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I’m touched by the strength of feeling. I am listening to all of your responses and considering options... no promises, but you are being heard.


Ok, tell me more about this. Having access to this forum is a major selling point for Lightroom itself? Is that because the forum software is easier to use? Or the atmosphere and sense of community? Or the fact it’s simply more intimate than the Adobe forums?

I think that answer to your questions is "Yes" to all 4, plus something else. The advice and problem solving from the gurus and other advanced users that are here is 2nd to none. I could post a comment/problem/question and get what I needed back within a very short period of time.
Likewise, reading through someone else's questions and follow-on answers often gave me new insight into changing my own workflow.
All of these are perhaps part of the community we have. The expertise that we have here is outstanding, with information communicated in a professional but friendly way.

Why else do people come here multiple times a day? You have a community of LR users that continues to grow.

I also skim around the dpreview site a lot. In their Retouching forums, your site is often given as a go to site for problems that people might post looking for help.
 
If you will note there are many expressing sentiments like this:
If Adobe would adopt this type of forum interface, then leaving this website and migrating over to Adobe might be feasible. As it exists now, the Adobe website will Kill LR support before it gets improved to the quality of this one.

Clee - don't sell yourself short. You are one of the reasons that this site is so popular. Adobe could change their forum interface, but without the rapid professional & friendly feedback from experts like yourself people would go elsewhere.
 
Ok, tell me more about this. Having access to this forum is a major selling point for Lightroom itself? Is that because the forum software is easier to use? Or the atmosphere and sense of community? Or the fact it’s simply more intimate than the Adobe forums?
Part of the attraction of LR is that it is an "all in one" solution; it is a digital asset manager as well as an image "manipulator" (for want of a better term), it serves those who "publish" their photos only to the web as well as those who print, it supports geoencoding (and the reverse), etc. It isn't necessarily the BEST at any one of these capabilities, but taken together, it's hard to think of a better solution (which, aside from inertia, is probably the reason so many have said, "I've looked at alternatives but I'm sticking with LR.") But, the multifaceted nature of LR is also its chief drawback...any piece of software that does so many things is necessarily complex. Many have spoken about the "steep learning curve." I've been using LR for many years now, but I now I am nowhere close to "mastery" (I know what I know, and I know I am not fully aware of what I don't know!). There is simply no good source of information and guidance (of which I am aware) other than this forum. The Adobe forums, as others have pointed out, aren't 10% as useful, for a number of reasons. But, beyond the "facts," as others have also pointed out, this forum is a community of PEOPLE, not just an information exchange (compare the feeling here, say, to that of other forum boards that only feel like dry exchanges of info). That's a large part, for many, of the "Lightroom experience." Not having this community will be a huge loss. (That said, this is your decision to make, and as others undoubtedly feel, I am more grateful for what I have had and gained over 10 years than I am upset by contemplating its absence.)
 
Ok, tell me more about this. Having access to this forum is a major selling point for Lightroom itself? Is that because the forum software is easier to use? Or the atmosphere and sense of community? Or the fact it’s simply more intimate than the Adobe forums?

Yes, this forum is a major selling point (for me) in sticking, for now, with LR.

Yes, this forum is _much_ easier to use.

Yes, the sense of community and camaraderie is greater here than on other LR-specific forums.

Yes, although I wouldn't use "intimate"; informed without bias is more what I'd use.
 
This forum was a bright light on a dark and sometimes stormy sea. The generousity of multiple people with knowlege to share that knowledge and experience will be lost to the ether for ever. I checked this forum every day and will miss my daily fix. My other daily fix is The Online Photographer. Another generous soul.

If desperate, I will raise a support ticket with Adobe.

Thanks to The Lightroom Queen for been such a bright light.

Maybe my last post. Yeats comes to mind.

Had I the heaven's embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half-light;
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

W. B. Yeats


Another light goes out and maybe some of our dreams also.

Adieu.
 
If you will note there are many expressing sentiments like this:
If Adobe would adopt this type of forum interface, then leaving this website and migrating over to Adobe might be feasible. As it exists now, the Adobe website will Kill LR support before it gets improved to the quality of this one.
Couldn't agree more Cletus... I had an 8 month struggle with the Adobe forums, trying to sort out ridiculous (pre CC) glitches before I finally got things sorted (with the help of non-Adobe people... it may even have been you!)... I lurk on this forum a lot - I usually find my questions have already been addressed, and the posts are so easy to find - I will be very sad to be thrown back onto the impersonal and unfiltered mass that is the Adobe forum. If Victoria can be tempted to reconsider, I for one (among many!) would be delighted!
Thanks to Victoria - and all the people who contribute their knowledge to this site
Kirsty
 
Add me to the list of folks who are horrified and dismayed at your change. The Adobe forums are useless. There is no way to browse them easily, the forum SW is arcane and hard to use. Questions get lost and the people are unwilling to assist.

