Changes to the free tier - please BS - add a basic tier!

[WilliamL 667]

Hey all, I’m seeing a few posts on Reddit that people are seeing warnings come up on the free tier that states limits that seem to be around 1 notebook and 50 notes. Now I don’t know if that’s a bug or a plan - some are seeing these things others it’s working as normal. But I wanted to try and suggest something 

If the plan is to change the free tier and add further restricitons to it - this would be a great moment to add a basic tier - there is nothing below pro and not everyone is looking for those features. Some free users might consider a subscription if there was a lower priced tier. I know in the past there was plus tier but having a basic one for people who find free useful would surely be a fairer option than restricting free and leaving those users no option but to pay £9 or leave.

Just an idea - the whole thing might be wrong granted!  

[agsteele 3,061]

I never believe rumours on Reddit.

[PinkElephant 8,838]

Could be a test drive to see reactions, who knows.

I run Free beside my paid account, and have not seen anything like it.

[mackid1993 1,291]

I have a spare free account and just made 10 notebooks. This is either a test or a bug. If implemented they might as well get rid of the free tier.

[Boot17 1,539]

It wouldn't surprise me if Bending Spoons is trying to make the Free plan more of a "try it before you buy it" kind of thing vs allowing users to live there long term for years and years like they've been able to do in the past.

Agree with the sentiment of a 'Basic' tier as the gap between Free and the lowest paid subscription is very wide now. Evernote did have a semi-Basic plan already with the grandfathered/legacy 'Plus' plan -- however, instead of reopening it, Bending Spoons are getting rid of it altogether now and moving Plus users to the Personal plan.

[mackid1993 1,291]

Perhaps they could have a Basic plan that lacks the AI powered features and maybe 5 GB of upload a month for less money like $89 or $99 a year and then make the free plan a 14 day free trial.

[Grant837 137]

I just opened a new account to try this out  (I follow the Reddit forum closely and its indeed 75% complaints and false ´bad experience/bug´ stories)

I created 11 notebooks, one stack, and 55 notes with no problems.

[gazumped 12,075]

Bearing in mind that Evernote paused (?) development on the Linux app because they want to concentrate on getting the overall infrastructure right,  I'd doubt they have the time or the inclination to develop a new level of subscription.  Plus limiting usage by volume or by device just generates arguments about the 'vital information' that some user is locked out of.  If you want to pay less for fewer features,  there are probably dozens of options out there.  See https://noteapps.info for some of them...

 

[Jorge Quintanilla 2]

I've been receiving the notice - 1 notebook and 50 notes limit. Very annoying because I wasn't given any warning. 
It feels like extortion - I need to pay $15 to continue my work.

I agree with the other comments on this thread - I would OK with a basic level at a lower annual fee. I do not need any of the upgrade features listed in the Personal plan.

[Grant837 137]

13 hours ago, Grant837 said:

I just opened a new account to try this out  (I follow the Reddit forum closely and its indeed 75% complaints and false ´bad experience/bug´ stories)

I created 11 notebooks, one stack, and 55 notes with no problems.

OK, I am worried. Here is an image of what an existing free user got recently… 

[WilliamL 667]

Yeah there’s a lot mentioning this, was quickly dismissed here and I can’t be bothered arguing it lol, whatever is being planned will become clear in time. Personally I’m ok with the restrictions as long as if paid drop to free their data is preserved and can be exported. There should be no risk to data and no lock in as consequence of going free.  

[gazumped 12,075]

7 minutes ago, Grant837 said:

OK, I am worried. Here is an image of what an existing free user got recently… 

Why worried?  If you have information in an existing account I'm sure Evernote will not delete it.  If they're ending (or at least severely limiting) the free account,  then you simply have to decide whether to pay up to continue using the service or check out.  There are lots of options (see the link I posted above) but most of them charge for any level of 'serious' use.  There really is no such thing as a free lunch unless you get down to the big operators like Apple or Google or Microsoft - where you've probably already paid for access to their service anyway.  Personally I'd want to pay (and I do) for my note-taking service so I have a contractual relationship and a support team. 

[gazumped 12,075]

Hmmn.  Just had a quick troll through the Reddit pages - judging by the reaction,  there's a lot of outrage that people are actually being asked to pay for the app if they choose to use it beyond the most basic level - at least one user was vowing never to use the app again...  I'm sure Evernote will be horrified...

[larissaF 2]

Hello, 

I had the same message when trying to create a new note today (see image).However, when I browse the characteristics of the different types of subscriptions in the "help" section of Evernote, there is no mention anywhere of a limit of notes or notebooks.  

[PinkElephant 8,838]

The official limit is still way higher.

I think this is a test of the impact of such a measure. Since the Free users are users, but not customers, EN can practically always change the rules for the Free plan. If they decide to limit it to a true testing bed, there is not much affected users can do about it.

You can use the feedback function, or contact support about it. For support, use the "Account" ticket type.

[gazumped 12,075]

The discount seems to vary between notices - I guess the testing part here is more about what's the best introductory discount to persuade free users to subscribe - 25%? 40%?

- Either way,  for those who don't want all the fancy bells and whistles that come with Personal or Professional,  there are plenty of free or low-cost alternative products out there.  They may not offer the same look and feel,  they may not be as good at features like Clipping (forinstance) but that's why Evernote get the big bucks.

Evernote doesn't seem to have any wish to find ways to limit access to its features for a reduced-price option while they're still working on the full-access version;  and you can bet if they came out with a new restricted access version,  some comedian would immediately complain that they needed some other part of the package and why isn't that an option too...

[Dave-in-Decatur 4,006]

Free users have had relatively large use of Evernote in the past, but I have to say I think this method of randomly(?) and without warning limiting some people's accounts to encourage them to start paying is yet another extremely poor choice from a communication perspective. Naturally it will stir up shocked responses, since it comes out of nowhere. I really do wonder whether BenSpoo is capable of learning lessons about this sort of thing.

@Jorge Quintanilla and @larissaF, how many notes and notebooks did you have before this notice appeared? If you already have more than 50 notes, this would be particularly alarming.

