It seems to me that you are generating a major customer relations problem you truly don’t want. Someone said you are breaking a contract, another said you are breaking your word, etc. It all adds up to a lot of unhappy customers, something evry company dreads. Perhaps there is a better solution to your cash-flow issue. Why not try a grandfathering approach. For those of us who have been loyal customers over the years, why not grandfather us in completely and let new customers carry the upgrade load from the beginning, clearly informed up front as to the costs rather than springing an unexpected price increase on existing customers. One of the responders said he/she was still looking for the good news. Well, so am I, and I don’t yet see it. In my company I might have increased the initial price for a new app enough to cover the increased production and upgrade costs. That way the prospective client knew from the outset what he would pay and what each increase would cost.
Can you image a car company sending out a note to owners saying that the warranty on the car purchased 18 months ago will now be a charged item? Not mentioning the horrible customer response, that company might find itself with a huge legal problem. You folks started with a stated policy - a contract if you will. Now you want to change it without any input other than your own. Bad business, my friend, and a policy that might well spell the end for Topaz Labs.
Hi Eric, Not sure when I joined Topaz but I did and still do enjoy using some one them.
Though I do understand your decision from a business point of view, it seems to be a bit on the harsh side to impose suddenly a fee for upgrades which seems to me a bit on the high side.
Especially, I would feel, if you could accommodate users who are more than a year with Topaz, with a discounted price for the new upgrades.
However, I will not delete my products but pay for upgrades when and if I need them - BUT, I hope that this change in contract will remain the only change, i.e. I remain still the owner of the software and can use it a life time, with or without upgrades.
I do not want to end up like with Adobe where you do not have a choice anymore, either you stick with their site expensive creative cloud or you do not use Adobe - so, hope we will not face one day a similar problem with Topaz.
As mentioned before, I do understand the business decision and hope it will help your company to stay afloat and provide more and great software products. Thank you
Hans J.P.
Let’s say you have 2 or 3 apps but not the whole bundle because you don’t need or want all of them. I have Mask AI, Gigapixel AI and was thinking of possibly trying the version of Gigapixel AI for videos. If I needed to upgrade them all for some reason, I’d have to pay to upgrade each one. That means I’ll pay more than if I got the bundle upgrade unless I stick with the two which means it will be equal to it. I wouldn’t qualify for bundle upgrade unless I buy all the other apps but I don’t need them all. Can it be worked out in such a way that you can get a bulk licence based on the actual amount of apps you have? Or maybe just apply a discount based on the amount of licences being purchased?
I understand in a business sense how this makes sense going forward, BUT that means GOING FORWARD!!! - I just recently bought a suite of Topaz products within the last month, with the promise of free lifetime upgrades. That was the terms I purchased this product under!!!
If I buy a Hyundai with a 10 year/ 100,000 mile warranty, I don’t expect Hyundai to suddenly announce that they only now have a 5 year/50,000 mile warranty and that includes ALL existing customers, it means the customers from that date forward are subject to that policy, does it not??? Disappointing to say the least.
This to me is a breach of contract. I started with remask and bought nearly all of your programs. Please refund all the money for those applications and I’ll uninstall them from my computer.
I support this general position for purchases already made. A promise of life time updates form part of the value proposition at the time of purchase. It has the advantage as a user to opt in early even so there might be still some teething problems and thus enabling development of the product. In my case I did this with Mask AI even so I had a license for Remask already. I didn’t like to re-purchase a licence for a Topaz masking tool, grumbled about it, but I did it with the promise of at least to have then upgrades for the AI version. Overall it was the only product in a mix of a lot of free upgrades Topaz did provide. Mask AI doesn’t quite perform well enough for me as yet to have bought it as version limited perpetual license, but I was willing to support it so it had a chance. In other words I was willing to have skin in the game, or call it crowd funding, whicheverway one wants to look at it. Seeing this retrospective change for existing license holders feels to me like a slap in the face at least.
I am very curios if you will listen the feedback wrote here
OK, you want to make some changes, but the people who bought it 1 month ago…half a year…2 days…maybe bought it for unlimited upgrade (yes, me was in this area, i bought one week ago DeNoise Ai and an argument was the free upgrade)
also, ok you want to charge for some upgrades, but near the price i bought it? practically i pay one year subscription for the product…not unlimited, yes i still can use it but… ?
OK, a price like 10 dollars in the same conditions can be right, but 50??!?
some of us are living in countries with not such a great power of buying, and with adobe cc payment, a cloud service and also topaz now at 4$ / month if you make the math…it is not great to pay like 20-25% from our income to software monthly
I hope you will look at all those feedbacks and make some changes
Hi, i’m really a longtime user of topas software even i did not ever use it on a day by day basis like photoshop illustrator and co. Now as i understand your business point of view i also understand mine. Purchasing the software forced me to agree to an eula and also you agreed to lifetime free upgrades as a part of your offer. Now you want to change this without the permission of me as your customer/business partner to your advantage. This is not a fair solution as we as customers have no way to disagree to this contract. I think it would be fair if you treated the customers in the same way as they treat you. Therefore, changes should not affect contracts concluded retroactively, but should be oriented towards the future. New customers and new products may be under different contracts that include upgrade costs. Existing products should be continued for old customers under the existing conditions, so there are no upgrade costs. As a customer, I really feel like a fool today with such a mail. I also find an upgrade price of $99$ to be way over the actual value of the products.