Having access to this forum is a major selling point for Lightroom itself? Is that because the forum software is easier to use? Or the atmosphere and sense of community? Or the fact it’s simply more intimate than the Adobe forums?
I can't answer for others but yes, IMO this forum is a huge selling point for staying in the LightRoom ecosystem. The Forum SW both allows you to see ALL the threads and questions in an easy to read format but also there are fast responses to almost any question.

Searching is not an effective way to really get help unless it's a very specific issue. Being able to browse is much better.
 
Thank you Victoria. I have many thoughts and emotions on this topic but I'll limit myself to the following:
  • Lightroom's continued success wouldn't exist if it wasn't for the support of this community
  • This community wouldn't have thrived without this sentiment, "The atmosphere and style of help we've cultivated here is something I'm very proud of, but I've come to realise that it's due to the way WE treat people, rather than the website we're using."
If there's anything we can do on Adobe's managed platforms(Help forums and bug reporting forums) to help ease this transition please let me know. We're also investing in more modern approaches to feedback including interactions within the application.

Sincerely,
Tom Hogarty
Adobe Systems
Drop the entire forum structure and implement something like this or just use these forums as is.
The Adobe forums are impossible to navigate, you cannot get the serendipity of finding information and ideas that you didn't even know you had questions about. The people here are friendly, respond and are patient. Adobe just leaves users hanging unless it happens to feed one other corporate advertising thrusts.

The way Adobe is handling the entire CC Classic et all issues and now the loss of this forum is again having me reconsider staying with LightRoom.

I'd rather pay Victoria a small subscription fee to keep the forums going as is. At least with a subscription to her I know I am getting good value for my money!
 
Maybe my last post. Yeats comes to mind.
Yeats may be the reason that I'm planning a trip to Ireland.

FWIW, I don't think I have ever seen poetry posted to the Adobe Forum. If Victoria figures out a way to keep this thing going I'll reward her with a Haiku.
 
Wow. So sad to see this end, but it's understandable. Not sure there's anything quite like it out there; the character of a forum like this gets lost in a big tech support forum like Adobe's (how many "my lightroom lost my files!" posts can one endure? ;) ). I hope that you have good fortune with whatever comes next.
 
I've put off responding while I've tried to participate in the Adobe forums, but honestly I can't stomach the attitudes displayed there. Those computer jockeys who feel they have free rein to bash Adobe for not designing the software for their own tailor-made machines don't have anything to contribute for most of us and simply consume space and suck the oxygen out of the air for most of us.

I'm used to the user-friendly atmosphere and the helpful nature of the gurus who provided so much teaching to everyone on the forum, and I just cannot accept the brash and downright mean nature of some of the bullies there. Frankly, these Adobe forums remind me of other forums (ie, Luminous Landscape) where the dismissive attitudes of some of the prima donnas who populated them dragged down the forum for me in the end.

I guess I'll go elsewhere...
 
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I think it was unfortunate that Victoria chose this time to stop providing user support. The Adobe forum has never had the functional, useful interface to find and follow an issue to resolve it. Moreover, I am convinced now more than ever that with the approach that Adobe has had toward Lightroom development and direction that the Lightroom product will not survive the Adobe blunders and now the loss of this forum.

I guess that this is my final post. I've enjoyed helping people and found my volunteer efforts rewarding. I also appreciate the world-wide friendships that I made here. I have even been able to make face to face connections with some on both sides of the Atlantic.

Thank you Cletus, and thank you, Victoria for this learning opportunity. It's been great and I will miss all of it.
 
As a new user of Lightroom this forum has been invaluable, I've only made a couple of posts but I've read and learnt a huge amount.
I tried the adobe forum but soon gave up (signal to noise ratio, as an earlier post rather succinctly put it) was the main reason. This is not just a problems with adobe forum a lot of manufacturer forums seem to suffer from this problem. maybe independent forums attract more people of a similar outlook.

I am already considering if I want to continue with Lightroom. At the moment 6.14 supports all my cameras and glass straight out of the box. But how long will that last? I wish I could have some of the new features that are not available in 6.14, if there was a perpetual licence for V7 I would probably pay for the upgrade. I don't like the model adobe is using, personally I want Lightroom Classic. I have no need for Photoshop, I have no need for Lightroom CC, I have no need for adobe cloud ( I have 2 other cloud subscriptions that give me all the functionality I want ) yet, at the moment, if I want to upgrade my version of Lightroom Classic I have to pay adobe for extra's that have no value to me, Maybe (probably not) adobe will have a classic only subscription. I don't have an objection to subscription business models. I'm happy to pay Microsoft for office 365, considerably better value though with 5 accounts and the cloud storage you get, but paying for something I don't want just irritates me.

Loosing this forum just adds another tick in the box that says I need an alternative to Lightroom.

Finally many thanks to Victoria for the work that has gone into this forum, it will be missed. Independence is a great asset and loosing it detracts from the diversity of the community.
 
