back to article Adobe, 'hyper personalisation' and your privacy

Business success today is about "data required to understand each person's context in every moment", with the intelligence to take the right action, said Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen in the opening keynote of the company's EMEA Summit in London. "People are buying experiences, not products." Adobe Project Felix, a 3D design …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Just a short simple question

    Is every Sillycon Valley executive obsessed with being a data-perv, is that all there is now? Sociopathic Slurp on every street corner, that's where we're heading? You Data Nazis, fuck your twisted vision of the future!

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "People are buying experiences, not products"

    Bullshit.

    That's why, by the way, I still didn't upgrade Lightroom. Because I just need a product to edit photos, not a "cloud experience", sorry.

    And not having a CEO pay, I buy petrol where it does cost less - "brand loyalty" is only for fools.

    But I understand some people have a lot of bovine shit to sell.

    1. AMBxx Silver badge

      Re: "People are buying experiences, not products"

      Sadly, I upgraded Photoshop Elements. Now wtf are my layers? Dumbed down so much I might as well use MS Photos to edit my pictures.

      1. Korev Silver badge

        Re: "People are buying experiences, not products"

        I'm hearing very good things about the Serif products. When they have good cataloguing features then I'll probably wave goodbye to Adobe

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          "I'm hearing very good things about the Serif products"

          Some smaller companies are trying still to sell "products" instead of "experience", but larger one are making a heavy of "influenncers" to driver people to their "experiences" - you'll see very little coverage of competing products.

          Tom Hogarty (Senior Director of Product Management at Adobe), is known to invest heavily in PR and in recruiting influencers to driver Adobe adoption, just look at what he says in his LinkedIn profile.

          It could be hard for smaller companies to get enough coverage and customers. DxO, for example, went into receivership recently.

        2. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: "People are buying experiences, not products"

          "I'm hearing very good things about the Serif products. When they have good cataloguing features then I'll probably wave goodbye to Adobe"

          I was thinking about moving from the likes of Paint.net and GIMP to PS. But saw the year on year costs and said "fuck that". I do it part time and there is no way on this planet I would pay that. I know loads of people that are still using the last proper PS, also refusing to buy into this subscription model....and these are people that USED to buy PS every few years.

          The Affinity stuff is looking like a perfect fit for me.

        3. detritus

          Re: "People are buying experiences, not products"

          I've been using Illy and PS for over 20 years now, and loathe Adobe and its lock in Cloud scam more than ever - so, whilst i'm currently completely locked into Adobe to ensure compatability with files I receive from clients (literally the only reason I finally 'upgraded' from my bought CS4 disc to the ball-twisting irritation that is CC) I buy every Serif product, Just Because. I've barely even used them... .

          Adobe needs competition; They need to be forced to open out their file; formats or at least have a significant challenger to compete with something existing and open (EPS or SVG, anyone?).

          I'm not hopeful. It'll be years before their current position can be in any way threatened. A shame for me - I used to be a total Adobe fan boy, now their money-wringing business model just turns my stomach.

        4. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: "People are buying experiences, not products"

          Just this. It's marketroids who think selling products is beneath them; "experiences" sounds so much more prestigious (or something).

          Yeah but without the personal jet and the complimentary Macbook, I'm not buying.

          And the marketeer will have a bad hour-long "cellar experience" in my Asian mansion.

    2. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

      Re: "People are buying experiences, not products"

      Just this. It's marketroids who think selling products is beneath them; "experiences" sounds so much more prestigious (or something).

      Customers, OTOH, just want products which are fit for purpose. If they get an experience it's likely to be the bad one of discovering the product wasn't fit for purpose.

    3. K

      Re: "People are buying experiences, not products"

      I hate articles like this, I also hate companies who sell experience (if I wanted this, I'd see a hooker).

      But if you demotionalise it, you are buying an experience, even if your budget conscientious. For example, if you shop at Aldi, but start finding it crowded or constantly taking too long to get through checkout, you'll start to shop elsewhere.

      On the topic of CxO's, often they are the biggest penny pinchers of them all!. A couple of years ago I worked with the CTO of one of the UK's biggest FTSE companies, he drove a 10 year old Skoda Octavia, which he then part exchanged for a.... second hand Kia Sportage!

      1. AMBxx Silver badge
        Joke

        demotionalise

        WTF does demotionalise mean? You sell experiences don't you?

        1. K

          Re: demotionalise

          baaaa dum tshhh!

          What I meant was, forget the fact this article is basically calling you a statistic, and marketing droids are trying too milk you for more cash. But if you have a shit experience, you will shop elsewhere.

