Why Are Open Source Alternatives So Bad?

GIMP is not a competitor to Photoshop; Photoshop is an image manipulator while GIMP is a puzzle-based image modifier.

OBS over here as the final boss of the Internet, single-handedly fueling an entire modern entertainment medium.

Blender is a perfect example of open-source working as intended, I hope more open-source software moves that way.

Okay for open source, but how about buying commercial software that doesn't require "subscriptions"? Why can't I just OWN anything any more?

OBS is one of the few that doesn't have a proprietary equivalent.

I think its ironic that Blender's biggest proprietary competitor Maya, suffers from the 90's UI that Open Source software is known for

The whole internet runs on free and open source software. It's not that "open source alternatives are bad", but "these specific FOSS alternatives do not do the same as the prorietary thing". Edit, because I'm tired of having to explain again and again: "FOSS" is only a license. It only means "Free and Open Source Software". Some also call it "FLOSS", for "Free/Libre and Open Source Software. Some applications are good, some are bad. It is not the license that makes it good or bad, it is the software itself. Blender is the defacto software for 3D modeling, and it's probably the best one out there. "Oh, but it started as.../Oh, but it is backed by..." Doesn't matter, its license is copyleft, FOSS. Now, before replying to this, ponder about this subject a little bit more.

I didn't mean to beat up on GIMP so much, but they were the most obvious example of the issues with FOSS. I'm aware they're working on GIMP 3.0 which should hopefully solve a lot of issues with GIMP. At the same time, it's taken them decades to deliver on basic features like adjustment layers. Wish the devs the best though, all love ✌

And then there's Blender, just casually being the industry standard.

I remember posting a bug report on GIMP forum. There was an issue in a way it hadled Czech diacritics in text. One guy posted ten replies about me being a total idiot, who can't setup my language settings properly and angrily closed the issue as being stupid and irrelevant. 16 months later another guy reopened it and said they've fixed the issue in the latest release and they thank me for my feedback. I love open source, but you are right about the communication sometimes being a little difficult...

Open Source is AWESOME. Especially now that Adobe claims ownership of anything you created with their software

The takes in this are weird. I especially like when the video casually states "Anyone with an app idea and a little bit of programming knowledge can create an app over the weekend, monetize it with Stripe, and make thousands of dollars a month." Totally glossing over how difficult it actually is to create a unique app, penetrate an over saturated market, maintain and update the code to work with later versions of the OS. And thats not even mentioning the headaches that can happen if the app relies on a third party library, service, or api. GIMP may not be a Photoshop killer but I sure appreciate their and the open source community's efforts.

People don't want to learn GIMP, people want free Photoshop.

I also used to hate Blender for how clunky and unintuitive it used to be…. … and then came Blender 2.8 with the UI overhaul. I never needed to look back to Maya ever again since then

Everything is open source if you're a reverse engineer.

meanwhile here in the gamedev world, blender is already an industry standard (i was taught in maya and zbrush but now use blender professionally), krita is irreplaceable when it comes to seamless textures thanks to wraparound mode and godot is getting better and better and what we are using for the current project

A lot of the criticism here is valid, however, you are wrong about one thing; Successful Open Source projects are usually not a hobby project, even though they may start as that. I work in industry on embedded software. You are probably using the project my employer pays me to work on for a daily basis, but it is a small utility project embedded in something you don't even think of (think control software for an elevator, though it isn't actually an elevator). This code is open source because it costs us less to submit half a developer to contribute to the code base each month, than it takes paying licenses to a specific company. The code is mature so not much new development is happening, it is mostly making sure newer platforms are supported. This model has unfortunately yet to reach a bigger software house like, say, Dreamworks. If Dreamworks paid three guys to contribute for five years to Gimp, that software UI would be much improved and Dreamworks would in the end be in a much better spot paying a lot less to Adobe. Instead of renting code, Dreamworks would be owning code. Sadly, most suits do not understand this.They believe software is like nails - why build a nail factory when you can just buy them by the dozen?

obs is fine. literally everyone uses it

Open source contributor and artist here. Inkscape is awesome. The only valid consumer complaint I’ve heard is the learning curve, but there are valid dev complaints in the code base, as with most software. Also Krita is another great example. That’s top tier industry standard raster painting software

I remember back in the day at uni a classmate asked the teacher why they were teaching us photoshop and illustrator instead of open source tools since we probably didn’t have the money to adopts the licenses after graduation. The teacher just replied “man who cares, just pirate it unless your employer pays for your license” 😂