five years later, despite having added many major upgrades to the product, not just bug fixes.
So in addition to being a great product, we are all still getting new features added for years now, for only our initial investment of $50 or $36.99 - their on-sale price. Frankly, I am still learning things that AP can do that I had no idea it even did! I am looking forward to when they do finally launch version 2.0 (sometime in 2021, probably) because I imagine it will be wonderful with true major upgrades to the program - and I will be glad to pay to update because Serif has proven it gives value to it’s customers, instead of nickle and diming them to death.
And throughout the pandemic, Serif’s emails have kept in mind that times are hard, by both offering frequent sales and help to students to get their products and upping the number of their tutorials and advice from working professionals to help both users and the industry going during these trying times. Topaz Labs could learn a few lessons from them.
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Well said! My sentiments exactly, when they do come out with 2.0 I will be one of the first to purchase it knowing how they have treated their customer base.
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Well, it looks like my reply to @PaulM and his reply to me - which I have an email copy of - has been deleted. All the more reason to walk away from Topaz.
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This is disgraceful behaviour by Topaz. Topaz offered free upgrades and people, myself included, paid hard earned cash on that understanding. I believe that is a contract and Topaz has broken it. Topaz should honour their contract to those who have bought software prior to this change in company policy. If the company wishes to change its policy for new products that is a different matter, but imposing new policies, on existing customers who have bought into existing products with ongoing upgrades, in my view, demonstrates a total lack of any moral backbone. As to the pricing structure, it’s laughable - for a small amount more than $99 a year, I can get Lightroom AND Photoshop. Before I sign off permanently, may I say to the software development team - Good Job! The software rocks but the managment decision making has lost this customer - c ya!
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Of course now when I open Denoise AI, I get hassled about a new version (2.3.x). I don’t care and I don’t want to be reminded. The only option is to snooze the reminder for up to a couple of weeks. Hey Topaz… Stop it!! I’m never going to buy your upgrade because you lied to your customer base. I don’t like liars and I’ll not do any more business with them. Get rid of your damn recurring reminder.
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They don’t seem to understand that if you annoy people who are ALREADY annoyed with you, you’re really pressing your luck.
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Maybe if you use an app like Radio Silence, you will be able to block Topaz from contacting you.
I’m on Windows so Radio Silence isn’t an option for me. Instead, I’m trying a simple firewall rule to block Denoise from being able to get to the internet. So far Denoise seems to still function, but I’ll know more in a couple of weeks.
Sorry I should have been clearer, since I didn’t know what system you are on. Check to see if there is a Windows app that does the same thing. There are usually more of them than there are Mac versions. Otherwise, I hope setting up the firewall works (which is what I suppose Radio Silence does).
So far, it looks like the firewall rule is doing the trick. I seem to be able to use the program and it does not prompt me to update, even if I tell it to check for updates.
For anyone interested, I created an outbound rule that denies all internet access to “%ProgramFiles%\Topaz Labs LLC\Topaz DeNoise AI\Topaz DeNoise AI.exe” (the location may be different depending on how it was installed). I will just have to create one of these rules for each of the effected programs as the first major upgrade is released.
I will be happy to pay for an upgrade when Topaz manages to release a reasonably bug-free and properly self-installing one on the first try. I resent being asked to pay to be effectively a beta tester. So far I don’t see that happening, so I will stay with the versions I have.
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If this new policy does nothing else for me - any feelings of good will I had toward Topaz are regrettably gone. It’s such a bold face disconnect from the unlimited free upgrade policy that sold the products to me in the first place that even if Topaz were to reverse course at some point in the future the trust is gone.
The entire product development line has been overlapping and confusing and often buggy. I’ve stayed with it because of free upgrades. The value just isn’t there anymore.