    4. bombastic bob Silver badge
      Facepalm

      Re: "People are buying experiences, not products"

      This 'experience' thing reminds me of a light bulb joke:

      Q: How many people from Silly Valley does it take to change a light bulb:

      A: Three. 1 to change the bulb, and 2 to "share in the experience".

      Yeah, it's how these idiots think. Why are we (collectively) ALLOWING them to "define the future" FOR us?

      icon, because, facepalm

      1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
        Pint

        Re: "People are buying experiences, not products"

        Yeah, it's how these idiots think. Why are we (collectively) ALLOWING them to "define the future" FOR us?

        Max Zorin had a chance, but that eejit from the UK foiled his ingenious plan. "Responsibility to Protect", go figure.

        No Union Jack icon, WTF is with this webzine?

        1. Fungus Bob
          Coat

          Re: "People are buying experiences, not products"

          Union Jack is sexist without a corresponding Union Jill...

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Why do they all have such lame examples of personalisation

    Is it because, in reality, this data whoring is not for the benefit of the target?

    Personally, when I'm pressed for time and need fuel, any forecourt I'm passing is perfectly acceptable, I don't need the supplier of some of the most insecure shitware out there to be monetising the safeguarding of my personal data.

    Looking forward to some fun with registered letters to these pimps, it's certainly going to cost them more that it will me. £1.68 to send, I wonder how much it will cost them to reply? Anybody up for a crowd funder to send a few thousand?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Go

      Re: Why do they all have such lame examples of personalisation

      How about just gathering all their details into one giant database and mass mailing them from someone like mailchimp.

      Oh the irony would be so sweet.

      Edit. Use CC feild, not BCC, just to enjoy it even more.

    2. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

      Re: Why do they all have such lame examples of personalisation

      "Personally, when I'm pressed for time and need fuel, any forecourt I'm passing is perfectly acceptable"

      And you certainly don't want to waste time getting your car washed. The fact that they thought their scenario meaningful tells us a good deal about their thought processes.

      1. Warm Braw

        Re: Why do they all have such lame examples of personalisation

        their thought processes

        I'm pretty sure that the people at Shell know full well that fundamentally nobody really cares what brand of fuel goes in their car just as fundamentally nobody really cares what brand of washing powder they use.

        The whole [vacuous] point of marketing is to take essentially fungible products and pretend they have some essential distinction and the reason so much money is spent on doing so is that it's actually quite hard, but the rewards are huge if you get it right.

        I'm sure major brands are very keen to meet "Tom" - a loyal customer with a connected care [sic] and a smart home is the very definition of an idiot who will buy anything. "Personalisation" in this context is simply a euphemism for identifying easy marks - it's really just victim targetting.

        1. GrapeBunch

          Re: Why do they all have such lame examples of personalisation

          In Canada, we're all easy marks. For example, in British Columbia, if you refuse to have a smart home (i.e., refuse a so-called smart meter), you have to pay $32.50 extra per month to the electric company for that privilege.

          Stupid 'Я` us.

      2. Korev Silver badge

        Re: Why do they all have such lame examples of personalisation

        >When he gets [to the garage], the personalisation system has good news, the car wash will be free as a loyalty reward.

        Wouldn't it have a bigger effect if he was told beforehand that the car wash was free?

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Why do they all have such lame examples of personalisation

      Just had a good read at GPDR + training.

      No way they are going to comply.. as they cannot require you to give them data that is not needed for them to provide the service.. if it is required because they DEMAND it, then no consent.

      I dont expect them to be fined whatsoever. I expect them to have an unbrella corporation to deal with data subjects, I mean, customers, and other companies fromthe group to demand this info to the company dealing with the customers, passing the GPDR in appearance.

      Sad that we can predict what will likely happen. I hope to be wrong.

      1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

        Re: Why do they all have such lame examples of personalisation

        "passing the GPDR in appearance."

        I don't see how doing what you say gives the appearance of passing GDPR, nor do I see a sham front end doing anything other than attract bigger fines.

  4. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

    I can't help thinking that when we're able to push back* in a meaningful way it may well be that businesses start asking serious questions about what their marketing departments have really been doing for them all these years. If we can actually make them question the value of that it may be a more effective way of dealing with the data-slurping industry than more direct action.

    * a typo almost made that into "punch back" which might even fit better.

  5. Zippy's Sausage Factory
    Devil

    "Adobe: Cambridge Analytica as a Service"

    There. I think I found their new marketing slogan.

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Adobe. A word to make you shudder.

