Right, but presumably when you're NOT MAKING A WEBSITE, "don't do an intro, I hate Flash intros on websites" may not be the most appropriate thing to say...

To my surprise, most Linux-related podcasts are really, really bad.

This surprises you how exactly? Linux users are almost never involved in media production, most coming from orthodox IT-related areas. I do a lot of creative production work, and I have to laugh every time I talk to somebody who is both a Linux user (as I am), really into tech, and somehow passionate about getting something produced. They really have no clue what is up or down, and most of their anecdotes come from being really pissed off by Flash-driven websites, even when they ARE dealing with time-bound, linear media where something like an "animated intro" is considered a staple of production. I still chuckle about it.

More structure = paid = lynda.com

More free = various collections = here

That's what I do when I use Photoshop. :-) Still not the same though.

This is the first time I've actually heard of people complain about actual lose-your-work crashes.

Actually I think most of the lost work in our case comes from factors external to Photoshop. In our labs, we usually see hardware problems crop up and cause loss of work long before a Photoshop stability problem occurs.

However, if Adobe kept a big Trac or Bugzilla site somewhere, and even if it just showed bugs from labs where I teach, I think the reliability point would get across. There are just some awful bugs in the software, and as you mentioned, Photoshop is complex enough that workarounds aren't hard to find once the issue has been isolated. But man, you should see some of my students when they lose work. I think this is why Adobe provide versioning software now. Support can say, "so do your backups not work then?" [long pause, phone line goes dead] ;-)

Many Photoshop users feel this way; I don't think you're alone in that. There are many features that Photoshop has that are very powerful, like its Type tool, which bears a sharp contrast to GIMP's rudimentary text tool. Even if you compare Photoshop of, say, four versions ago, to GIMP of today, you come away with many features where GIMP falls short.

This shows why feature set alone isn't the main motivator for GIMP users. Some of them are just cheap; some of them want a portable graphics package; some are sick of dealing with licensing and activation pains; some have had bad experiences with Adobe customer support.

On the other end of the spectrum, I think, are full-out artistic types who view the issue of freedom as a vast battlefield upon which commercial interests can become the worst kind of double agents, often actively working to subvert the interests of the wider community in favor of extra profits.

I tend to lean this way myself, having worked on many marketing teams and now owning my own business. I'm more interested in my own mental and spiritual development and its application in the digital domain (tough as the going may be), and less interested in putting Deanna from Marketing in a new Lexus.

That can sound pretty fundamentalist, but many artistic-types really do need the extra room to breathe.

To respond to your first point, you are right on. I've never had a positive review of GIMP by a Photoshop student who hadn't already tried it prior to taking the course. Most of the crits come from interface-related issues. In my case, I had other motivations for using GIMP, and had already worked with free software, so I knew that I needed to adapt myself to "GIMP's way of doing things"; after I learned the TAB key shortcut and other little helps, it got a lot easier. But it is really nice to see that GIMP have got Peter doing some great interface work that will be rolled into future versions.

Also, someone used to Photoshop will be more likely to move to an open toolchain rather than a single app like GIMP, if they're considering migrating to free software-land. That means also learning software like Inkscape, possibly Blender, possibly ImageMagick, and so on. But that quickly becomes one powerful toolchain, for all its quirks.

I wonder if GIMP isn't designed by and for advanced users who've outgrown Photoshop!

I'm not sure I would go that far. Features-wise, Photoshop has a lot to offer. If I didn't think so, I wouldn't be teaching it.

But in a way, you're right. Once you're really competent in Photoshop, you should have realized what bounds you are working with and should at least have some computer graphics concepts down pat.

This makes it easier to become concerned with issues like proprietary software vs. freedom software, which is one thing that happened in my case. I tried to think about how much Adobe really cared about creativity and freedom of expression, but I just couldn't get there.

I've noticed that consultants I work with who prefer freedom software for its open aesthetic are almost universally better grounded in the fundamentals, and are more productive and more sought after because of it.

There are a lot of web designers who started out in Flash who made the same journey too, and now they're pushing out standards-compliant code and talking about open toolchains.

and stability is not one complaint I've heard

Really? No beachballs of death at least? Anyway, for all I know you're just cropping images all day. My students are typically doing work that acquaints them with more advanced features -- even if they're not totally necessary -- so perhaps that's where the difference comes in.

In fact, some of my illustrator friends have a bad habit of not saving often. Why Murphy's Law hasn't taught them a lesson about that I"ll never know.

So it's just your illustrator friends who have stability problems? :-) Anyway, those following this thread might be interested in reading Adobe UI Gripes. The comments after this blog post are also pretty instructional, I think. :-)

Actually it's a very nice feeling. I know what you mean about adjusting opacity values, but what about minor things that don't have such convenient shortcuts? What about auditioning fonts? I'd rather do that with the scroll wheel than any other method I've tried, keyboard-based or not.

Photoshop instructor here. It's a great app, but really is overkill for most needs. I actually used GIMP to design my Photoshop class websites, since I like some of the GTK conveniences better than Photoshop's relatively primitive widget set (can't hover over a spinner and use the scroll wheel alone to change the value, being one example).

Of course, I don't really advertise GIMP in my classes, but I do give extra credit to students who are willing to give it a try and write a review (they can also choose to try other software, like Aviary).

Anyway, it's nice of Adobe to keep improving Photoshop, but it's amazing how many millions of dollars have gone into this software, and it is still getting a bad rep for tons of crashes, expensive third-party plugins, weird bugs, etc.

Saddened is a good word for it. I thought it was sort of awkwardly incongruent when Canonical rolled out Ubuntu One. They could have made their entry so much more unique by positioning it with respect to some of the core values that free software rides on. That's the sort of creativity they'll need in order to compete with the likes of Dropbox, unless they intend to lock down the entire Ubuntu platform at some point.

I guess we haven't learned our collective lesson about software freedom when there's a Cloud involved...

Matt, you were intensely criticized by members of the Free Software community for your critical stance facing "vague concepts" like software freedom and "no vendor lock-in." Reading your blog, it seems to me like you are still a fan of focusing on "high quality software at a compelling price" rather than these other concepts. How will this position affect your work with Canonical and more specifically, its relationship with freedom-first software advocates?

>brainstorms ideas, patents them, then lives off of the licensing revenue

Still holds true, according to the article >without actually contributing real products to the world

For all values of "contributing," yeah, they might be considered contributors to the greater welfare. But keep that in mind next time you invent some revolutionary way of helping the developing world, start selling it for super-cheap prices, and then find yourself in court staring at Nathan's lawyers.

>or even prototyping their vaguely defined ideas

Here's your prototype, pal. See? We have GREAT ideas. And they're all...well, ours.

YES. Mod parent up; those of us who purchased pro fonts recently have felt the pain.