Ok, tell me more about this. Having access to this forum is a major selling point for Lightroom itself? Is that because the forum software is easier to use? Or the atmosphere and sense of community? Or the fact it’s simply more intimate than the Adobe forums?

Short answer is yes. Without this forum I doubt I would have stayed with Lr or even adopted it.
The forum software is much better, the quality of the posts, the community... all of it.

Tim
 
Hi. Although I thought I read a few days ago that you weren't accepting any more new registration to the forum, I've just managed to join.
I just wanted to add my name to the long list of people who really hope the forum can continue. Although I was not a forum member until a few minutes ago, I've looked at it pretty well daily for the last year or so. I suppose the reason I never registered was that I'd managed to find any information I was looking for, just by looking at the site without having to ask a specific question. I doubt that is something I could do on the official Adobe site, although to be fair, I've never actually visited it.
If it can't continue I'd just like to say thanks to all the people who have helped me, even if you didn't realise it.

John
 
Only a fairly recent member of the forum compared with others but it has helped me immensely getting to grips with LR so I would be very sad to see it go. I fully appreciate all the hard work that goes in to running such a resource but, should the inevitable happen then I would like to say thank you to Victoria and all the other guys who have helped me out. TBH I find the official Adobe forums far too difficult to get any information from.

<Note to Self: must order copy of VB's LR 6 Standalone book toote suite!>
 
I’m touched by the strength of feeling. I am listening to all of your responses and considering options... no promises, but you are being heard.

Ok, tell me more about this. Having access to this forum is a major selling point for Lightroom itself? Is that because the forum software is easier to use? Or the atmosphere and sense of community? Or the fact it’s simply more intimate than the Adobe forums?

Victoria,

I fully support you in doing that you need to take care of your self. If you are done with overseeing, managing, upgrading and worrying about this forum than you should let it go and peace be with you. We are all grownups and will cope but as you have heard the loss is palpable for many. I hope that you will take all this outpouring of emotion for what I think it is, acknowledgement of what you succeeded in creating. An online technical discussion community that is honest, kind, helpful, respectful, friendly etc..

I also want to emphasize the importance of the small group of dedicated Lightroom "gurus" that have donated hours and hours of their time to patiently answer the questions. Sometimes that same question over and over again. My hat is off to you folks that jump in and answer for the umpteenth time "Why all my thumbnails have a question mark. Oh by the way I just happened to move a few folders." , etc. etc..

-louie
 
One thing I've been thinking about...

I think one issue with the Adobe forums is there is a perception that one is communicating with Adobe. Their occasional presence there reinforces it. Then frustration mounts when solutions (from Adobe, as in changes) are not forthcoming.

The clear message here is that you are communicating with people who know the product but are not Adobe, and both implicit by that scenario and explicit by moderation one doesn't devolve into rants about "why are you [Adobe] not fixing this", but rather focuses on what users can do.

I am not convinced an Adobe branded forum will ever truly get around the idea that "Adobe should be listening and fixing this".

I think the separation has itself led to a lot of the success here.
 
Linwood,
You're right. People generally come here looking for help with their problems rather than expecting Adobe to magically fix it for them. That means that they'll stick with us through the potentially long and drawn out process of helping them.
 
MUCH prefer you remain here. A totally different flavor and support for those of us still using 6 and resisting moves to Software as a Service to the nubs of my fingernails.

Reconsider Victoria? If not you will be missed.

~Bob
 
Thanks a lot for all great support from a great team of Lightroom gurus!
This site has helped me understand Lightrooms tweaks and tricks and also solved issues I have had.
And a big thanks to Victoria for maintaining the forum.
So sorry to see it ending - but life goes on!
 
Thank you Victoria. You have provided a very great service and your efforts are appreciated. Part of my daily morning routine is to sip a cup of coffee and swing by this forum and scan the new posts to see if there is a tidbit or two to be picked up. Nothing ever stays the same and a life lesson has been that everything changes. That said I will miss this forum.
My very best and fare thee well.

Stan
 
I’m touched by the strength of feeling. I am listening to all of your responses and considering options... no promises, but you are being heard.


Ok, tell me more about this. Having access to this forum is a major selling point for Lightroom itself? Is that because the forum software is easier to use? Or the atmosphere and sense of community? Or the fact it’s simply more intimate than the Adobe forums?
I have never found the Adobe Forums anywhere near as user friendly as this one. People on here are helpful, friendly and very tolerant. It has given me easy access to lots of information be that via opening my own threads or reading others. I have never not found an answer; it might not always have been the response I wanted, but it has been the right one :). In a nutshell this forum has been able to remove the mega corporate image of Adobe and replace it with the human face of post processing. Without that LR does not hold a lot for me and I have never been a great fan of the subscription model anyway.
 
In a nutshell this forum has been able to remove the mega corporate image of Adobe and replace it with the human face of post processing.

One of the best 1 sentence summaries I have read. I like it.
 
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