    You just know whatever it is it'll cost a lot and be filled with the weirdest of bugs ass associated with teh functions you specifically bought the carp to do.

    Also it'll have some inappropriate and onerous authentication mechanism that will make life a misery

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      > Adobe. A word to make you shudder.

      I thought adobe was a mixture of shit and mud?

      Well named then.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      You forgot to say that it'll have a UI that conforms not to the conventions of the platform you're using but something hypothetical that Adobe, in its wisdom, knows is Better. And it won't use the platform's own APIs, it'll use a shitload of Adobe's homebrew stuff, which is, of course, Better.

  7. James O'Shea

    Interesting

    I currently have Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 on many systems around here. CS 5.5 is no longer supported. CS 5.5 increasingly has... problems. CS 5.5 depends on Java 6, which has different... problems. Java 6 gets deleted with every new upgrade of macOS, and has to be reinstalled. Both CS 5.5 and Java 6 depend on 32-bit binaries, which will soon no longer be supported on both macOS and Windows. (Apple has started to issue 'warnings' about 32-bit binaries...)

    I am replacing CS 5.5 on most machines. The replacements are not from Adobe. I had no intention of becoming a rentboy for Creative Cloud in the first place; thank you, Adobe, for adding additional reasons why CC will never, ever, touch any system I control.

    When I get into the office today I shall be deleting all things Adobe, down to and including Adobe Reader, except on those machines which cannot connect to the Internet. I expect that this will vastly improve the 'user experience'.

    1. Tabor

      Re: Interesting

      This caught my eye : “I am replacing CS 5.5 on most machines. The replacements are not from Adobe.”

      Could you elaborate on that ? Since they started forcing subscriptions I have been looking for good alternatives, mainly for Photoshop, Illustrator and Indesign. Decent file compatibility is a must, and I need both mac and windows clients to run it. Sadly I have not found what I’m looking for. Gimp is not the answer, and Corel... well, the less said about them the better.

      I’ve got about 70-ish CC users (only 15 of which use more than PS/AI/Acrobat), so it’s not that there is no budget for this. I fear that there’s just no competition for our use case. So, if you’re replacing CS 5.5 : please share !

      1. James O'Shea

        Re: Interesting

        Have a look at the Affinity products at https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/. Affinity Photo does most of what Photoshop does, and is cheaper than one month's rent of CC. Affinity Designer does pretty much all of what Illustrator does, for less than another month's rent. Allegedly they're working on replacements for inDesign and Dreamweaver. iStudioPublisher http://www.istudiopublisher.com might also be something you want to look at.

        Acrobat, unfortunately, is a lot harder to replace fully than I'd thought. PDF Expert and other apps of that type replace some features, but right now only Acrobat Pro does everything. It's very annoying. Acrobat Pro may well be the only Adobe application on my systems going forwards. It appears to be 32-bit, so it will have to be replaced when Apple and Microsoft take 32-bitness behind the barn, but at least it doesn't depend on Java 6.

        1. Tabor

          Re: Interesting

          A bit late in the thread, but thanks for sharing. I will definitely look into those.

  8. alain williams Silver badge

    Hashing does not stop something identifying someone

    "Device Co-op is not on personal identifiers. It is hashed," she said.

    If you take a hash of a personal identifier that yields a unique hash, then it is a personal identifier. Just because you cannot (easily) reverse it to get the PI does not mean that it is not a PI. If push came to shove just look through the entire database hashing each ID.

    Adobe is squirming, trying to evade the law; but they will still be breaking it.

    1. Herring`

      Re: Hashing does not stop something identifying someone

      True. And I don't think they're the only company who are trying to pretend that pseudonymisation will get them out of the crap.

      Even Amber Rudd could explain that to them.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Choices

    At least you can opt of of creepy data hoarding by Shell, and still be able to buy petrol.

    But with online services, it's a question of "here's our privacy policy: take it or leave it". I'm not sure the GDPR is going to help here. You'll be left with a stark choice: agree to their use of your data, or don't use the service.

    The GDPR forces them to be more explicit, and not bury the usage in the small print, but I doubt many online services will give you fine-grained opt-in/opt-out for individual ways that they use your data.

    Ultimately that's because if the service is "free", then the price is your data.

    1. Adelio

      Re: Choices

      As far as i remeber under GDPR a company cannot say "like it or lump it"

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Choices

        > As far as i remeber under GDPR a company cannot say "like it or lump it"

        Well, that's exactly what they are doing.

        Here, for example, is a mail I just got from the government's DART crossing site (where you register for discounted rate charges for the Dartford crossing tunnel/bridge)

        Dear Customer

        One of the biggest changes to UK data privacy law comes into effect on 25th May.

