When DRM is in the way, Bittorrent FTW!

I would really like to see Consumerist go back to its roots and try to rattle the cage of corporate offices regularly, rather than just being a conduit for front page news. I wonder what Adobe would have said about this. Not that I'm defending them... I wasted $250 buying Adobe InDesign CS3 only to find it had an Orwellian activation scheme, so I went back to PageMaker.

I've decided, I'm going to start a new hospice therapy service. What I'll do is go around to hospice centers, go over people's situations, and find issues in which they'll need to contact a customer support center. If no such issues exist, and there is time, we can provide them with a Capital One credit card, or get them an HP laptop with Vista and some Adobe software. Anyways, after getting disconnected six times, talking to two males who could care a less, one male who could care a less and is down right rude, two females who kind of sound like they want to help if only they had any idea what you were talking about, having to call back each time because the previous person lied to you to get you off the line, having to hear the next time that you are the liar.... well, dying just won't seem so bad.

here's my recommendation:
[www.mininova.org]

you paid for it so I wouldn't have any qualms about a little pirate action.

@timmus: Your friends are over here, in a different thread. Wait, no, they're here, hanging out at the end of point #1.

I think one key problem is that you are cut and pasting the serial from the Help menu. Adobe DOES NOT list the full serial there. This is an attempt to reduce piracy (I believe). Anyhow it has been years since the displayed serial was valid. (makes it terrible for licensing compliance purposes).

You can dig the serial out of the registry for most adobe programs though if you can't find the original. You may ahve to google for the location for this particular item as we've never used this product at work.

Adobe's CS is terrible though.... I pretty much refuse to purchase their product if I can find an alternative that works (works well for avoiding Acrobat 'Pro').

From my personal experience:
I am trying to install trial X, and it keeps complaining about the licensing system not starting.
Oh, sorry you can't get the trial working. Why don't you buy the full product and then we will help you?
My response: Why would I purposely buy a broken product?
There is nothing wrong with our product, your system might not be compatible.
(note I am running nothing odd)
Off to bittorrent I go...

The customer got disconnected once and gave up. I just don't know about this one.

Yes, Adobe's customer service sucks. Yes, they disconnected her.

But these problems are pretty common: Bad email customer service. Very typical. Long hold times. Typical. Getting disconnected. It happens.

If the customer had tried again and got disconnected again, then that would be one thing. But... methinks the customer had a low threshold for typical customer service issues. Writing to email support and requesting a call back?

I don't know about this one. Sometimes Consumerist post complaints that are pretty lame...

Adobe is the Microsoft of the design space. Sad, but true.

The hostile attitude towards paying customers and terrible quality is catching-up with them.

Sure, just like Microsoft they think the market share is too dominant and their products are too complicated for the open source crows. "And don't forget the plug-ins" they fool themselves.

Yes, we use Adobe products. There is not a lot of alternatives. But give the open source crowd and Apple a few more years, and I am sure we will pull Adobe off our vendor list just like we did Microsoft this year.

Hiya...Just a little bit of info, your EECB email list includes several people who haven't been at adobe for years.

Also, I think the OP may not have much luck with that chargeback. She got the software. What is she charging back? Most credit cards do not get involved in these kind of issues ("quality of merchandise").

Anyway, I'm sure Adobe will contact her now and all will be well...

See my name listed for a description of who I certainly am not a (former) one of, so here's few comments as to the problems listed there.

First, as per kamel5547, the full serial is *not* listed in the help menu, which is one of the reasons why the serial number there was not accepted.

Secondly, upgrading from a Suite to a single product is *not* a valid upgrade path for any product, I.E. having Golive CS2 as part of the suite will not allow you to upgrade to Dreamweaver CS3. Also not commenting on the policy behind this, just saying that's the way it is. Considering you were unaware of this, you may be able to actually call in to their tech support and they may be able to help you. (8006423623).

Also, in re: problem #2. Yeah, current versions of our installers are crap. This is well known and has even, heh, been publicly admitted by some of our sorta-PR people, for example John Nack. That's one of the things that got poorly done when trying to integrate Macromedia stuff. Vastly improved in CS4, at least functionally, if that's any consolation.

Finally, as far as the email team telling you to call the phone team... Well, the email team is overworked and gets to things as fast as they can, honestly. Yeah, I know, get a bigger email team. But the reason for telling you to contact the phone team could be one of two. Either one) they're gonna tell you what I mentioned earlier, namely that Suite -> CS3 single app is not a valid upgrade path, or two) they're gonna "unlock" it for you so you can install it anyway. Doing this requires you reading a code from a semi-hidden screen in the registration dialog to us, and us generating a code and sending it back to you. The code from the screen is system specific, and the code we send back is time sensitive (~15 minutes) so obviously that can't be done over the email system.

