[donmcronald]

It’s free for now. The log in and activation means they can change that any time. I’d rather pay for v3, v4, etc. than being held hostage with a login requirement.

If it’s going to be free for everyone forever, why can’t they give us a truly free binary that will work locally forever? That would give people peace of mind they can always access their data locally, the revenue doesn’t change, and the AI subscription features can still be locked behind a login.

The login and activation is a clawback option.

[gazook89]

My understanding is that you need an account and Internet for the download and license activation, but then works offline (they specifically say “for extended periods”) in the FAQ. That is pretty much the same as v2 right?

[chii]

They ought to follow the intellij/jetbrain model, where you pay for the subscription to access the latest version, but when you stop paying, you can keep using the last version you've paid a subscription for.

But of course, this does not hold your data hostage, and thus less "profitable" in the long run.

[dtagames]

Since Affinity saves your files to local disk, no one can hold them "hostage." And it reads and writes standard filetypes, including PSD (Photoshop).