I have been using various versions of Photoshop and other products in Adobe’s Creative Suite, beginning with the original CS and the last version of CS6. As you probably know, Adobe recently moved to a subscription model and called it the Creative Cloud (CC). Individual products in the CC are suffixed with CC to identify them with the creative cloud, or what I called in an earlier post Captive Consumer. In this post I am affixing another meaning to CC: Creative Censor.
Photoshop Un-help
You see, I am a curious sort. I want to learn new things even though I am an old dog. One idea that intrigued me recently was to add a conditional branch to Photoshop actions I develop for various purposes. A little search lead me to several posts on private blogs and one on Adobe Help site. Its title “Photoshop Help / Adding conditional actions | CC, CS6” was exactly what I was looking for (see screen capture on the left). I carefully read the instructions but I could not find the “Insert Conditional” option in the actions menu. Please pay attention to the versions of Photoshop it applies under the heading “Applies To” on the top left. It clearly lists Photoshop CS6 and Photoshop CC, the old and the new versions.
Puzzled by the missing option on my menu, I did what the page suggested at the bottom: Discuss This Page. I logged in as a registered Adobe user and wrote a comment which said something like:
“I am using Photoshop 13.0.1 and cannot locate the Insert Conditional menu item. Could you please tell me how to proceed.” Strange as it may sound, I am paraphrasing myself since my question is no longer there. But wait, there’s more …
I kept searching and reading, and asking questions on other forums where someone replied by saying “You have a perpectual license version of photoshop cs6 13.01. The conditional actions were added to the suscription version of photoshop cs6 13.1 (creative cloud)” [sic] Essentially, Adobe was referring to the new product as Photoshop CS6 and Photoshop CC where the CS6 also referred to the older version, thus creating unnecessary confusion.
So, I went back to the Adobe Help page again and added to my previous comment by saying something like (paraphrasing again) “I since have learned that Photoshop CS6 does not really mean Photoshop CS6 but only Photoshop CS6. Is there a VP of confusion at Adobe? Why are you using the confusing reference to Photoshop CS6 to mean the old and the new versions.” Oh, the mighty moderators did not like my sarcasm and deleted the comment altogether. Later I went back and saw the missing comment (or did not see it) and wrote another comment “Why bother to discuss this page since you delete the comments and questions you do not like. Shame“, or something like that. And I meant that, Shame! Yes, it is their forum, yes, they control the content, but by inviting to “Discuss This Page” they are making an offer and I am accepting it. And, with clean language I am expressing how confusing that page is, where it is supposed to help the users. What is wrong with these companies? The bigger they become the more draconian they are. If you want registered visitors to discuss your content you need to be grown up enough to accept negative comments along with the positive you seem to be expecting.
I repeat my admonition to Adobe, shame on you to censor user comment which you openly invited. And accept the fact that using Photoshop CS6 to refer to two different products is clearly confusing.
But again, maybe that is the purpose!