[Boot17 1,539]

Reminds me of when the prices started dramatically increasing and there wasn't an official announcement until well after the reports started trickling in. Same with the termination of the grandfathered plans. I think the pre-Evernote team communicated the subscription changes ahead of actually making them IIRC. Bending Spoons is more covert about this for whatever (possibly strategic) reasons -- maybe to gauge some feedback and other metrics first before making it official.

[Boot17 1,539]

I narrowed in just now on the wording -- the "unlimited notes and notebooks" and the "without limits" part of the "Upgrade now to create notes and notebooks without limits."

Do you think this really means that there won't be the 200 MB note limit, 100,000 notes limit, and 1,000 notebook limit? Or does it just more practically mean without such tight limits as 1 notebook and 50 notes? I'm betting the latter, but the wording makes it sound like the former.

[gazumped 12,075]

9 hours ago, Boot17 said:

the wording makes it sound like the former.

Agree to disagree - in what's essentially a marketing message there's no legally binding commitment here;  the terms and conditions will be laid out in full if a user decides to upgrade,  and I am sure there won't be 'unlimited' anything...

[Boot17 1,539]

Heh - I never said it was a binding commitment. "marketing message" -- exactly, the wording makes it sound a little better than we really think it is once you read the fine print.

"I am sure there won't be 'unlimited' anything" = "I'm betting the latter, but the wording makes it sound like the former."

 Ha - sounds like an agreement to me! 😄

I just thought it was kind of interesting and worth mentioning as we've seen feature requests for higher limits for notebook count, note count, and bigger note sizes in the forums.

 

[mackid1993 1,291]

10 hours ago, Boot17 said:

Heh - I never said it was a binding commitment. "marketing message" -- exactly, the wording makes it sound a little better than we really think it is once you read the fine print.

"I am sure there won't be 'unlimited' anything" = "I'm betting the latter, but the wording makes it sound like the former."

 Ha - sounds like an agreement to me! 😄

I just thought it was kind of interesting and worth mentioning as we've seen feature requests for higher limits for notebook count, note count, and bigger note sizes in the forums.

 

Maybe the backend changes they are making (the switch to microservices) will enable them to be more agile and increase these limits. It's likely a technical limitation to prevent the database from getting too bogged down. They also kind of offer pseudo unlimited storage so the 200 MB note limit keeps that from getting out of hand. Many other services have a storage cutoff point but EN just limits note size and upload per month.

[L-Squared 1]

I just ran into this problem today. I had already started migrating to OneNote that's included in my Microsoft 365 plan. 

 

[PinkElephant 8,838]

We won’t panick when you do. Farewell. 

[toroprime 0]

Same notice as ones mentioned above. Being limited to 50 notes. I've used this service for over 10 years have many many notebooks and over 450 notes. I would like to continue to use evernote if possible.

[Dave-in-Decatur 4,006]

23 minutes ago, toroprime said:

Same notice as ones mentioned above. Being limited to 50 notes. I've used this service for over 10 years have many many notebooks and over 450 notes. I would like to continue to use evernote if possible.

My suggestion based on my own experience would be that if you've used Evernote that long and at that level, your best bet for continuing with it is to become a paying subscriber. I used Evernote for free for awhile (nowhere near 10 years), and when it became clear that it was going to be a long-term part of my work and home, I picked an appropriate level (at that time) and subscribed. One way to gauge this is to break it down to a per-week or per-day charge. If one subscribed for (say) $100/year, that's about $2 a week, $0.27/day. I definitely get more value than that from Evernote. Of course, another way to gauge it is to ask whether your budget actually has room for a yearly or monthly subscription, no matter what the cost/value proportion is.

That said, I think 50 notes is unreasonably low for a trial subscription. I'm sure I had more than that before I started paying, and I started paying relatively quickly. Whatever the method is they're using to pick out the test subjects for this plan, they really ought to start higher than that. Certainly for someone who already has 450 notes, I don't know how Evernote would even cut that back to 50. What would they do with the other 400? It doesn't even make sense to me, practically or ethically.

[WilliamL 667]

32 minutes ago, toroprime said:

Same notice as ones mentioned above. Being limited to 50 notes. I've used this service for over 10 years have many many notebooks and over 450 notes. I would like to continue to use evernote if possible.

They are offering a 40 percent discount I think on those notices you’re getting? If I were you I would snap that up if you can. If you like Evernote and it works for you, that might be the more productive option than looking for an alternative which can be a bit like going into wonderland! 

[KAK63 0]

I just wish they would bring back something like the plus tier. I don't have a large volume of monthly use but I do want to have a cross platform solution that I can access from any of my 5 devices. Basically I just use Evernote as a replacement for my home filing cabinet and scan or write a few notes a month. For the time being I have canceled rather than make the jump to $130 and I have exported all my notes and imported them to OneNote (a tedious process). OneNote may ultimately be the answer for me, but I would think that there is a base of users similar to me, that don't need or use the advanced features, that could help subsidize development costs for those power users. I guess I'll start getting comfortable with the alternative and watch to see how things develop. Best wishes to all as you find a solution that fits your unique use case.  

[Who 1]

I too got the dreaded extortion pop-up... at first, I thought it was saying I couldn't add more than 1 notebook and 50 notes a month (I could probably deal with that)... no, I can't create a note or even move a note.  

I have been an Evernote user since 2008 and paid for many of those years.  I recently dropped my subscription because Evernote has doubled my subscription cost the last two renewals.  I'd had enough and wanted to send a message to their new leadership (hoping that if enough of us did that, they would get the message), so I decided to run free for a while and see how it went.  It was fine (other than the constant annoying pop-up ads)... until today.  This is a ridiculous and desperate marking plow to force new subscribers (or others like me to come back).  At least be upfront about it and communicate.  At this point, I don't want to pay because of the principle of it... I would just be giving into their tactics and proving to them that they were right in doing this.  It is not right... 

Not that I have high hopes it will matter much but I did send a ticket and asked that they forward it to their leadership.  

