Adobe:"NO COMPLAINTS PLEASE" Open Letter

Question

Dear Adobe,
Like SO VERY MANY other people, I'm frustrated and angry with you. You make some of the best software, which is why we all tolerate your bad behaviour.
Your reluctance to improve only ADDS to our frustration: I've spent the last hour trying to make my voice heard. Unlike Apple and others, feedback is not invited, there is no place for complaints (other than the forums, where we just talk to each other), there's never a 'customer satisfaction survey' after any of the horrible interactions with you,  and it seems you just don't care that your over-complex, ridiculous, horrifically designed installation and app-opening/management processes are wasting the time of millions of PAYING CUSTOMERS.
Two nights ago I spent OVER TWO HOURS trying to get through to your 'Chat support' because one of your products I'm forced to subscribe to told me I had exceeded my activations on the max 2 computers (remarkable as I only have 2 computers). When I eventually got through, the girl at the other end actually said "have you logged in with your username and password?" Really Adobe? Do you have any concept of just HOW bad you are?
Like others, I work from customer premises on my laptop and can't always be ONLINE all of the time. Every other app I've ever paid for allows me to work wherever I like. But not you; you force me to go through online authentication every 12 hours. Really Adobe? I'm PAYING YOU EVERY MONTH AND YOU WON'T ALLOW ME TO USE THE PRODUCT I'M PAYING FOR WHEVER I LIKE? Seriously?
Updating any app I own takes a tiny amount of time, beyond the basic download. It's a background process. But we have to take a lunch break if we should be unlucky enough to trigger an update to an Adobe product; even the smallest downloads take forever to complete and take over our entire machine!
In this world of clean, simple computing, you seem like an ancient dinosaur. For example, just now I updated my flash because a popup appeared on my screen. By the end I'd actually had to experience 5 separate window interuptions to my work...FOR A SIMPLE UPDATE!  Honestly? Then, when it eventually finished, yet another window popped up telling me it had finished and that I might be interested in another Adobe product, which failed to appear.
How can you justify 5 separate windows for one simple app update? IT'S A MESS. And how about a bit of design continuity here!  I could go on and on and on.
It's obvious to us all that the people who design your amazing products, like Photoshop and Lightroom, can't possibly have even a passing association with the people who put together your horrorific, amateurish, nightmarish installation and app-management processes.
The fact that I have to post this here tells me your ears are CLOSED and your head is buried. But please, I beg you, let's stop this silliness now. Clean up your disastrous installation and app management nightmares. And don't tell your loyal paying customers where they can and can't work. We appreciate you want to limit pirated apps, but don't do it at the considerable cost of upsetting your paying customers.
We love you, but we won't much longer if you keep abusing us.
Big sloppy kiss,
Jonnny Doe

Answer 1

I think what they meant was in 18 months other companies will have options and present viable alternatives to adobe.
Corel actually makes it very easy to complain and contact customer service or a sales representative. Maybe their site and products work so well they get few complaints... For me their site is very good about giving information about products and other sites are good also. Adobe is really bad about giving you info about their products as though they belive they need no introduction...They seem very interested in customer service and listening to them. They make it very easy to get in touch with them for different things. I have not called them yet but have not needed to. I have called other companies befor and had to wait over an hour on hold. Corel has an answer to that. You can besides calling for free pay and your call will be put at the top of the list and says you will be guaranteed to be called back with in 2 hours. But if its anything like my online char im sure you wont have to wait long as mine were less than 2 minutes of wait time. The 2 times ive done live text chats they responded very quickly. The first time I think I waited 1 minute before a rep replied. The 2nd time I think it we less than 30 seconds. So fast I had actually gotten up to grab something while I waited and heard the beep of the response. Also corel has at least 2 times asked me to give them feed back for using their site and adobe only 1 time. Also their forums are actively monitored and contributed by their employees. I posted a question about if a product would do what I needed in a forum and an employee actually responded. I have seen this person actively in the forums. They gave me a very impartial answer saying its good for x and not as good at x and told me I could try the trial and find out for myself. Very none pushy. The other time was from the adobe forum I commented about a corel product and the person in the forum was a corel employee trying to provide factual information. I looked him up later and found he is active of corels blogs and this Sr. Director of Product Management, Graphics, responsible for CorelDRAW,http://www.corel.com/painter Corel DESIGNER, CorelCAD and the CorelDRAW Graphics Engine SDK as well as a few other products. It was amazing and a great honor to get contacted by email by a top employee from corel asking my to take a servey about corel because I sounded like I knew a fair amount about corel. He responded and was amazed that at the time I didnt own any corel software but knew so much about them. Its amazing how active and accesable corels employees are and even their manages.
I agree if you have cs6 you are good for at least the next 18 months or longer if you choose. For me I own no adobe products as a student. Im a blank slate. Im still not 100% decided on an alternate company or cs6. I for sure will NEVER use CC (crazy cloud). They just had a class action lawsuite opened against them about the security breach and lack of security and false advertising of market leading security. There is no way in the world I will give adobe my credit/debit card information. I think if I do buy CS 6 standard collection I will get a 1 time reloadable card say from Walmart but just enough on it to get the purchase. Get my purchase and drain all money from it and cancel the card and make sure adobe has none of my personal information. Or I may buy it in cash or charge it to my student account at the student store.
Since May or since the first release of CC 1 year ago many of adobes competitors have reacted. Most have at times offered sales to entice adobe users in by giving them the upgrade price. Many are running sales. They dont seem to have jumped the gun too much by releasing products immediately in reaction to cc. Many have released new editions for 1/4-1/2 of their products since may though. Serif has 5 main products and have released 2 new editions since may. Xara has 3 main products and has released 1.5 new editions since may. Corel has more products than I can count on 2 hands and has released several new editions of several of their main products since may, I think 3. Companies are reacting to the smell of blood in the water and the sharks and vultures have started to circle adobe looking for an opportunity. Most likely all of adobes competitors will continue to see spikes in their new membership and all will grow. My bet though is on corel. They seem the next best to adobe in multiple aspects.
The more I learn of adobes business practices the more disgusted I become.