Adobe's god complex – any suggestion?

[froglet]

Hi

I just had to share this, because I am still slightly shocked, and need to rant a bit to be honest...
I have long been an advocate of properly paying for your software especially since I use it for my freelance work and so always paid for my copy of macromedia / adobe flash.

About two years ago adobe came out with a great marketing step and offered flash users the possibility to upgrade from flash 5 to studio 8 for only about £80 or $150 more than a straight flash upgrade. That meant you get to test drive not only flash but also Dreamwaver and fireworks. I thought that was a good idea and bought the studio upgrade. I quickly found I never use Dreamwaver and I don’t like fireworks but flash as always was great. Now that the CS3 is out, I wanted to simply upgrade my flash, to my surprise I found that paying more for my last upgrade means that I now am stuck with studio and am not allowed to simply upgrade flash. The options I have are either to upgrade the whole studio suite (for double the price) or buy a new flash programme (for triple the price). The even more amazing thing, and the reason why I have to share this with you guys, is the reply I got from Mr. JW of the Adobe Customer Service here in London, once I sent him an Email asking for alternatives:

“While I do sympathise that your needs have changed since you bought studio, we cannot allow an exception for you to upgrade only Flash. The reason for this is simple: it is Adobe policy. Adobe has not provided an explanation for why this is. But explanations or reasons are not relevant. What Adobe ordains is beyond discussion”

Now what do you do with this kind of response????

[gerbick]

Ever thought of upgrading your original Flash 5 license? Sorta a way to walk around upgrading all, but it might just be the path that's available to you.

As to that response... quite high & mighty. But I had worse from them when I had a license issue going from Windows to Mac...

[froglet]

thanks gerbick!
sadly i can't they only have a 3-version-back upgrade rule so upgrading 5 to studio 8 was cool but 5 to 9 is impossible.
It is just so frustrating because it feels like since they bought Macromedia they became such a monopoly that they can just do whatever they want.
And I feel like such an idiot for falling into their trap and upgrading to studio.

[renderhjs]

dont buy the upgrade from england- they (adobe) have the highest prices there next to germany and some other european countries. It seems that england and german users are used to pay +40% more than US- users - so that might save you also quite a bunch.

the bad news regarding that adobe smallowed macromedia is that they dictate mare is in the past the prices of their products. CS3 is by far the most expensive suit they ever released. I´d hope that the EU just like they did with microsoft would give them some pressure to lower their prices.

[PAlexC]

My God, a software company that dictates its licensing and upgrade terms? Where do they get the stones?