[doriane.bd 0]

I am in the same situation. This saddens me because I have years of work on Evernote.
I can't afford to pay and I'm stuck in my work... There was no warning or communication!
If this is a test, do you think this will be fixed soon?
I'm hesitant to migrate everything to another platform and leave Evernote... 😔

[gazumped 12,075]

50 minutes ago, Who said:

desperate marking plow to force new subscribers (or others like me to come back).

I don't thnk it's a "desperate" anything.  Evernote seem to be tired of free users taking up bandwidth and storage space and want to take back control of their own network.  They just want folks to make their minds - either pay,  or find another provider.  They are at least offering a discount for the first subscription.

[Dave-in-Decatur 4,006]

3 hours ago, gazumped said:

I don't thnk it's a "desperate" anything.  Evernote seem to be tired of free users taking up bandwidth and storage space and want to take back control of their own network.  They just want folks to make their minds - either pay,  or find another provider.  They are at least offering a discount for the first subscription.

Perhaps this is the case, but even so, if someone chooses not to pay, what happens to their notes beyond the limit of 50? Does Evernote assume that that limit is so absurdly low (which it is) that all free users will either pay or leave and take their notes elsewhere? If someone doesn't, where do their remaining notes go?

[PinkElephant 8,838]

From how I read it (haven’t got that message myself yet on one of my Free accounts) it practically freezes all accounts beyond the limit.

It is not absurdly low - it means simply the end of the Free plan as an usable alternative. If the figures that leaked some years ago are still valid, if 1 out of 10 Free users converts the account into a paid account now, it would practically double the number of subscribers.

Given the new prices, it would roughly mean to double revenue as well, even if all new accounts get the 40% deal.

My question is how the management believes to generate new subscribers after the unavoidable shakeout that will happen. Will be interesting to see … !

[Blizzard Joe 14]

If this low limit remains I'm not sure how useful it will be to attract new users.  I was on the free plan for a few years and only used it sparingly, but I'm sure that I had more than 50 notes in that time.  My use of the software steadily grow to the point where I found it useful to pay for the software.  If I was limited to 50 notes at that time I would have simply stopped using the software and looked elsewhere.  

It also poses an issue with existing customers who have stopped paying and want to come back and kick the tires again.  Most of those users will be over the limit making it very difficult to see if they want to return to Evernote without creating a new temp account to try it out.  A pain that many people will probably not bother with.

[Who 1]

We'll see how it goes.  My experience so far today has been that it doesn't freeze any notes.  I still have my 10+ notebooks and thousands of notes.  I can update any existing note and I got around the inability to create a new note by repurposing an old note that was no longer useful.  I just can't create a new note and I can't move a note between folders or create a new folder.  I definitely can't operate like this for long.

I called this "desperate" in my earlier post because there was no communication... it still isn't listed as a limitation on their plan comparison page.  That seems desperate to me... 

Also, for the discount,  you can get 25% off Personal... 40% only applies to Professional.  With the 40% off Professional, it makes it tempting but the way this company is now operating, it just makes me angry and like I said before, it's the principle of it.  The way to get new subscribers isn't to double the subscription cost or extort them into submission without communicating what's happening.  

[PinkElephant 8,838]

What is more desperate ?

1) To leave the grown plan structure as it is, with grandfathered old subscriptions and a very generous Free tier ? Out of fear the (bloated) user numbers could be visibly reduced to those who really use the app ?

2) Or to cut back to a core of performing accounts, reducing cost of operation and complexity ?

The former management decided to follow the first approach - and in the end „convinced“ the owners that it was no good to throw more good money after the bad.

What we see at the moment still seems to be a test on some Free accounts. It doesn’t yet look like a full rollout to me.

We will see where it goes. In the end if your goal is to have performing (=payed) accounts, you won’t shed too many tears about loosing a good share of the non performing ones. 

[BonskY 84]

On 10/23/2023 at 4:49 AM, Grant837 said:

I just opened a new account to try this out  (I follow the Reddit forum closely and its indeed 75% complaints and false ´bad experience/bug´ stories)

I created 11 notebooks, one stack, and 55 notes with no problems.

Yes, Evernote subreddit are toxic...often, I stand up and defend Evernote and I got downvoted...

 

[WilliamL 667]

I can see why Evernote would alter the free plan. 

I cannot see why they have not communicated this however. I do find it lacking honesty that the free plan says one thing but customers are getting something else instead. That is deceptive, sure change the plan, but be honest about it. As they are saying one thing and then doing another I feel my concerns for the companies integrity growing. Just be honest and transparent or trust erodes. 

[Who 1]

1 minute ago, WilliamL said:

I can see why Evernote would alter the free plan. 

I cannot see why they have not communicated this however. I do find it lacking honesty that the free plan says one thing but customers are getting something else instead. That is deceptive, sure change the plan, but be honest about it. As they are saying one thing and then doing another I feel my concerns for the companies integrity growing. Just be honest and transparent or trust erodes. 

Yes, I agree.  

[gazumped 12,075]

18 minutes ago, WilliamL said:

I feel my concerns for the companies integrity growing

As @PinkElephant pointed out - this looks more like test marketing than anything.  Before doing anything account wide,  Evernote is trying different levels of discount to see if there's a price point that will attract the most subscribers.  I'd have expected focus groups and surveys first - but maybe they did that somewhere we haven't been aware of.  I'd expect Evernote to refine their plans and then make an announcement - but it seems clear that if you already have volumes of notes on a free service,  you're going to have to find a new service to carry on adding to them.

[WilliamL 667]

5 minutes ago, gazumped said:

As @PinkElephant pointed out - this looks more like test marketing than anything.  Before doing anything account wide,  Evernote is trying different levels of discount to see if there's a price point that will attract the most subscribers.  I'd have expected focus groups and surveys first - but maybe they did that somewhere we haven't been aware of.  I'd expect Evernote to refine their plans and then make an announcement - but it seems clear that if you already have volumes of notes on a free service,  you're going to have to find a new service to carry on adding to them.