        The General Data Protection Regulation, known as GDPR, is a really positive step towards you having more control over how your data is used and how you're contacted. The changes will also help to better protect your personal data. We have updated our privacy notice to reflect these changes, which you can find at www.dartford-crossing-charge.service.gov.uk/Static/PrivacyPolicy

        What do I have to do?

        You don't need to do anything as these changes will automatically apply to you. If you don't want to accept the changes you can close your account or your service by contacting us at the following CustomerService@dartford-crossing-charge.service.gov.uk .

        Without an account or service, you will have to pay for any crossings at the standard rate for your vehicle. If payment is not made, then you may receive Penalty Charge Notices (PCNs).

        In short: if you want to pay the reduced crossing charge, you have to accept the privacy policy in whole, like it or lump it. If you don't like it, go away.

    2. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

      Re: Choices

      "You'll be left with a stark choice: agree to their use of your data, or don't use the service."

      Only if they withdraw from the market altogether because what you outline is what incurs the big fines.

      1. bombastic bob Silver badge
        Meh

        Re: Choices

        "what you outline is what incurs the big fines."

        EU will NOW test this concept. If it works, I think the USA will demand it too. I fear that a workaround is 'ready to go' such that the big players continue to get away with it, while the smaller ones get the fines.

        Good luck with GDPR. I want to see it actually succeed. I think it won't, though.

        /me imagines the 'forget' list for search engines being SO large that it renders them pretty unusable...

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Choices

        But sovereignty's going to get in the way of enforcing these fines, won't it? How will the EU get their pound of flesh if America won't cooperate and Adobe sits on its virtual market lock-in to wait for people to come crawling back knowing there's no real drop-in replacement for its products that can maintain compatibility? Since they run on a subscription model these days, there's no long-term money at stake, and the nuclear option (embargoes and cut-offs) can spawn complaints of people not being able to bloody do their job.

        1. bombastic bob Silver badge
          Devil

          Re: Choices

          "no real drop-in replacement for its products that can maintain compatibility"

          I've been using Atril to view PDFs for a long time. haven't had any trouble indicating any incompatibility. I used Evince before that, except that they "went .Not" so I'll *NEVAR* install it *AGAIN*. Morons.

          I also NEVER use flash, not for many years.

          So what else does Adobe provide [with no reasonable open source equivalent] that I might actually need? I suspect that if I can't do it with Libre Office already, or perhaps mash together with gimp, I probably won't think of it [or will write my own application to do it with imagemagick and/or shell/Perl/Python/C]

          Maybe you can list a few things I don't know about, just for grins. I'm actually curious.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            "Maybe you can list a few things I don't know about"

            Adobe is something more than Flash/Acrobat/Photoshop.

            Take for example Lightroom. It's a non-destructive editor, which means edits are simply recorded as parameters in a separate location (database or sidecar file [1]), and changes are applied to the image in memory when displayed. The original image (usually a RAW or DNG file, but it could a TIFF or JPEG as well) is never modified. You can read the parameters (they are stored in XML documents), but you may not know what the algorithms exactly do when fed those parameters. Cropping or white balance may be straightforward, but sharpening or noise reduction may not.

            Switching to another tool mean:

            1) Export the image with the changes applied, i.e. to TIFF. You lose the capability to edit the changes if needed.

            2) Start from scratch with the new tool trying to achieve the same result you got in Lightroom - with thousands of tens of thousands of images, it's a quite daunting task, more even so in the beginning when you're not still proficient with the new tool.

            Sure, you can use a combination of both as long as your version work on your OS, but it's still a compromise which forces you to juggle among different tools.

            Some tools try to import LR edits, but being different, they may not import everything, and you don't have any warranty images will look the same.

            Something alike may happen with Photoshop adjustment layers - which GIMP doesn't support yet, AFAIK. You may also need a tool that supports your Photoshop plug-ins, many Windows/Apple one does, under Linux is more difficult.

            Premier is a non-linear editor as well, so it could have the same issues, but I never used it.

            I don't know how much "portable" Illustrator and InDesign documents are.

            IMHO Adobe does rely on this kind of "lock-in" - that's why its subscription model worked.

            [1] DNG allow edits to be stored inside the DNG file, but that means the whole file will need to be backed up again for any change, even a very small one.

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: "Maybe you can list a few things I don't know about"

              Adobe is something more than Flash/Acrobat/Photoshop.

              Take for example Lightroom. It's a non-destructive editor...

              Switching to another tool mean:

              1) Export the image with the changes applied, i.e. to TIFF. You lose the capability to edit the changes if needed.