As far as the actual calling in... yeah, customer service is in Mumbai, it sucks, it wasn't much better than when it was in the US. If you call into the tech line you'll get somebody in the US, though, and they may help you. Most of them *are* fairly willing to help.

In other news, the activation system is getting noticeably less evil/annoying in the next version, namely CS4... See Acrobat 9 for more details. ;-)

Yet another reason just to pirate the software. Not only do I not have to pay for it, the nice pirates often remove the nasty DRM and make it much easier to install as well. It's a win-win.

@B. Whaler: Well, in comparison to MS, their support is horrible. But their products are amazing. Powerful, elegant, the gold standard.
MS only dreams that their products were held in the same esteem in their space that Adobe is in theirs.
That said, Adobe, please get your subpar support together. I can see how it drives people to piracy, which can't be a very promising business plan.

@jjason82: The nice pirates often remove the nasty DRM and make it much easier to install as well. It's a win-win.

This logic is so sad but true. Microsoft provided a XP license for my work machine, right? I had to activate it over the phone because they didn't like my dual-boot configuration. ("You have 36 hours until we blow up your computer. Now please say the numbers in group A. Thank you. Say group B...C...D...E...F. Thank you. Your patience is important to us. Now enter the following numbers in Group A...B...") I kept thinking about that handy pirated copy, just a few shakes away. Why do they hate their paying customers?

It reminds me of the poignant anti-music-piracy pitch: "Watch for Compilation CDs that could only exist in the dreams could only exist in the dreams of a music fan."

@twophrasebark: Without a working serial the software is broken/useless/defective. Adobe refuses (or lacks the competence) to rectify the situation. Been there, "cracked" it.

@Necoras: Yes, because stealing tools is always preferable to negotiating a lower price. Um. Or something. 'Cos stealing is right is you're the slightest bit inconvenienced!

@factotum: While what you're saying makes perfect sense, the credit card company doesn't care. Adobe delivered the product. The credit card companies don't get involved in whether or not you can use the software. They have NO clue whether or not you got the serial number. You didn't order a serial number. You ordered software and you got it.

What you're referring to is known as a "quality of merchandise" complaint. Few credit card companies will get involved in this. "The software doesn't work" "This product isn't as advertised" "This tailoring sucks." They have no way to evaluate those kind of things nor will they. Some credit card companies will give you a credit as a courtesy if the amount is small (Amex does this a lot).

Believe me, she WILL have to mail back the software to Adobe in order to win the chargeback. In which case, she's really just getting a refund...

...

Dear Torrent Babies: Those of us who pay for software that helps us make a living and give feedback to Adobe long and loud about restrictive DRM because? We frakkin' hate you. Because if you don't pay, you don't get listened to.

You pirate jackholes make the lives of legitimate customers a lot harder because you think that to retouch a picture of your slammed Accord or figure out how to put some celebrity's head on a ho's body you need a free copy of Photoshop...because Adobe charges "too much"...get a real job as a graphic artist and pay for your tools. You'd steal an airbrush or a canvas from an art store?

@CaliforniaCajun: I think the point he's getting at is, if you're going to be treated like a pirate, you might as well be a pirate.

I wouldn't call this "slightly inconvinienced", especially if you're on a tight schedule and the place you bought the software from is refusing to help despite having paid for it.

@CaliforniaCajun:

Dear Torrent Babies: Those of us who pay for software that helps us make a living and give feedback to Adobe long and loud about restrictive DRM because? We frakkin' hate you. Because if you don't pay, you don't get listened to.

The point here is that THE SOFTWARE WAS PAID FOR YET THE OP WAS STILL GETTING THE RUNAROUND FOR IT.

You'd steal an airbrush or a canvas from an art store?

You'd pay for it, they'd refuse to give you your newly bought property, they'd refuse to answer anything about it, you'd walk out with it.

Could we at least ATTEMPT to keep the comments on track?

The only use I had for adobe was for opening pdfs, I couldnt BELIEVE how much space it took up on my HD!

About a month ago I finally deleted it & replaced it with a free alternative program.... think it was called "foxit". Found it in a lifehacker article. Foxit takes up hardly any space on my HD.

And yeah I agree with the earlier comment. Its just easier to download a pirated copy of whatever software because of all the bullshit DRM hoops software companies make you jumpe thru on a legit copy.

Keep making it hard for actual paying customers.... and you just make them run to a pirated copy.

"It accepted that, but then asked you to
verify that you was eligible to upgrade." Umm... I think they mean, "It accepted that, but then asked you to
verify that you were eligible to upgrade."