And I get that, but they could be communicating what they are doing and why. I don’t think it’s reasonable that someone signs up for a free tier as advertised on the website only to discover when using the product what is claimed isn’t actually true, there are undeclared limits. If I was testing that, there ain’t no chance I would consider buying at that point. 

I think it’s far better to be honest about what they are trying out, sure there is gonna be a negative reaction, as any change seems to generate but this method could prove far more harmful as it draws questions over can Evernote be trusted, if they say one thing but do another here, who is to say they won’t do that elsewhere. When it comes to a company we entrust our data to, trust is essential and they should be doing all they can to nurture and protect that in my view. 

[mackid1993 1,291]

1 hour ago, WilliamL said:

And I get that, but they could be communicating what they are doing and why. I don’t think it’s reasonable that someone signs up for a free tier as advertised on the website only to discover when using the product what is claimed isn’t actually true, there are undeclared limits. If I was testing that, there ain’t no chance I would consider buying at that point. 

I think it’s far better to be honest about what they are trying out, sure there is gonna be a negative reaction, as any change seems to generate but this method could prove far more harmful as it draws questions over can Evernote be trusted, if they say one thing but do another here, who is to say they won’t do that elsewhere. When it comes to a company we entrust our data to, trust is essential and they should be doing all they can to nurture and protect that in my view. 

The company is in transition right now. Testing a change on a small subset of users to gauge response both in the community and as to whether the discount entices people to subscribe is very common. Those using a free service simply aren't owed anything they have the legal right to change their service (even their paid service) at any time. Anyone who is using a free service for critical work is quite frankly foolish. Nothing important or critical should rely on a free cloud service. If you don't want to pay just install Joplin and call it a day. If you are jotting down grocery lists and cookie recipes then a) maybe Evernote is overkill and b) a severely limited free service shouldn't matter. If you need more than 50 notes you are clearly using the service and should pay for it or use something actually free. Don't entrust critical data to someone else's computer that you don't even pay to use!

[mackid1993 1,291]

I also want to add, there is NO cloud. Just someone ELSES computer. Using a free cloud service for anything remotely important is extremely poor information security practice and anyone who does that and then complains about it really should take the time to educate themselves about Information Security.

I don't trust my critical data to anything that I don't pay for or host on my own network. That is also why I use only paid email with multiple custom domains that I own and have full control over the DNS of. 

Those using Evernote free or any free cloud service for anything besides recipes for banana bread are taking a massive risk.

[WilliamL 667]

10 hours ago, mackid1993 said:

Those using a free service simply aren't owed anything they have the legal right to change their service (even their paid service) at any time.

I cant agree with that, I think everyone is owed honesty and transparency, if those are things we now need to pay for the world is way more screwed than even a cynic like me thinks it is. 

Sure they can change those terms but they actually need to communicate those changes, not have what is written and what is delivered different.

[gazumped 12,075]

I don't know many genuine free services online - most are supported by advertising or selling user preferences (Hi FB,  Google...) so there's an incentive for the provider to keep offering the 'free' service.  A few may be free because the service is in beta testing and needs the traffic for testing and QA.  (It's generally unwise to use a beta service for anything important!) 

In all cases there are service agreements - those boxes we all tick without reading when installing software.  They mostly say "we can withdraw this service at any time" and "if anything goes wrong,  it's not our problem."

In Evernote's case there's no income and no need for beta testing.  The 'freemium' model is intended to generate a conversion to subscription payments which - with the fairly wide limits originally applied - clearly was not working.  A large number of users were able - and very willing - to take advantage of this apparent free lunch and keep on coming back day after day for years with no intention of ever contributing actual cash for the service they were using.  I'd bet the actual conversion rate was a fraction of 1%

Which means the new,  very businesslike owners of Evernote have a problem.  They have literally millions of users who all use bandwidth when and if they connect,  and are probably taking up petabytes of storage with their historic data,  all of which is funded by actual subscribers like you and me.  It's not sustainable.

However mailing out to millions of free users to say "this service is ending" is like yelling fire in a cinema.  You are going to get buried by queries, complaints, additional attempts to connect,  users frantically trying to download their content... not to mention that there would be a flood of non-deliveries because a lot of users have moved on with their lives and don't use their Evernote registered email address any more.  Followed by more complaints from paying users who can't connect;

And Evernote is already under pressure from the takeover / getting used to the new package / putting up the subscriptions.

Far better to connect with the relative few who actually try to use their account and inform them then that things are changing.  There's still fall-out (clearly) but that's relatively low-key while Evernote refine their message.  I'd expect a full announcement  in the next couple of months when they've had a chance to review the results,

Any chat about 'extortion' and 'bad faith' and the like seems to me to be just paranoia.  Evernote/ BS are a responsible business organisation dealing with a commercial issue.  They're minimising any threat to their service and protecting their paying customers,  whilst also - apparently - protecting saved data from non-paying users (which is good practice,  but not a legal requirement...)

TANSTAAFL - there really is no such thing as a free lunch.  Contacting basic customers when (and if) they connect seems to me to be the most efficient and effective way to soft-release any changes.  Yes there's a disconnect between what was offered and what's being said now,  but unless you subscribe,  you have zero legal recourse. 

It's not possible to require that someone continue a free service - now that would be extortion.

 

 

 

 

[Dave-in-Decatur 4,006]

I agree with the reality that the free, plenty of available resources Evernote can't endure. But I also agree that the communication has been lacking, and the fact that the online plan comparison still lists the "old" free plan limitations, not the 1 notebook and 50 notes "test" limitations, is unclear at very best, and deceptive at very worst.

To me it's starting to sound like a Monty Python sketch. People are in a department store. John Cleese dressed up as a floor walker, flower in his buttonhole and all, walks around with an old-fashioned umbrella, randomly poking the pointy end of it into people's toes. When they complain, he says, "Oh, did you not like having you toe poked by an umbrella? We're running a test to see how many customers object to having their toes poked by an umbrella. It's only a test. Sorry." And pokes again.

