No there isn’t. Companies are incentivised to extract as much money as possible from any given buyer. There is never a “this is enough money, I won’t charge you more” situation. Inevitably every buyer will become a non-buyer, because they were outpriced.

Competition should solve this issue, but it doesn’t work in media because there’s no two rights holders for star wars content, or marvel content, or whatever. So services cannot compete on the same content, because the rights holders simply won’t let them.

Copyright is a pest.

So why isn’t it competitive?

Because it’s made by volunteers, in their free time, who either don’t have the time or skill or goal to make it competitive. But I wrote that a couple of times already and you continue to ignore it. So much for ‘not seeing my point’.

It doesn’t follow patterns that similar software follows, because they’re used to it, so everyone else should be too.

If someone is not able or willing to learn their way around something new, that’s literally their problem. Why would it need to be similar? If you want Photoshop, well then use Photoshop. Sometimes doing something different might also end up being the better idea. Won’t know until you tried.

And yes, good software is good code. That’s just a fact. Because otherwise you inevitably end up stuck and need to refractor the whole thing, instead of adding new features. And then angry people start complaining how you’re not competitive, and oh my.

Have a nice day.

It is the next best completely free alternative. Whether people like it or not.

GIMP has had literally decades of development and even with Photoshop in the worst state it’s ever been in, it isn’t competitive.

How is that an argument? How do you get the idea that GIMP is basically required to be competitive, just because it’s old? Completely disregarding the fact it’s made by volunteers vs a billion dollar company. And also completely disregarding the fact that Photoshop is even older than GIMP. By your own logic, just going by age, how can they be competitive when they are half a decade younger than PS?

Rewriting the whole thing would sure help. But not with the “I’m not going to help, fuck off” community.

Ok

Nobody is acting shocked. Least the people who learned to use GIMP.

The problem is people like you who are outraged, when asking for a free Photoshop alternative, that the next best thing is not to their likening.

And yes “consider fixing it yourself” is absolutely a valid response for GIMP issues because GIMP is made by volunteers For Photoshop it a bullshit response because it’s made by a billion dollar company which charges you for the development and use.

It’s a bit lunatic, but it’s arguably the only way forward. GIMP doesn’t have a multi billion dollar company behind - only volunteers.

Expecting the developers to have the capacity and skill to emulate the features and looks of Photoshop (and quickly, please) - in their free time - is even more lunatic.