JetBrains Reconsiders Subscription Licensing Changes

craigtp writes: On 3rd September, JetBrains, maker of IDEs and other productivity software, announced big changes to the way they sell and license their software. The changes were not well received by certain members of their user base. Within a few days, JetBrains announced that they were listening to the user feedback and that they would reconsider their changes. Today, they've finally announced their revised licensing changes, and while the subscription model remains, some important concessions have been made. Once a user pays for a year's subscription, they'll receive a perpetual fallback license, so they can keep using the software even if the subscription lapses later. They're also providing an option for offline license keys, so the software can run without needing to phone home.

Comments

tl;dr

[Anonymous Coward]

1. We are moving forward with subscriptions with important adjustments.

2. You will receive a perpetual fallback license once you pay for a year up front or 12 consecutive months.

3. You will receive up to 40% discount for continuous subscription.

4. You will be able to use the software without an Internet connection.

5. Current customers with active or recently expired upgrade subscription get first two years of subscription for the price of one.

6. We still recommend you take 10 minutes to read it all for the complete details.
 

Re:tl;dr

[laie_techie]

So what exactly is the point of paying beyond year one?

With a subscription, you are entitled to newer versions of their products; the fall-back license is permission to continuously use that (possibly) outdated version indefinitely.

Re:tl;dr

[tlhIngan]

With a subscription, you are entitled to newer versions of their products; the fall-back license is permission to continuously use that (possibly) outdated version indefinitely.

The fallback license is for the version that was current when the subscription started So if when you bought the 12 month subscription, or 12 monthly subs are up, you will get a key to use the version that was current a year ago. So if it's January 2016 and XYX was at version 1.2, and they released 1.3...1.5, then in January 2017 (if you bought monthly, or Jan 2016 if you bough annual) you will get a key to use version 1.2. If 1.3 came out in March 2016, then in March 2017, you will get a key to use 1.3 as well. If January 2017 they release 2.0, well, you get a key for that in 2018. The permanent key is valid for the version that was released 12 months prior. This way if you want to use the version released in the past 12 months, you have to keep your sub. Or just pay up for a new 12 month sub.

That said, the changes are actually pretty decent. You still get permanent licenses, and you get long term discounts. And if they try to screw you, you're not stuck.

Have to admit, I'm pretty impressed with the changes. Not often you get a company that not only listened to feedback, but actually implements it in a customer-friendly way.

How it's supposed to work

[theArtificial]

While I'm not thrilled about the license changes this is great news and how things are supposed to work. That said, Jetbrains makes excellent tools and I recommend them to all of my colleagues.

Re:I wish...

[MartinG]

If you own something, you can re-sell it so someone else entirely without the permission or knowledge of whoever sold it do you. If you can't do that, you don't own it.

Re:who the fuck is jet brains

[rainmaestro]

Jetbrains makes a number of popular IDEs and related dev tools. IntelliJ (Java IDE), ReSharper (VS extension for inspection/refactoring), TeamCity (CI/build tool), etc. Their tools are pretty well known in certain segments of the development industry (Java, Python, .Net), and TeamCity is quite popular as a less painful alternative to tools like Bamboo.

Re:Once again, the only thing worse than eclipse..

[theArtificial]

I've used an Eclipse variant called MyEclipse that solves the plugin hell. It's not the prettiest beast but it gets the job done, if you're stuck in Eclipse land it might be worth scoping out if you're disenchanted with Intellij.

Sounds like good changes to me

[Phoenix Rising]

Now if only Adobe would figure this out, I'd pay them for a CC subscription. As it is, I refuse to trust my business to Adobe's online model - I want a piece of software that works after I stop paying, not hundreds of useless files that are the life of my business.