Quote Originally Posted by behzad View Post
I think the cloud business sucks. What other Magix programs use cloud? I think None, so it was all xara that came up with the idea.
There is nothing wrong with the Cloud as a concept. It is all down to how it is exploited.

Xara thought having content on-line was a good thing as it allowed new content to be uploaded quickly. Then another thought we can ensure downloads to the Design Gallery can therefore be automated. Everyone will like that. Until it goes wrong and your Cache disappears or Xara decides to "remove" a template (e.g., calendars) without notice or a widget (e.g., v12 Xara Slideshow Template). Then Xara realised, that through the Internet, we can jerk the chain and we have our Customers dangling. Finally, the great idea, let's put all the content behind a pay wall. Xara 365 and the Update Service was born. Xara Cloud is just another thought as to how to resell the same content to a template-driven web audience. The original idea was to make Xara Desktop application functionality device-agnostic. That may still happen but Software as a Service (SaaS) looks towards the bottom line and if web audiences are happy to fork out for professional templates then the designing parts will fade.

What has dragged us down it all these thoughts have consequences. The main one is what goes behind the pay wall. In the Xara Desktop applications, it is all (all?) the updates in the year vanish on re-install. Sure, if you are lucky, you can keep the updates and bug fixes, if you are computer-literate enough. I can, but my loss is I am a lousy graphics designer; most others can't as their bent is artistic not mechanistic. Doing this with the fear-inducing Magix marketing drive Customers to re-invest, possibly realising little tangible benefit other than "at least my website or design or PDF won't break as I can still edit those new-fangled gimmicks I thought were wonderful". Eye Candy and new Bugs start the cycle all over.

Acorn