[Boot17 1,539]

On 10/31/2023 at 6:41 PM, mackid1993 said:

I also want to add, there is NO cloud. Just someone ELSES computer. Using a free cloud service for anything remotely important is extremely poor information security practice and anyone who does that and then complains about it really should take the time to educate themselves about Information Security.

"there is NO cloud" -- got it. no cloud.

"Just someone ELSES computer" -- got it. Someone else's computer.

"Using a free cloud service..." -- wait -- we are back to there being a cloud again just two sentences later!? 🤣

Sorry -- I thought it was too funny to resist.

On 10/31/2023 at 6:41 PM, mackid1993 said:

Those using Evernote free or any free cloud service for anything besides recipes for banana bread are taking a massive risk.

There is a wide array of use cases in between banana bread recipes and critical data that doesn't all fall into the massive risk camp. Evernote also makes it easy enough to back up your data to your own machine which anyone can do.

 

[mackid1993 1,291]

3 hours ago, Boot17 said:

There is a wide array of use cases in between banana bread recipes and critical data that doesn't all fall into the massive risk camp. Evernote also makes it easy enough to back up your data to your own machine which anyone can do (at least for now anyway).

Everyone should always have backups of everything, preferably in different locations and on different media.

[debby0815 0]

As a note, I get the message when creating a note on my laptop but I can add a new note from my iphone and then I can see the new note from my laptop app.  Why the difference?

[gazumped 12,075]

13 hours ago, debby0815 said:

Why the difference?

This hasn't been fully implemented yet,  but I'd expect loopholes like that to be tidied up once an official announcement is made.

[DelphineB 0]

On 10/24/2023 at 12:18 PM, larissaF said:

Hello, 

I had the same message when trying to create a new note today (see image).However, when I browse the characteristics of the different types of subscriptions in the "help" section of Evernote, there is no mention anywhere of a limit of notes or notebooks.  

 

[PinkElephant 8,838]

We don’t know more about it than yourself.

But from how it looks, that’s the „new“ Free plan.

Once the initial 50 notes are exhausted, you need to subscribe to continue.

[SWSL 83]

I am also concerned about the price change when mine renews from whatever the least expensive level was last called (Plus?) to what is it now, "Personal"?      I did see that BS is offering a student discount and wonder if there could also be a "retiree/low income" tier.  Amazon USA offers this for prime subscription and I was able to verify low income using a medicaid approval among other things.    

Just a thought.   If you are making good money etc, then new pricing is still affordable I suppose.  But if you are living on a very restricted (under 30K USD for us) income, it's a much higher percentage of the yearly budget than for a "middle-class"  60 -150K household.     I know, it sounds whiney and anyway, why would anybody with a low income need good tools, right?    But realistically, there are a lot of people who live like students and it's a market segment that could represent additional income as free gets phased out.  

To reiterate, I am a long time subscriber advocating for sliding scale pricing that covers more than just students.  Don't have to create a new tier, just offer vetted alternate billing schemes as already done with promotions.  Many companies do this on a case by case basis via their "customer retention" department and maybe BS will too.  But upfront would be best.

[gazumped 12,075]

1 hour ago, SWSL said:

To reiterate, I am a long time subscriber advocating for sliding scale pricing that covers more than just students.  Don't have to create a new tier, just offer vetted alternate billing schemes as already done with promotions.  Many companies do this on a case by case basis via their "customer retention" department and maybe BS will too.  But upfront would be best.

We're mainly users here,  so no idea what idea what Evernote might contemplate.  They do offer some substantial 1-year discounts to encourage people to subscribe,  but until you get your invitation you won't know whether you'll have that offer.  I pay for professional which costs me about the same as a couple of coffees per week.  I think Evernote is worth that expense.  If you disagree,  you may need to look at alternative options...

[Dave-in-Decatur 4,006]

@SWSL, I sympathize with your point. I'm fortunate to have a good income in retirement, but I know that many others must make difficult choices. I do hope that Bending Spoons might wedge in a low-income discount, or a tier between Free and Personal. In fact, the current note size, notebooks, upload, etc. limits on Free accounts might work well as a low-end subscription plan, with a truly minimal trial plan for completely free use.

[Petsolb 55]

Considering the 'take-it-of-leave-it-popup message, maybe they are actually just looking for a way to get rid of free accounts asap to save some bandwidth and money as prices go up everywhere else? I guess it makes sense if they want to keep improving the software and keep the updates and fixes coming.

I do understand the frustration of having to upgrade from free to several dollars a month, and I made the decision to move down from the personal tier myself this year. I also think it would have been good to offer a more basic plan for people who aren't planning to use all the features, even though that would also have to be managed somehow. However, demanding that software stay completely free forever in a world where nothing really is, doesn't really make a lot of sense.

I do think efforts should be made to provide users with enough time to export their content if they are unable to upgrade at this time and choose to close their account. Or, let them keep access to the content they have already created, if possible.

[PinkElephant 8,838]

The Free tier was build on the expectation that users will get acquainted to the service, and eventually subscribe to win access to the full feature set.

It probably showed that the first part worked all too well, and the second didn’t. I mean, when you have all the data from user movements, it’s not really rocket science to know your conversion rate.

What went under the radar is that currently all grandfathered subscriptions are terminated when they become due. These subscribers are asked to move to Personal, or drop to free.

This is a pretty obvious statement that there will be no cheaper tier any more. As much as I understand the personal logic behind asking for it - I don’t think the course to a high featured, high priced product will be reversed.

Who can’t follow the move should get his parachute ready.

[gazumped 12,075]

I get the "I'm enjoying the comfort of a Rolls Royce but I don't go out much,  so I think you should offer a 'not driving' subscription for ownership that is much cheaper than actually buying the complete luxury car..."  - but seriously?  You have access to any content you saved to this point,  but if you wish to go further - pay a subscription,  or find an alternative. 