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There are many ways to think about what this new policy is really about but the most logical is that they honestly need the money to continue developing. But the sad fact is that, up to this point, their development has not proven its worth. Looking at the release notes for the newest Denoise “major upgrade”, it is full of bugs and short on content. Yes, aside from the bugs, the products do what they are supposed to do, and they do a better job than the competition. But as many people have pointed out, the older versions of their products often work better than the new versions, which is even less of a reason to pay for an upgrade. The policy might have been something that could have been swallowed at half the cost. But when an upgrade costs $10 less than the full product, you’re just plain out of touch.
Let’s make a list of pros and cons of the new policy for existing customers:
Pros:
/crickets chirping
Cons:
- We have to pay for an upgrade which we had expected to be free
- The upgrade doesn’t have any substantial difference in capabilities (re-arranging a UI does not count!)
- Based on history the upgrade will probably have a significant number of bugs
- It may not even work as well as what we already have
- We can’t try the new version without wiping out our current version
The silence from management shows a total disconnect between them and their customer base. Why should I pay for an upgrade or why should I purchase any new product they might come out with after being treated like this? I’ll just continue to use the versions of what I have until they don’t work. By then, someone else will have something that does the job that the Topaz software used to do, Topaz’ intellectual property will have been gobbled up by another company, or it will simply fade away due to poor management.
It’s actually quite sad to to see.
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I agree, I find myself not really using them anymore. To me they are very hit or miss how they work, I’m not very impressed anymore.The only Topaz product I use now is Topaz Studio but who knows when that too will be included in the pay to update scheme.
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Nepotism is rarely a good way to pick a CEO, nor to keep one.
Incoming rant alert…
OK - I’ve been an avid Topaz user since their early days of plugins for Photoshop. On the list of products I have on my account on the Topaz site, I need to scroll a long way to see them all.
BUT - among the products I’ve bought is DeNoise AI, and having spent a small (?large) fortune on Topaz products - all of them - over the years, I now get the message that there is yet another update available BUT my license doesn’t cover it. WHAT??? It’s not even a major version update - it’s a dot point update. But having spent hundreds, possibly well over the thousand Aussie dollars, on Topaz products, to be told my license doesn’t even cover a dot point update, well, that IS an insult! And a rip-off.
Also, WTF are Topaz doing with Adjust AI? It’s languishing unloved and un-updated, with the old installer, and won’t work on the latest Mac OS versions - it just hangs. They’ve acknowledged this with me via email - but that was ages ago, and they said they would be updating Adjust AI and including the new installer that all the other AI apps use. But still - nothing.
So, due to persistent money-grabbing, and failure to update such a basic function as Adjust, I’ll be leaving Topaz now. I still have them all, but many no longer work.
Any recommendations for similar apps and plugins that are better supported and that don’t involve money-grabbing ripoffs?
End of rant…!
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Ah, but you must have missed the memo. Topaz has not only decided to re-define “free updates for life”, they have also chosen to redefine “major update”. For them - unlike every other company I know - “major” is the 2nd digit, not the first. So 2.2.11 to 2.2.12 was not a major update, but 2.2.12 to 2.3.0 IS a major update. The fact that there are no major enhancements and many bugs doesn’t matter to them. They determined that it is major because they wanted to and that lets them charge for it, but I’m not playing their game.
I may be wrong but it looks like they have decided to let Adjust AI and JEPGtoRAW die on the vine. Neither of them have been updated in over a year. Given that those two products both have free lifetime updates, I’m not surprised. I don’t expect to see any development of any products except the ones that require paid updates after a year.
It is sad because the products like denoise and sharpen do a good job, but I refuse to deal with a company that treats their loyal customers unethically. I personally believe that either ON1 or DxO (with the Prime noise reduction) do a good job on at least 99% of the images. Others swear by Capture One but it is expensive, and Luminar is supposed to be good too. And there’s obviously the elephant in the room, Lightroom/Photoshop. I used to like Lightroom but I’m not willing to go with a subscription model. So for my needs, I like ON1 - both the capabilities/functionality and the workflow.
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