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Sep 17, 2022Liked by Matt Stoller

I am not a professional graphic designer, but I have happily used Adobe's Creative Suite for years. I can't speak about the current Adobe service because I am absolutely opposed to rental software. What I work with is Adobe Creative Suite 6, the last software that Adobe sold to the user.

I mostly use Photoshop and Illustrator. From my perspective, the software is so well designed - it is intuitive for the user, especially for a non-trained user like myself..

Because I knew that someday my Creative Suite would collapse, either through the aging of the software or because of what you've described in today's newsletter, that Adobe software as we know it will disappear. I've sampled competitors who are still selling their software and the learning curve for these products is, for me, horrendous. They are just not intuitive.

** I suppose, that like early word processors who tried to compete with Microsoft Word, and found themselves in trouble with Microsoft if their processing in any way mimicked Word . and so other word processors of the time became less intuitive.**

I did purchase one software design package that had a suite of the same sort that Adobe had, but the similarity ended there. The counterparts to Photoshop and Illustrator were nowhere near as intuitive as Adobe. In fact, they weren't intuitive at all.

I understand why Community Colleges offer Adobe software so exclusively, and I understand why professionals will pay the price for rented software. But the Adobe Creative Suite 6 Deluxe was an expensive package to buy - I considered it an investment. Being a non-professional, I do not consider renting software an investment - I consider it a ripoff.. I wish Community Colleges or the YWCA's that offer software courses would consider providing training in these other design packages for the rest of us,

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founding
Sep 17, 2022·edited Sep 17, 2022Liked by Matt Stoller

Josten's has a competitor in Varsity Brands/BAIN Capital's, Herff Jones. Varsity's whole schtick is to monopolize the entirety of schools. From building the buildings, to supplying the sports team uniforms, the band uniforms, the cheer uniforms, branding the school, building the sports facilities, and more. So while Josten's is one of very few suppliers for these things in schools, they are seemingly less worrisome than Varsity's Brands and Herff Jones quest for ALL things school.

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Thanx for continuing to cover Amazon - I don't think enough people still really get it - too many of us, I think don't really care if their practices are crushing competition - as long as they get a "cheaper" price - the welcome to my parlor said the spider to the fly doesn't really dawn on them until its too late - and then its "sigh, oh well, prices always go up, but that's the way it is" sorta like, "well the planet is heating up, but that's the way it is"....

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As a developer a do a lot of graphics myself. The graphics aren't complicated but an app has lots of icons. I've used Fireworks since the first beta because it was perfect for icons. I've used it until it became too old for the version of macOS I was using. That was like 4 years ago I think.

I didn't want to use Illustrator at all because it has an awful and dated interface. I don't know if this has changed in the last years. Knowing Adobe it hasn't.

I tested some apps before I settled on Affinity Designer. The app is nice but there are still some features missing from Designer that were available in Fireworks. Exporting and batch capabilities for instance.

Adobe is everything that is bad in the software world: bloated interfaces, vendor lock in, subscriptions. Adobe products are only used because you have to use them as professional designer.

I can understand that the developers of Figma want eff-you money. But why do they sell out to the enemy?

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Not sure about the Adobe Figma combo but I’m sure it will lead to more “software as a service” where you end up paying forever for the use of the software. While this may be a great profit model for the business it surely sucks for the users. The companies claim that this way you always have the latest and greatest available at your fingertips via the cloud. Sounds good but all it is is a way to guarantee screwing you over many many years. As an example, I still use my copy of Microsoft Word from 2003 and it works perfectly for most everything I could ever want to do. If I had the newer Microsoft 360 (I think it’s called) I would be paying forever for the privilege. I’m still using one PC I have on Microsoft XP and it works just fine despite continuing gloom and doom warnings about security and so on. I also drive an 18 year old car. Can’t afford a new $100k Tesla nor would I want one.

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From your ref article on Healthcare:

"The problem with health-care isn't that it's an imperfect market – it's that we treat it as a market at all. Markets may help organize and allocate discretionary goods and services, but the core of healthcare is not discretionary."