[Dave-in-Decatur 4,006]

18 hours ago, gazumped said:

I get the "I'm enjoying the comfort of a Rolls Royce but I don't go out much,  so I think you should offer a 'not driving' subscription for ownership that is much cheaper than actually buying the complete luxury car..."  - but seriously?  You have access to any content you saved to this point,  but if you wish to go further - pay a subscription,  or find an alternative. 

I think this misstates the point some people are making. It's more like "The free ride was great. I understand it can't last forever. I can't afford the Rolls, or even the F-150. Could I please have a Corolla?"

[gazumped 12,075]

40 minutes ago, Dave-in-Decatur said:

I think this misstates the point some people are making.

OK - I'll accept that - as long as everyone understand the answer (to the corolla question) is 'no'...

[DirkBelig 0]

Been a free user since April 2010 to which I'm sure the cultists with thousands of posts and will defend Evernote's corporate antics to the death because they loves it so will sneer, "Then pay for glorious Evernote!" I too have been frozen out of creating new notes by this garbage "1 notebook, 50 notes" blockade which doesn't even appear as the Free tied in their options list. That remains what I've always had 1 device + web sync, 60 MB in uploads, etc.

I have 8 notebooks (some unused in a decade) and 963 notes. That works out to an average 71 notes per year or 1.3 per week. My notes are usually copies of things I've posted or the occasional list. I don't need collaborative tools or any of the features I'm being extorted to pay $78 (with the one-time discount) to keep using EN. Basically I'm supposed to pay a dollar a note or figure out how to migrate my note life somewhere else. This is the extortion that the fans are cheering.

There was no warning for this shenanigans. At least when they reduced the device sync to one they warned you ahead of time and kept web access open. Nothing in their plan tiers mentions this new 1 notebook thing. My use of EN has ground to a halt and while the cult is happy to purge the heretics, this still sucks.

[SWSL 83]

59 minutes ago, Dave-in-Decatur said:

I think this misstates the point some people are making. It's more like "The free ride was great. I understand it can't last forever. I can't afford the Rolls, or even the F-150. Could I please have a Corolla?"

Well said.  But it goes beyond the "free ride" dismissal.   Many of us have paid in consistently over many years, supporting the company and turning on others to EN;  it was hardly a free ride.   Still, at some price point, cost is an issue. 

It's not even "could you make a Corolla for us little guys? "  It's more like "Hey, you got me to try your automobile invention and after a decade I have become accustomed to having a car - it is really a fine way to get around.  But then you added so many features  (or maybe cars were always subsidized and the price was artificially low, but anyway)  now it's looking like my only option is a high-priced luxury car.  But me, I don't really need all the luxury, I just need a car.  It sure would be nice if you could offer something dialed back and more affordable for our market segment.   Maybe it would even help your bottom line!"

Personally, I use EN enough so that I will drop Amazon prime or something as EN gets more expensive.  I depend on this system and it's important to me.  I don't really care about most of the added features but now that they are part of the package, I don't seem to have a choice.   Leather seats or no seats? OK, looks like I'll be paying for leather. 

I used to ski and would see this with the smaller resorts.  They would have a nice mountainside with 4 good lifts.  Affordable. good skiing. Plenty of vertical.  Short lines.  Then they opened another area, built more parking lots, more lifts, then lodges, more development.  Eventually, it's another big deal place that is crowded and charges top rates. Do I get to ski more?  No, actually the lines are longer so I skied less.  Eventually, I couldn't afford it anymore and stopped skiing.  I guess their business model worked for the investors anyway.  

It's an aspect of how the world works today - but I'm not a fan.

[SWSL 83]

45 minutes ago, gazumped said:

OK - I'll accept that - as long as everyone understand the answer (to the corolla question) is 'no'...

So the level/price structuring is final then?   I imagined that they are still sorting things out as they redefine the levels.   Are you with management or perhaps have a good line of communication with BS ?  

[PinkElephant 8,838]

Let me say this: All of us who are active with this forum since a while sort of observed what's going on. We are users, we have no inside knowledge. But we are used to read the grapevine.

There is one significant change that went for most under the radar (see my post above): The old management year by year continued the grandfathered subscriptions (Plus, old Premium). This policy has changed: These subscribers are now asked to upgrade to Personal, or downgrade to Free when their subscription becomes due.

How likely is it a "base level subscription" will be introduced when existing "base" subscriptions in the 40-60$ p.y. range are actively discontinued ? Doesn't really take a degree in rocket science to predict this, does it ?

[s2sailor 2,456]

Evernote is, or was offering a 40% discount for many of those that dropped down to the free plan.  To me that suggests the jury is still out on whether we may see a lower entry price point.

[PinkElephant 8,838]

True enough, but all discounts are 1st year only. And none of them are available for existing subscribers who want to renew their subscriptions.

[gazumped 12,075]

14 hours ago, SWSL said:

Are you with management or perhaps have a good line of communication with BS ?  

For the record - just another user.  I do have some lines into the Forum admins as a Mod too,  but that's just housekeeping stuff.  I find out about policy decisions when the rest of the world does.

[CalS 5,310]

Plan for the 100% price and potential perhaps "typical" increases and you won't get disappointed.

[wineandpassports 0]

I get that companies need to make money but that's no excuse to have ZERO communication about this change

[PinkElephant 8,838]

As of today, AFAIK it’s not official. Those users who participate in the market test are informed.

BTW for Free accounts EN can change the rules without consent and at any time.

[zztopman1 1]

OKAY, just saw my account went from '$34' to Personal to the turn of $129!!!

I'm not happy about that at all. I would love to talk to Customer Service direct, I've been a paying member since 2015, but not at a $129 rate I'm not. Somehow it said if I didn't do anything my account would stay at $34 for the plan I was on.... but it got upgraded to 'Personal' without me knowing it.

 

[Dave-in-Decatur 4,006]

11 hours ago, PinkElephant said:

As of today, AFAIK it’s not official. Those users who participate in the market test are informed.

BTW for Free accounts EN can change the rules without consent and at any time.

These are good points. But I will say that "participating" is not quite the word I'd use in regard to a market test, particularly one like this, since "participating" implies a measure of consent. One does not "participate" in, say, a landslide.

