This is the third time this week that someone has reached out to me with this question. When this happens I usually write a blog post to answer instead of writing the same email to multiple people explaining my thoughts about this controversial question. This way I can now refer people making similar inquiries to this post rather than repeating myself.
Adobe has invited me to participate in things like conferences and training, but I think it’s important to say that I do not know Adobe’s plans for the marketing or selling of Adobe Captivate. When it comes right down to it, I’m just a user like all of you. Everything I say in this blog post is just my thoughts and opinion.
There was a time when Adobe offered a product called the Adobe eLearning Suite. In fact, this is how I purchased my first personal copy of Adobe Captivate. The eLearning Suite included the following applications:
- Adobe Captivate
- Adobe Photoshop
- Adobe Dreamweaver
- Adobe Flash
- Adobe Audition
- Adobe Presenter
- Adobe Acrobat Professional
The last time Adobe offered this suite of products was with Adobe Captivate 6.
Since that time, the only other product where Adobe Captivate is bundled with other software from Adobe is in the Adobe Technical Communications Suite. The Adobe Technical Communications Suite includes the following pieces of software:
- Adobe Captivate
- Adobe FrameMaker
- Adobe RoboHelp
- Adobe Captivate (2019 release)
- Adobe Acrobat
- Adobe Presenter 11.1
Of course, many people are always hoping that Captivate will become part of the Creative Cloud. As a Captivate and Creative Cloud user, I completely understand this. For me, the greatest benefit of such a merger would be the ability to install all my Adobe apps from one Creative Cloud application. Imagine purchasing a new PC or Mac and simple logging into your Adobe Account and selecting the option to install all your Adobe software. I could go away and have lunch while everything I need to be creative that afternoon would magically appear on my new PC.
Of course, some of you are hoping for a reduced price. I understand that also. Captivate, and the Creative Cloud represents over $US 80 per month. I would gladly accept a bundled price of less than $80, but I don’t think everyone would agree. Imagine if you were not in the eLearning industry but were a Creative Cloud user. If Adobe asked you to suddenly pay $30 more for something you didn’t need or want, you would likely not accept that. I would imagine that many illustrators, designers, and graphic artists might start looking for alternatives to Creative Cloud.
And for those who think Adobe should absorb Captivate’s cost and include it in the Creative Cloud for free, I say no thanks. If Captivate became a bonus piece of software in the Creative Cloud, I would imagine that it would stop being the innovative software it is today. I’m fairly certain that Adobe would no longer offer new features like interactive video or 360° VR training. As free included software, Captivate would cease to be that innovative product it is today.
“And for those who think Adobe should absorb Captivate’s cost and include it in the Creative Cloud for free, I say no thanks.”
But Adobe Creative Cloud isn’t free.
I pay a monthly subscription for it, and it should include all of the apps I need or be customizable to include the apps that I need. Half of Creative Cloud is useless to me, but Adobe has many other apps that could be useful to me that are not options in it.
Therefore, to counter your argument, “Why should I continue to pay a subscription for apps I don’t need and still not have access to the Adobe apps I do need?”
Either include everything or let us choose our own subscription package. Saying that Adobe cannot include it because they USED TO HAVE another package is irrelevant.
Why not a custom creative cloud? App choices for you to select. Subscription based on numbers of apps. More apps Adobe lowers price point for each app.
Nobody can learn all the apps you get with Adobe CC. Over time, yes. Lastly, are all the updates true useful innovation that most people can really use or is it bloatware and some bells and whistles that only a few want or will use?
Thank you for sharing this!
This is a good post to include here Paul. I see both sides of the coin in this argument.
I can see your point that perhaps the level of updates stop happening if it is included in CC, but I would also like to think that a responsible company like Adobe would see the benefit of updating their products.
But I get it. Everyone is looking for more for less. Myself included. The marketing of software and services has gone to subscription and in a way, it is cheaper to buy this way in order to maintain the most recent features. But at the same time, it is a commitment. It is a recurring charge. It is never ending if you want to keep the software. One has to do the math in order to understand and justify the cost.
I haven’t picked a side here on purpose because I haven’t actually picked on. To your point, I want the updates. To other comments, I want it easy and I want it affordable.
One last thought. I would like to throw out an option to others – what about a choose what you need scenario to create a custom CC for each user? There are things in CC that I will never use. But it is there. I could use it. Will I? Probably not. But if I had the choice of what I know I would use, then that would be beneficial. Tough to do from product/service/pricing triangle, but if they could ever figure it out, that might be the way to go.
Just a thought.
That makes sense even though I still wish I could get them all together!
I want add my 5 cents. It’s a bit offtopic, but generally, today’s business model is all about subscriptions. For me the most important feature of Captivate is that you can buy a life licence (and the best part is this incentive program which I’m really thankful for.) As for CC cloud it’s a fantastic tool, but financially out of reach for many. In my case, I can make use of a Captivate licence bought by my organization, or my own (which I got as a part of incentive program.) Once I’m forced to pay a subscription, I’m out, looking for alternatives. I had used Adobe illustrator for quite a time, up to CS6 version. When they transferred completely to a subscription model, I’m still using my CS6 version, but I also found an alternative for vector art which I’m really amazed at (lifetime licence too). And one more thing about cloud, I guess the model is not very flexible. There’s no option of buying a shorter time subscriptions but you always pay annually, and you don’t have a possibility to subscribe to just one application, I mean I can, but the price difference is negligible comparing to the bundles, so it doesn’t make sense from the economic point of view. The one I’m most interested in is Adobe Animate. One of the reasons is the possibility of producing OAM files, but I can only count on my organization to pay for it. Individually, it’s out of the question.
Very interesting. Keeping it out of the reach of many is also hindering the growth by participation. As far as innovation is concerned all Adobe products undergo innovation both from users as well from the Adobe. Well this is my perspective and I still feel it to be more accessible for normal people…there are many who can’t afford.
My thoughts exactly. This ” As free included software, Captivate would cease to be that innovative product it is today.” statement makes me question Paul’s knowledge. Adobe has always been IMO very receptive to users insight allowing all their apps to stay “innovative”….. just an odd statement by the author.
Good points, Paul!
Thanks, Michael, I think we always just look at it from our perspective, however, we need to consider that such a merger would affect millions of existing Creative Cloud users as well.
Thanks Paul for the explanation.
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