Exactly - Matt, I know your site is directed at monopoly, per se, but at the heart of all these discussions is the underlying zeitgeist whose basic principle is that a market economy is the best of all possible worlds and that every interaction should be judged on its effect on The Market - and underlying that is the concept that everyone has a right to "make a profit", not only a right, but a need to make a profit - how much, by whom and for whom is never defined - so it comes out to "as much as possible" - "enough" is never part of the discussion.

Given that, once a "business" is placed inside the "Market" model - everything follows inexorably, and the discussion of whether that business should be in such a model in the first place is never considered ...

Healthcare is a perfect example of one such that should NOT be - because, as the article states, "the core of healthcare is not discretionary"

I would love to see a discussion of which "Businesses" are engaged in activities that are "discretionary" and thus, perhaps, appropriate to be placed in, and thus legally subject, to its legitimate dictates - I think this would be a very interesting discussion and get a lot of commentary :)

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I'm a small-scale courseware designer. Used Adobe briefly, never heard of Figma. I think Adobe may be heading in the wrong direction. Many designers are getting tired of mandatorily online programs. Constant updating and constant web access seriously interfere with GETTING WORK DONE.

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founding

"Why are the railroads firing their workforce if they are making so much money? One key problem is that the railroads are run by financiers who seek to extract whatever cash they can from their capital heavy industry, regardless of the cost in service. They understaff their trains, they run unreliable schedules, they underinvest in capacity, and they let their capital stock degrade, all so they can pay out the $190B in buybacks and dividends they have done since the early 2010s."

Isn't this true of virtually all service firms these days? Doesn't every phone call to a financial or health care company include the straight-arm phrase "Due to unusually high call volume...?". It appears these companies have mastered the art of being one employee short. Obviously, being short employees is even more profitable for technical jobs like running a freight train.

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From your ref article on crypto :

"The White House last week issued a climate report on crypto which found crypto assets consume between 1% and 2% of U.S. electricity each year. The White House also found crypto asset activity produces between 0.4% to 0.8% of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, similar to the emissions from iron and steel production in the United States, according to Alondra Nelson, Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.

“By way of comparison, the crypto asset industry is expanding rapidly using more electricity and producing more emissions,” said Nelson. “Crypto mining affects local communities with noise pollution, as well as air and water pollution from direct fossil fired electricity.”

I would love to hear a justification for an industry that uses as much energy, generates as much GHG to produce an endless string of 1s and 0s as an industry that produces iron and steel ...

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These newsletters are one of the few bright spots in the political economy of late. Thanks!

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I did the same for a long time until my computer started shorting out on me (that was Creative Suite 4). I put Creative Suite 6 on our Mac (has a 24-inch screen - good for old eyes like mine). The Mac (which is old and its operating software can no longer be updated and McAfee stopped updating their software for it- but some home-grown geniuses made protective software to keep the software from being attacked.. So thanks to revolutionary super-nerds, our old Mac takes a lickin' and keeps on tickin'.

The software package I got is Affinity. But I'm finding it a hard go. I'm thinking of getting a 24" monitor so I can see the software's screen better.

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I think your references to healthcare, Amazon and the monopoly mechanism are all "connected". There is a set of stand alone clinics called WellNow urgent care centers - I suspect that if/when Amazon gets its grubby hands on OneMedical - WellNow will be the next target, taking it over or driving it out of business ... We shall see

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dunno if this is another weird monopoly but there's been lots of noise recently in the adobe creative community about the withdrawal of pantone colours from all adobe apps due to a licencing disagreement between adobe and pantone. apparently there is no alternative to pantone colours, so many creatives are in a bind.

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I heard that the Engineers driving the trains had camera's on them every second while driving. They drive 8, 10, 15 hrs straight. And many times the train is stopped for hrs. Even when the train is stopped for hrs the engineer is not allowed to read a book or loop at their phone or a news paper or close their eyes. The camera monitors them and they are written up if their eyes are closed more than 10 seconds, even while the train is parked.

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I am an Adobe share holder. The stock has been crushed this year and this acquisition further crushes the stock. That said, Adobe really does have a monopoly in the Creative Suite area and in the document cloud. And a near monopoly on the Marketing Cloud.

As i a share holder I'd be a buyer. As an Americans citizen the Justice Department needs to stop this.

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