Not thrilled about the change but I understand. I use most of your products on a daily basis. So far, I am impressed with most of them and look forward to seeing new improvements!
Bad move. Completely understand a new model for new subscribers. Not so for long-term customers that have been told repeatedly that there would never be a charge for upgrades. I have purchased licensees for your products since 2008. I support legal action.
I must agree with the sentiment that most customers supported Topaz because of their lifetime free upgrade and support promise. Now they have decided to renege on this promise, then serious consideration should be given to quarantining their existing customer base from further costs, and implement this new yearly upgrade program on all new customers, from now on. That way y
Topaz are not breaking their promises to legacy customers.
I live in Australia and $99 p.a. cost translates to AUD$147!!! There’s no way I can justify this sort of expense with second tier products that are not my primary editor suite (Adobe). Even more so as a retired person with limited income and photography being a hobby, and not an income source.
So unless there is something incredibly worthwhile coming out from Topaz, I guess it will remain as it is now, on the current versions, for the very long, foreseeable future.
Gotta say, I’m pretty disappointed in the decision and proposed pricing structure. I do hope they will listen to their customers concerns and provide a more acceptable way to achieve their financial outcomes without alienating existing, loyal customers.
The problem I have with this new business model is when I bought the software, it was with the understanding/promise it was a lifetime license with upgrades, like with previous Topaz/Topaz Labs software. The more I thought about this, and considering how much I have already invested in it for "lifetime licenses’ (several hundred dollars so far), going to yearly subscription is somewhat a slap in the face. It’s one of the reasons I stopped upgrading other software, it was just too expensive on a yearly method. Yes, I still use CS6E, and have succumbed to using Adobe’s ‘rental software’. and now having Topaz doing the same thing? I haven’t read all the replies yes, so don’t know if anyone from Topaz answered, but if we choose to NOT shell out the shekels for a tweaked ‘new version’, will that prevent the current versions installed from functioning?
When having bought a product under specified conditions it can’t be possible to change those conditions if one of both parts of the contract won’t agree. This can’t be possible and some would call your announcement “fraud”, especially when I consider the high prices.
That ends up being almost $150 AUD, as bought all three of the products. What about Topaz Studio 2 and the ‘pro’ plugins/filters? Am I going to be charged for updates on those, too?
this news is unfortunate,as i have quitted adobe for about the same reason (subscription,payable upgrades),i will not update after the expiration date,i have almost all your products,
and was looking to buy new upcomming products like gigapixel video AI,as i have luminar and affinity,who’s upgrades are free
i will be using these programs if the topaz programs dont work on the newer OS anymore
i think you will lose many customers by doing this,and less people will have the intent of buying something from you
anyway,like i said,this is unfortunate
I have a myriad of Topaz products dating back to 2013. All paid for “in full.” Truthfully, I don’t use all that much of them, never have. There are a few programs I do like and use regularly (Denoise AI and Sharpen AI, and sometimes Mask AI) but I only use them as Plug-in’s to Photoshop. If I was a professional who made my living via photography and photo editing, I’d have no issue with what is being proposed. It’s the cost of doing business. But as a hobbiest, I doubt I’ll be willing to pay $99 a year for the use of the programs. Of the three I regularly use, only Denoise AI exceeds what I can do with vanilla Photoshop CC. What I love about Topaz is the speed in which it does what would take me longer to do in Photoshop. If I was a professional (i.e. time = money), yeah, I’d pay for that convenience. I’ll be curious what Topaz has waiting for us. What the hook is that’s going to make us want to pay the subscription fee.
No, I don’t want ‘free upgrades’. I want the updates/upgraded that I paid for in the lifetime updates purchase. I have the entire Topaz Labs legacy plugins (got them before they were legacy) and got all the AI software, except the masking AI. When I bought them, they came with “lifetime updates”. That isn’t free. It’s what I paid for.
EDIT: My Mistake: I do have the masking AI. Same thing applies.
hey maria,as i understand it,with every purchase you get one year of upgrades (all sort),after this year you must pay 99$ for another year of upgrades,but even when your not paying for new upgrades,your bought programs will continue to work,that is,so long microsoft doesnt change the OS too much
then the programs will stop working,i’ve would have been ok with paying something for big changes in the programs,but this is like adobe,instaid of monthly,a yearly SUBSCRIPTION
i will be looking out for other companies with AI functionallity,with free lifetime updates that is
