Do you remember the time when you could sign up for beta testing your favourite editing software? That way you would get a sneak preview of new features. In return you would provide the programmers with bug reports so the new software version could hopefully be released with as few bugs as possible. It seems those days are long gone.

Perpetual Beta Testing

Granted, even after a long period of beta testing no new software version has ever been released completely bug free. But today beta testing is a thing of the past. As more and more software developers switch to subscription models instead of perpetual personal licenses, updates are released on a monthly basis. Or so it seems. The basic idea is, that the users can have access to new features of their editing program as soon as they become available. That’s commendable, however, it increases the risk, that the new release is plagued by bugs (pun intended). The customer who pays a monthly fee to use the software is now a perpetual beta tester. Whenever the top dog of editing software (no names, but I guess you know of which company I’m talking … ) releases a major upgrade my Facebook feed is full of complaints about newly introduced bugs. Not a particular one but a number of seemingly unrelated issues. And it’s not neccessarily the new features that don’t work correctly but quite often it’s those tools that were introduced years ago. Mind boggling!

Obviously the software manufacturers feel obliged to release new versions so frequently that customers feel they get good value for their monthly fees. In the olden days of perpetual licenses we never bought every upgrade. Only if the new version had a real new killer feature that we couldn’t possibly live without, did we shell out the money. Coming to think of it, worthwile new features have become rare after 30 years of editing software development. If the best the developers can come up with is automatic sky replacement it seems to me that they are becoming desparate. Personally I would prefer well tested software that works instead of new features the world doesn’t need. But perhaps that’s just me.

What can be done?

First, and most importantly, never install a new software version immediately after it has been released. Let other people do the beta testing and wait till most of the bugs have been ironed out. That seems so obvious it shouldn’t be mentionend at all. But obviously many users don’t follow this simple rule. Otherwise my Facebook feed wouldn’t be full of complaints. Then again, it’s good that some people do the beta testing for us. Let’s be thankful for that.

Another possibility is too look for software that is still available as perpetual license and that has been properly tested. It’s out there!