              2) Start from scratch with the new tool trying to achieve the same result you got in Lightroom

              If those users are that attached to the proprietary software, then they really deserved to be stuck with those proprietary software.

              Coming from someone who uses more than adobe suite including a range of proprietary, free and open-source software for specific nice to have features, Lightroom non-destructive editor feature is also just a feature nice to have but not required.

              I have seen other image, video, audio, none MS made word document, and a loaded more software that do that. And when times come I need a feature from here and there, it is obvious I would "lose the capability to edit the changes" after mix match that much. That's why non-destructive editing at one point becomes not a required feature. Universal file format import/ export on the other hand becomes more important as it enables you to use the right tool for the right tool anytime you need to.

              Not to mention, software is a tool. A fairly good user should know how to get similar results without always relying on sole one specific tool. Taking from example, creating a custom macro with any image alteration software will likely be able to do what most people use lightroom for.

              -Went to a friend place and got only photoshop? Create your own macro, bam lightroom results.

              -Started your first day but they gave you got zero software for the job? Download a few free tools, click click you get lightroom results.

              -Borrowed your friend's pc but it came with ubuntu? Don't matter, open gimp start the macro, lightroom work done.

              Sure there 'are' tools far more difficult to have the perfect alternative, and you just got to do what you got to do. But you shouldn't get yourself stuck to it when you do not needed to.

              1. Charles 9

                Re: "Maybe you can list a few things I don't know about"

                But sometimes, you don't have much choice in the setup of tools available or usable in a given situation. For example, there's practically no substitute for a Torx-head screwdriver when you want to manipulate a Torx-head screw non-destructively.

                Similarly, if your contracted editor demands you use Word (for the annotation) or else, it's pretty much a case of "He's the Boss."

              2. Anonymous Coward
                Anonymous Coward

                "open gimp start the macro, lightroom work done."

                You are obviously blinded by your hate of "proprietary software" and it looks never used Lightroom or similar software. Also, your expectations looks very low.

                Non-destructive editing is a required feature, not a nice to have. Why don't take advantage of more powerful and sophisticated processing features which means better result, less time used, and thereby more profits?

                It's the full difference between working with punched cards and an interactive text editor to write software.

                That's why Lightroom - and other non-destructive editors - became the main tool of many photographers (and filmmakers too with their non-linear editors which allows them to make changes quickly).

                No macro in GIMP will make it a useful non-destructive editor. The closest software in Linux is Darktable, not GIMP.

                No "universal file format" will help you too - a lot of the value is in the algorithms that processes the image too, not only in the image itself. Critical operations like sharpening or noise reduction rely heavily on the quality and power of the algorithms, and different ones may deliver different result. You have to know how to get the desired result - and it's not tool-independent.

                You may be dependent on Lighroom, Darktable or Affinity Photo, or whatever you used.

                You will still export files in a common format to deliver them, but you still want to be able to edit them differently whenever you need to, without starting from scratch. You editor ask changes to a group of photos? It's far easier with non destructive tools than having to reprocess from scratch, even if you have saved macros.

                That's very different from a word processor or a spreadsheet document - where anyway losing formatting of a complex document, or having non-working formulas in large spreadsheet can still be huge issue.

                PS: when editing images professionally, you don't borrow someone else's PC, especially if it's not correctly profiled.

                PPS: whatever company doesn't give you the tools you need to perform your job, it's not a company to work for...

  10. Korev Silver badge

    True personalisation

    For true personalisation you could go to one of the many handwashes dotted around the UK these days. The guys* there will get to know you over time if you're a repeat customer. If they know you then you might even get free stuff over time or even know things like where your cars gets the most mucky.

    *I've never seen a female working at one

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Adobe

    Twenty years ago I used to have to install Acrobat Reader in order to read the manual that came with my motherboard. I no longer have to do that.

    1. Korev Silver badge
      Joke

      Re: Adobe

      It was two decades ago and you're still AC; I never realised that Adobe product were so embrassing...

  12. Shadow Systems

    Adobe in control of privacy?

    That's like hiring the fox to guard the henhouse.

    Hey Adobe! You know what kind of "experience" I want? I want the experience of orgasmic joy I'd feel over your entire corporation being sent away on the B Ark! Now THAT'S an experience I'd enjoy...

    You. fekkin. bungmonkies...

  13. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Adobe "experience"

    Like when you get the Flash Player update with the pre-ticked "install crapware" "option" box that mysteriously takes a couple of seconds to appear after the rest of the page loaded?

    Adobe: fuck off

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