I just got the notice that Premium is 50$ now, but we get 70% off for 14.99 . A month? Thats crazy talk, even at 14.99. The tools in here are not worth it, and I’m assuming most of us who own a unit would only really see a benefit with the “fast lane” option… BUT, the fast lane makes me feel… pretty insulted. Why is there a fast lane… why am I being asked me pay MONTHLY for a unit that cost me $5,500 to be the same as everyone else to upload MY designs to MY machine. The fact that this even requires an internet connection in the first place blows my mind but to then do this? Man… C’mon Glowforge, don’t insult your user base.
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I guess my way of thinking is, if you don’t need it, you don’t have to order it. If you don’t use the tools from the beta and you create your own files, then you can probably just get away with what you already had, at no extra cost.
But, say you’re someone who buys designs every month off other sites, or has little to no design software skills and you just want to use the interface for quick projects, then I think 15 a month for those things would probably save you money, so in that sense it would be worth it.
You don’t have to upgrade, and you wouldn’t incur any extra charges. But it probably would be a valuable subscription if you are one of those people who are buying monthly font packs or maybe a public space who need something easy for students or the public who don’t have the time to spend to learn the laser.
Think of it like a cable service. I only need internet, so I choose not to pay for TV and phone. Can I pay for them? Yes, but I don’t need them, so I don’t.
Edit: Actually, I think I might have read this wrong too, so let me address my interpretation really quick. You paid 5,500 for a laser because you wanted the extra features of the laser, the actual physical hardware that came with it. It had a higher cost because it included expensive physical benefits that the other models didn’t have.
Outside of the extra physical capability, I don’t recall anything extra being promised as way of service; so in that sense, as far as the digital portion goes, we’ve all pretty much been offered the same cutting services.
Again, from the announcement I read, the subscription is an unrequired service that does not affect the current operation of your machine. Nothing will change if you choose not to buy the subscription except the beta features will disappear, which they said they would, when they rolled out the trial. It was in the description that they were letting us test for free since we were all stuck at home.
I’m assuming that this long time period was my free trial before I actually purchase the subscription. In that sense too, you aren’t commited to a contract, so you can sign up, use the remainder of the free trial to see if you are missing anything or if the faster processing times make a difference to you. If you find they don’t benefit you, you can cancel before the trial ends and not have to pay a dime.
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Superfluous caps aside, your point has a fatal flaw: you aren’t the same as everyone else. You can choose to pay extra for faster processing and other design tools, or not.
How long is a MONLTH anyway? 
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Not sure if you’re misunderstanding or of I am misunderstanding you, but this is an optional service. Would you like the design tools, faster file processing among other things for $15 a month? Sign up. Don’t care for those things? Don’t, and continue using your machine for free. The $15 is a temporary sign up now bonus, but you’ll be locked in at that price until you decide to cancel. The $50 only applies to those who choose to not sign up within their discount window, or if you really want to pay $50 by not taking advantage of the temporary discount window.
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to be fair, i doubt anyone will ever pay $50/mo. Just like nobody has ever paid $16,000 to buy a Pro. that’s just their list price (it’s a silly list price) that they “discount” everyone from. i find it a disturbing practice, personally. but it’s hard to be sure what the actual price people will be asked to pay after this “early bird discount” thing goes away. i’m just sure it won’t be $50/mo.
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It’s being discussed at the link that @geek2nurse showed, but please…make sure you understand what the plan and your options are. It’s not as dire as a lot of people have interpreted it to be.
- There will be an optional subscription that everyone who currently has a machine can try out for the rest of this month, for free.
- If you decide you want to keep using it, the cost will be $14.99/month, for as long as you keep the subscription. So you can try it for a month, or two, or for ten years…at $14.99/month. If you decide you don’t want it any more, just cancel the subscription before the next month is billed.
- If you cancel, and then decide next year that you want to try it again, then you will pay whatever the current rate is. So the discount is a one-time offer. But there is no reason that you can’t decide to buy into the program for a month or two here and there, if you don’t want it all year.