@CaliforniaCajun: you pirate jackholes make the lives of legitimate customers a lot harder

Incorrect: they're just a scapegoat. DRM and activation schemes do not address bittorrent-type piracy. Hypothetically, it only takes one copy in the wild, cracked or otherwise, for it to be available to anyone. Smart thieves are downloading the activation-free volume license copies. (You see, the VL copies exist because corporations won't put up with that kind of activation bullshit, kind of like how the government won't put up with cell-phone ETFs.)

So why is the DRM there? Why shackle everyone when you know that people will have no trouble downloading it online? To keep their paying customers "honest". If the license says it shall be installed on one machine, then they're not going to let you put one copy on your laptop and one copy on your desktop, even if you never use them at the same time. And there are other reasons:

* Did you switch to Corel and you want to sell your old version of Adobe CS online? Nope.
* Want to install a new hard drive? Better call Adobe, Microsoft, and start praying.
* Want to play your music in your office and at home? Get Apple on the line.
* Tired of that song and and want to give it to your brother? Not going to happen.
* Did your dog eat your activation dongle? I'm sorry. I guess you didn't want to complete that project on time after all.

DRM is targeted squarely at paying customers, not pirates. It's all about control and putting the "L" in "license" and the "H" in "Hi, this is Adobe. Please bend over while we consider your application to use our software. We'll be with you in a minute."

@Nick1693:
aww, you made a grammar!

@Michael Belisle: FINALLY. Someone that GETS IT.

The biggest cause of software and music piracy, at least among everyone I've spoken to, is not so much that you're getting it for free. While that is a factor, the biggest reason they pirate is so that they don't have to deal with horrible DRM schemes that cripple the software that they legitimately bought. Therein lies the problem. There's something truly ridiculous about being able to snag a superior product from BitTorrent.

For a textbook example, consider the PC release of the extremely popular action-RPG, Mass Effect. The DRM on that game is probably the most incredibly awful, draconian mess I've ever seen. Electronic Arts, the folks who partially developed it, decided that they'd set up the SecuRom protection so that each individual copy of the game could only be installed THREE TIMES TOTAL. Uninstalling does NOT give you back an install. Once you've used all three installs, you're forced to plunk down ANOTHER fifty to sixty bucks for a new copy.

That is why piracy is so big. Sure, you'll always have folks wanting freebies. But DRM is the single biggest factor. It doesn't punish or restrict pirates. It only screws over legit users. Want to stop the problem? Stop using DRM, or at least stop using these ridiculous DRM schemes.

@twophrasebark: You're saying that someone who pays a high price for a piece of professional software ought to be put through this in order to get the software to work and there's something wrong with the customer who won't put up with disconnects and nonsense e-mail replies?

This is tantamount to buying a new car and being given keys that don't work then being patient for a few weeks until someone is willing to arrange for working keys to be given to you and blaming the customer for being impatient because we expect that there will be incompetence on the part of the seller.

This is pretty much an invitation to pirate the software IMO. Part of the reason to part with money is that you're guaranteed a working product with technical support. You've got a non-working product with no technical support, so why pay?

I'm not advocating piracy in general, just saying that this is the message that this standard of service puts out. If you build it (good customer service) they will come (and actually buy stuff).

You paid for it, you should have no problem with downloading a pirated version. That is what I do when I purchase games. They are almost always more convenient with their no-cd cracks.

@CaliforniaCajun: When I buy a lawn mower, I don't have to 'activate it'
If I paid for the software, and their shitty DRM keeps me from using it, I have no problem using a cracked copy.
You seem to think we should sit down and shut up, and be happy that we are all criminals to the software/music/movie industry.

Where is Peer Guardian for Vista?

I know quite a few people who have purchased legal copies of their OS that came with their computers and have installed a pirated version of an enterprise version so they don't have to deal with all the big brother crap from MS any time you change your hardware or have to reload.

A companies product it totally screwed when their legal paying customers are turning to pirated versions in order to get them to work properly.

Let me add...
Using pirated software = stealing. Yes, I agree.

Taking my money and providing software that doesn't work/works part of the time = ??? stealing, perhaps?

Chargeback and move on. Adobe evidently, sucks.

@doctor_cos: Of course it does but we have been so conditioned and many of our laws view the consumer as the lesser party in a dispute with a company. It is almost impossible for a consumer to take punitive action against a company. There is an entire industry to take punitive action against a consumer. Business interests have access to high volume legal mills dealing in going after consumers or using credit and collections to go after them. As in people who have been sent to collections or pursued by these high volume legal firms for financial amounts after a false accusation of shop lifting. Businesses also can pretty much as will slap something on your credit, valid or not. It is a time consuming uphill battle for the consumer to undo this even when the debt is invalid.