[PinkElephant 8,838]

„ … those users who are participated in the market test …“

[gazumped 12,075]

On 11/25/2023 at 8:55 PM, zztopman1 said:

OKAY, just saw my account went from '$34' to Personal to the turn of $129!!!

I'm not happy about that at all. I would love to talk to Customer Service direct, I've been a paying member since 2015, but not at a $129 rate I'm not. Somehow it said if I didn't do anything my account would stay at $34 for the plan I was on.... but it got upgraded to 'Personal' without me knowing it.

Hi.  The changes were announced by Evernote in April and have been sent out again to the addresses registered with them a month before each subscription renewal.  There's no access to chat for the moment - this and other changes caused a lot of Support requests - but there are now no other subscription options apart from Personal,  Professional or Teams.  It's a sharp increase if you were previously on a 'grandfathered' scheme of some kind,  but AFAIK no concessions are being made. 

If you don't think the app is worth that sort of subscription you can certainly request a refund and look elsewhere - though you may have a wait of several days for any response.  Support and CS are here... https://help.evernote.com/hc/requests/new

[zztopman1 1]

17 hours ago, gazumped said:

 It's a sharp increase if you were previously on a 'grandfathered' scheme of some kind,  but AFAIK no concessions are being made. 

If you don't think the app is worth that sort of subscription you can certainly request a refund and look elsewhere - though you may have a wait of several days for any response.  Support and CS are here... https://help.evernote.com/hc/requests/new

I guess I thought the 'grandfathered' in still was in effect from here out for older members.

Sorry, since and if, I misunderstood. I don't use all the features available so I'm not sure what to do, obviously evernote is unique. I have 900 notes so I guess I don't qualify for anything free? Or can I request a FREE account?  I'll take the "year" to deem it worth it or not. Thanks

[Boot17 1,539]

13 minutes ago, zztopman1 said:

I have 900 notes so I guess I don't qualify for anything free? Or can I request a FREE account?

Four months ago the answer to this question would have been more straight-forward and sure, but now...

You can cancel your subscription and that will allow you to keep your Evernote account but you will have these limits: https://help.evernote.com/hc/en-us/articles/209005247-Evernote-system-limits. Note that link states: 100,000 notes and 250 notebooks for free accounts, but this thread demonstrates that some free users are being limited to just 50 notes and 1 notebook. What future limitations are in store for free accounts is any users' guess now.

However, in all cases (so far) you will be able to access your notes still indefinitely from a free account, albeit from just two "devices" (the web version counts as one separate device across any number of computers).

[gazumped 12,075]

To cancel a subscription online (provided you pay direct to Evernote) go to https://www.evernote.com/BillyBillingProfile.action (it's the 'Billing' page of your online account) and check out the very bottom of the page,  just above "Terms of Service".   

[zztopman1 1]

On 11/26/2023 at 5:31 PM, gazumped said:

If you don't think the app is worth that sort of subscription you can certainly request a refund and look elsewhere - though you may have a wait of several days for any response.  Support and CS are here... https://help.evernote.com/hc/requests/new

I put a ticket in and thank you. I used PAYPAL, I hope I can just add a CC to my account and get refunded that way. I'll go to a FREE account and accept and consequences to my notes from there. I just didn't use all the full features of Evernote to justify $129. $34 was fine for the ease of the app and such, but ...

[gazumped 12,075]

33 minutes ago, zztopman1 said:

I just didn't use all the full features of Evernote to justify $129

Using any of the features means you're connecting to their servers and storing notes there,  plus getting access from anywhere - the annual cost is only a little more than a streaming TV service or (here in the UK) a couple of cups of coffee a week.  Well worth it for me - plus it means Evernote is likely to be around for a while longer!

[EricLorenz 97]

This has certainly been an interesting read. I don't get over here as often as I used to- I am in so many forums now that I do not have the time/bandwidth...

Anyway...I first learned about this happening from a couple of EN forums I am on in Facebook. An article in TechCrunch seemed to confirm this. For the most part, I do not have an issue with this. I would put EN on par with most other major productivity apps- where there is no "free". Bottom line- especially for an app of this type, it costs money. My only reason for pause is that I too wish that BS would have announced what they were doing before they... just started doing it. They seem to have a strange way in general of doing things...I don't if its because its now an out-of-US company or what.

That being said, EN is too valuable to me- I am sticking with it. I have 17000 notes in over 200 notebooks. I tried moving to OneNote. Once. That was ugly. Maybe there are other solutions out there. I do not have time to explore and move.

If there was a poll going, my vote would be- take the current "free" level and convert to a lower-priced basic level with the same features. I think then the new "free" level wouldn't be so unpalatable. Just my thoughts, YMMV.

[PinkElephant 8,838]

Obviously EN believes the low price accounts are unsustainable as well. Currently the subscribers with grandfathered plans like Plus or Premium are asked prior to their renewal date to move up to Personal (first year rebates offered), or to downgrade to Free.

When this has run its course, after 12 months there will be no „basic tier plans“ left. I doubt after actively closing them, they will be revived.

[gazumped 12,075]

2 hours ago, EricLorenz said:

If there was a poll going, my vote would be- take the current "free" level and convert to a lower-priced basic level with the same features. I think then the new "free" level wouldn't be so unpalatable. Just my thoughts, YMMV.

I think the poll would have to be - what do you need included in the 'basic' plan?  More or less everything Evernote does (AFAICS) requires constant syncing with the server,  and free online storage space.  The service is pretty much either 'on' or 'off'  there's no realistic half-measures I can see that might justify an ongoing discount.

[Dave-in-Decatur 4,006]

22 hours ago, gazumped said:

I think the poll would have to be - what do you need included in the 'basic' plan?  More or less everything Evernote does (AFAICS) requires constant syncing with the server,  and free online storage space.  The service is pretty much either 'on' or 'off'  there's no realistic half-measures I can see that might justify an ongoing discount.

One "half-measure" might be a serious limitation on uploads and number of notes. (Limiting notebooks is just silly; I can't see where it saves Evernote anything meaningful.) What is given away for free now might be paid for with a relatively modest subscription fee to account for the syncing and storage.

