[leftalive]

There was no version of this that wasn't going to involve ruffling some feathers among the loyal. You can't just blow up your whole business model without ticking off a certain section of the user base, and I'm sure that factored into the decision making process, somewhat.

They want us all on subs as soon as possible, so they need to make the sub look as attractive as possible, as soon as possible. There won't be any mea culpa or quid pro without MAJOR outcry and controversy (which isn't going to happen), and I'd expect that they'll do away with perpetual licenses altogether as soon as they feel they can.

The thing that worries me is that this new model doesn't exactly give them any more incentive to innovate or update the program and it's features than they already have.
I don't know who Avid sees as being their main competition, but my guess is that whomever is on that list may not be the same companies we think of when discussing it here.