- And there will be more and more added to the Premium Service as time goes on, so if you want to wait until you see something you like or need before subscribing, that’s also doable. (Just remember that at that point…no discount.)
Glowforge is giving us an early adopters discount for the Premium Service, just like we got when they were building the machines. It’s not finished yet though, there will be much more to come.
I would suggest that people go ahead and sign up for it now so that you can download all of the free files in the Premium Catalog section, build them, take some time to play with the tools, and decide if you want to try it for a month or two more at the current $14.99 rate before you cancel. You might see some things added that make it worthwhile to keep in your view.
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My mind is blown:
So now because i dont need to have circles and square templates I am put on GARBAGE SERVERS ?
I was not expecting that , That Noose got tighter around our necks.
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Basically Coalakida’s point is what I’m making. I’m personally saying that the services that others may use with the files and squares and circles may be useful to someone else, but not me.
My biggest gripe here is that I am now at a slower speed than others may be because I’m not willing to pay more. The fact that it requires an internet connection at all and I have to use a website and not a local application was not great, but this makes it feel a little worse.
My internet went out for two days recently and I wasn’t able to use my machine. Now I’m being asked to pay to make it faster? It should just BE faster or have the local app.
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to be fair, you should be at the same speed you were and people paying extra are at a faster speed.
i.e., they’re not taking speed away from you, they’re adding processing cycles to people who pay extra.
so if they hadn’t done this, you’d still be at the same speed w/o paying. and after they did this you’re at the same speed w/o paying.
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This is a hyperbolic leap, nobody is on “garbage servers”. Basic is coach, premium is comfort plus - but it’s the same plane.
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No, I get it, I still think its B.S. Would you also think it was cool of them to charge for a local app ever came out when it should have come with the unit?
We also don’t know for sure that they didn’t put people on a slower server. Do we know who they actually host with? Maybe it will get slightly slower.
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Also this is a perfect example of removing Net Nutrality coming to bite us in the butts. Soon you’ll need to pay your ISP to access certain sites or have faster, or “the same as it used to be” speeds on your VPN or Netflix.
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they host on google cloud.
if you want to presume the worst and that they’re out to screw over anyone who doesn’t pay for premium, i can’t do anything about that. i don’t think they are.
and i don’t see any way net neutrality has anything to do with GF.
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We do actually, they’ve told us many times. It’s Google cloud services. And they upgraded to faster servers than previous for everyone a few months ago.
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The servers are the same as what we’ve been using. But better servers cost more money, ask anyone who works for cloud storage companies. Even my husband’s company has to pay a ton for upgraded servers and he works for a dental company. So if you’re fine with the way it prints now, then that’s what you’ll continue with. If you want faster processing on faster servers, you pay more. And honestly, try it out for the rest of the month, because unless you are uploading massive photos to be engraved, you might not notice a difference.
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GLOW FORGE - Let me help you out since your going Broke !
Here is what you should have done:
$4.99 A month to add special shapes and text
$1.99 A month to have a Special Ruler
$3.99 A month to have Folders to Organize your designs
$3.99 To be taken off the Garbage servers and on to our SUPER DUPER servers.
Something like this would have made a sense , RIGHT ?
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No one’s servers are slowing down. They recently got faster. For everyone.
(And if you want to know more about it…go read the discussions at the link @geek2nurse posted. There is no reason to re-litigate this point in two places.)
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Honestly all of this could be avoided if they just let us upload directly from our local machines. We wouldn’t need to worry about servers, the internet, or needing to have folders, a basic function, on their GUI.
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No. I hate piece deals. Something like this would’ve put me off.
FYI, even though I make my own files, I find the convenience of the features a huge time saver. And, some of the patterns in the shop are really cool and fall into what I do. So the commercial license for these products alone is worth a monthly fee to me, especially since I didn’t have to spend the hours thinking it up myself and testing them. But everyone will find value in different things.
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