@twophrasebark:
You, obviously, are Job reincarnated.

1. Unable to buy locally.
2. Unable to be downloaded, then took a week to ship.
3. Product failed to install.
4. 1 business day response turned into 3, to just say "we can't help."
5. 90 minute hold time followed by a disconnect.

I think the OP was well within the limits of civility to be asked that someone call him.

To then get the same canned response back makes his choice of when to give up spot on.

He gave them their chance, they failed on multiple counts.

boo-yahhh
I love the photo:)

I love Adobe products, but the ordering process pretty much sucks. Especially if you're getting an education discount. It took over a week for someone to look at my educational ID to approve it. And the whole time my ID was publicly available online for the world to see. And then when they finally did process my order, it took over a week to ship. And before it even got to me, I got a notice saying that my personal information had been stolen from their site. Maybe they're talking about the ID that they left up on their site forever?

I've had issues myself. It makes me dream of how much better things were with Macromedia.

And to top it off, Adobe doesn't understand capitalized letters from lower case letters! Too many LeEt PRogRammErs?

On my Mac I formatted the file system as case sensitive (like a real *nix box) simply because that was what Ihave been using for ever (or so it seems). Actually bought CS3, tried to install it - ERROR - it won't even install on a case sensitive system. BLeaH. For that matter neither will many MS products - Hey programmers - letter case matters!

Sent the program back, installed GIMP - great program, little rough around the edges but hey it works!

As for twophrasebark: Boy corporations have you well trained don't they. I bet you like standing in lines and not getting your number ever called too!

"Ledgit" adobe products are FAR less useful than a cracked version of the same.

Sad but true, people with ledgit, paid-in-full-licenses, still use a crack to avoid just this situation. I'm one of them.

@timmus: I would really like to see Consumerist go back to its roots and try to rattle the cage of corporate offices regularly, rather than just being a conduit for front page news.

-I concur!

Unbelievable!

You'd think that after somebody plunks down several hundred dollars for a simple upgrade, they could've at least attempt to provide a courteous and timely service.

I used to think that piracy was reserved strictly to those who couldn't afford to pay the high (perhaps inflated) price of software, if not, the greedy guys. But the more I hear stories like these, it seems like the software publishers WANT even the paying customers to do so.

I can attest to adobe's horrible CSRs. Last week I bought a copy of Font Folio 11. Since the upgrade option I wanted wasn't available on the website, I had to call in the order. I placed my order and asked for the download option. The CSR said it would be emailed to me in an hour. 2 hours go by and no link comes.

I call back and talk to their call center in, what I'm guessing is india. After telling him my problem and asking for the download link, he puts me on hold for about 10 minutes. Comes back and tells me he can't do that because I asked for a CD. Long story short, after a lot of going back and forth, he says the only thing he can do is "wait for the cd to arrive, mail it back with a letter of destruction, and then he will send me the download link"

I about lost it there telling him that was the stupidest thing I ever heard. I felt a little bad about loosing it on the guy, but that really set me off. I ask for as supervisor, he puts me on hold for 10 more minutes, comes back and tells me the exact same thing! I ask for a supervisor again and he puts me on hold again. After a half an hour of waiting i get frustrated and just hang up.

No wonder everyone pirates their software...

@acasto: You are going to be filthy rich my friend, filthy.

I'm a full time designer who handles 1500+ accounts a year. Ever since we had to switch from Macromedia to Adobe when CS3 was released, we have had nothing but issues with authentication, things like Photoshop losing files in the Application Support folder (necessitating more installs/authentications), and so on.

To prevent any interruptions in our workflow, I have a cracked copy of CS3 on hand for the department at all times as a backup plan, to PREVENT the very same issues your reader has sent in, and after reading about the nightmares other users have gone through on this site. Just having one of our artists waiting around for 4 days to be able to use their software while Adobe's customer service gets their act together, would cause the loss of thousands of dollars in lost production time due to delays.

I'd much rather have to explain to the owners why I had to use cracked software to avert an emergency, rather than explain why presses are sitting empty for an afternoon.

In short, fuck Adobe...I can't wait til the open source community catches up, or until Apple gives them a rightful boot in the pants and ships their own pro graphics suite.

The trial version of photoshop elements 6 never works for me they always crash my mac for some reason

Yes, Adobe has their CSR all outsourced to India and most are not properly trained. It took me a month to receive an invoice for the product I purchased over the telephone order.

Adobe is very diligent on the piracy issue, their trial software even writes date on the boot sector of your computer to keep track of installations which no program should do. Since they make activations so hard for customers it does make it easier for you to just buy a copy then download a cracked version. Pretty silly if you think about it.