No, all apps are available for purchase for a one time payment.

I don't care about video, so I'll be buying Pixelmator now, and maybe music stuff later, and Video part never.

So it works like before, if you want.

Pixelmator is great and integrates well with Apple's tooling for batch processing.

For video, the free version of DavinciResolve goes a very long way, and their Studio is a single-payment-life-time license.

DaVinci Resolve also runs on Linux, so you won't be locked to staying on MacOS if you want to switch OSes but maintain your skillset.

The only "...for now" event I have seen in last 20 years of Apple software is iWorks and Mac OS X become free.

...and they integrated some of the Aperture to new Photos app, which is again was a transition to free.

Name me something a product, not a service which you can only subscribe in Apple's ecosystem.

Logic Pro in iPad is subscription only.

They didn’t take away a one-time purchase option for it though. It just never existed to begin with so the op’s point remains.

> Name me something a product, not a service which you can only subscribe in Apple's ecosystem.

The shows on Apple TV are only available via a subscription; there's no way to have a perpetual purchase (at least as far as that a la carte style of purchase is perpetual).

They specifically said “not a service” and you brought up a service.

I would argue a season or episode of television is a product, and Apple TV gates them behind a subscription.

I used to buy the season passes so I could return to shows later; that's not an option for ATV stuff.

Well really they are copying the original Microsofts suite packaging which everyone has copied over the years! But yes specific they are trying to take market share on Adobe.

Its actually like taking on MS and Adobe together... but they aren't really taking on MS office.

How so? Apple's subscription cancellation is one click away, and you don't get overcharged when canceling.

Subscription model so it’s adobes model. But you can buy “one time”. Though they have a tendency to just end product support (aperture software was canceled leaving a lot of bad taste for photographers that used it)

Wonder what Adobe thinks of this. Their support for Mac was pretty important in getting OS X off the ground, now they’re competing with a unified stack.

When I was a Mac user I remember buying Logic express 9 (I still have the disk). The price is a good deal, but you really are all in forever..

Depends on if you are stuck with the subscription for life, or if there's actually a reasonable way to unsubscribe.

You're never free to unsubscribe because you become accustomed to the tools, and use the file formats, etc. (That's why I don't do subscription, ever.)

FTA: “Alternatively, users can also choose to purchase the Mac versions of Final Cut Pro, Pixelmator Pro, Logic Pro, Motion, Compressor, and MainStage individually as a one-time purchase on the Mac App Store.”

Yeah but this is $129/yr, that's significantly cheaper

It’s cheap enough it’s not enough to fund development of Final Cut but also not enough money to bother spending time on it. Find it odd personally, just offering them free to keep hardware makes more sense than trying to push a tiny subscription revenue number.

> It’s cheap enough it’s not enough to fund development of Final Cut but also not enough money to bother spending time on it. Find it odd personally, just offering them free to keep hardware makes more sense than trying to push a tiny subscription revenue number.

Apple doesn't work that way.

Unlike almost all other tech companies that are organized by divisions, Apple uses a functional organizational structure.

So all of the software teams are under one head of software; there's no senior vp of the Final Cut division, for example.

For accounting purposes, all software is lumped together.

Apple made $391 billion in revenue last fiscal year; when you're making that kind of money, you can afford to do things for reasons other than the amount of money you could make.

Whatever revenue Final Cut generates isn't required to fund the Final Cut team.

> you can afford to do things for reasons other than the amount of money you could make.

This is what I'm saying and why I don't see the point in charging at all for these apps. The existence of the subscription price tag on them is evidence against what you're claiming.

> The existence of the subscription price tag on them is evidence against what you're claiming.

I disagree. Apple doesn’t need the money, but they also know consumers don’t value free apps the same way they do for pay apps.

It also plays into people’s desire for something better than what everyone has. Everyone gets Numbers, Pages and Keynote for free, but if you subscribe, you get bonus content and features.

So while Apple doesn’t need this to be a blockbuster product, they’re not going to leave money on the table either.

$129/year is surely better than $300 once, 15 years ago. Though I'm guessing not offering it for free is to keep it distinct from iMovie and to maintain some semblance of "Pro"-ness (which I'm gathering is up for debate either way.. the last time I did any actual video editing it was on Final Cut Pro 5 so I'm out of the loop)

It's the problem that the whole industry is facing - the current generation of hardware is sufficient that hardware refreshes will continue to decline, and companies that want to keep milking us for money regularly need to find a new way to do it.

> the current generation of hardware is sufficient that hardware refreshes will continue to decline

If anything, Apple is refreshing their hardware much faster now compared to the Intel days. There's literally a new MacBook Pro and MacBook Air every year. And of course there are 3-4 new iPhones every year.

By declining hardware refreshes, I meant on the consumer side, not the producer side.

Sufficient for whom? At my job they’re still refreshing workstations regularly. They buy and churn hardware on a regular basis.

Not quite “buying on release week” basis but some % of employees always getting new hardware at max specs in the design org

Makes even engineering jealous sometimes

I hate subscriptions as much as the next person but how would you pay for continued development of software? Do you say a person can continue to run version X forever but if they want a new version they pay for it?

> Do you say a person can continue to run version X forever but if they want a new version they pay for it?

I'm not particularly interested in sustaining the financial growth of software companies. I did that for years and I'm done.

But, what you suggest is literally what the software industry did for decades before subscriptions became the norm.

One might argue it offers significantly less value too.

Adobe invented subscription bundles? In that sense did the Creative Cloud copy iCloud?

When there are no more new buyers to sell devices, or new versions of existing software packages, the only way to keep the curve growing for shareholders and MBAs is to sell subscriptions.

It is also the only way to convince developers to pay for software.

Having a part hosted on some server is so much better than whatever anti-piracy schemes one can think of, and provides the continuous growth curve for printing money.

Thus subscriptions aren't going away in the modern software world.