[Wanderling Reborn 186]

Lowering prices is done for two reasons - to attract new paying customers, or to prevent the existing ones from leaving. I don’t think they are treating attracting new customers as a major priority (and haven’t been for a while), and the existing paying customers are already paying, why provide them with an option to pay less ? 

 

[SWSL 83]

3 hours ago, Wanderling Reborn said:

... existing paying customers are already paying, why provide them with an option to pay less ? 

 

Actually, many long term customers have been paying in at now eliminated levels.  When our renewals come up and our cost rises significantly, there will be some who are not big users or don't have enough disposable income that opt out unless there is a workable option.  

As far as server usage goes, monthly upload limits has been one of the ways to distinguish levels from the start.  And, as most of us know, many many apps and programs offer good utility for a regular plan while locking out cool features that business, power and/or high income users will not want to miss out on.  

There is always a decision with a business about pricing.  Do you price higher and make more on fewer users or do you price lower and depend more on economy of scale.  In this product servers are not the only expense.   Management, maintenance, development. initial buyout etc. all contribute to the cost of the service and these can lower per user as numbers go up.  

Again, I'm seeing many corporations dealing with this so that they can have it both ways.  They get the most out of customers who have the money to pay premium while offering a good enough product for those who might be otherwise excluded from the customer base.   An example is cell service.  Post pay cell service in the US is very expensive but you get priority and support.   The same companies also now run somewhat separate prepay businesses that use the same network but deprioritize data and minimize customer support.  It works.  Everybody gets what they can afford and the companies get more business off the same network. 

[PinkElephant 8,838]

All your arguments are sound and valid.

At the same time it is a fact that EN actively switches grandfathered „basic“ subscriptions to Personal. They obviously accept that a part of these users will decide to leave.

I doubt they haven’t discussed it all, and took a decision. We see the result, which is to shut down what is left of prior basic subscriptions.

Draw your own conclusions.

[Wanderling Reborn 186]

9 hours ago, SWSL said:

Actually, many long term customers have been paying in at now eliminated levels.  When our renewals come up and our cost rises significantly, there will be some who are not big users or don't have enough disposable income that opt out unless there is a workable option.  

As far as server usage goes, monthly upload limits has been one of the ways to distinguish levels from the start.  And, as most of us know, many many apps and programs offer good utility for a regular plan while locking out cool features that business, power and/or high income users will not want to miss out on.  

There is always a decision with a business about pricing.  Do you price higher and make more on fewer users or do you price lower and depend more on economy of scale.  In this product servers are not the only expense.   Management, maintenance, development. initial buyout etc. all contribute to the cost of the service and these can lower per user as numbers go up.  

Again, I'm seeing many corporations dealing with this so that they can have it both ways.  They get the most out of customers who have the money to pay premium while offering a good enough product for those who might be otherwise excluded from the customer base.   An example is cell service.  Post pay cell service in the US is very expensive but you get priority and support.   The same companies also now run somewhat separate prepay businesses that use the same network but deprioritize data and minimize customer support.  It works.  Everybody gets what they can afford and the companies get more business off the same network. 

Some will leave, but some doesn’t equal all.

As long as the % of legacy plan customers leaving is less than the % of cost increase, the overall revenue is going up, not down.

With the price of service almost doubling, it would take over half of the formerly grandfathered paid plans customers leaving to have a negative monetary impact. I think it’s clear that the EN owners don’t believe that this is going to happen. If even a third leaves, and the remaining 2/3rds are paying 90% more.. do the math.

[SWSL 83]

@Wandering Reborn:  You make some assumptions to arrive at your conclusion that there are no options possible besides double or nothing.  But after watching several rounds of subscription structure and pricing changes over the years and seeing how these things vary with other products,  I am not convinced that the pricing structure of the moment is the only sustainable option. 

We will see how the new owners' thinking about their product and market evolves.  They may have hit on a good balance just as you believe.   As I tried to say, there are many ways to skin this cat and each has it's trade-offs.  

 

 

[MrIllustrator 165]

Turned out to be true in the end didn't it: https://9to5mac.com/2023/12/01/evernote-free-users-new-limits/

Should be:

Free = Free, limited but 50 notes and 1 notebook is ridiculous, doesn't give free users a chance to see what's possible. That's what we want as a platform, to put off new users, put up ridiculous barriers to new people that want to join and see what the Evernote Community is about. Won't the majority of new people just choose one of the excellent free alternatives?

So the biggest feature Bending Spoons have implemented in the last year of acquisition is (Removal of the free version). Personally I'm not impressed and in fact quite worried, sorry guys, this does not give me confidence in Evernote, I'd left when they doubled the price and only came back when they offered me a 50% discount only 2 months after I'd left, what does that tell you?

I'd been using Evernote every day for over 11 years with over 13 thousand notes, I was a loyal paying user until the money grab without explanation. My very first contact from Bending Spoons to me back then was "We're doubling your subscription price" I'm sorry but I'd never even heard of Bending Spoons except though Uri Geller, if you think that is good PR, well, I don't want to work in your company!. 

Bending Spoons could have at the very least sent me an email introducing themselves with their exciting new acquisition and ideas, done me the courtesy of at least attempting to sell themselves to me, no they couldn't be bothered. It's been around a year now and I'm still waiting for any new interesting additions to Evernote, the only ones I can remember are bug fixes, I started screenshooting them and saving them to prove it to myself.

Long term users know it's not as good as the old version, no multiple windows, export of maximum of 50 notes (Still, Why?), no easy way of getting your information out of the app in a standard format (of course on purpose). Now you can't I think but luckily I knew how when it was possible and exported all my 13 thousand notes and 25 notebooks with the old version you then killed. Yes only the old, previous out of date version could do this, you all know that though.

Took them all into the new excellent (Free) Apple Notes. There are some great things Evernote can do for me such as simply being able to email straight into a notebook with multiple tags but it's all about trust, do I really trust a company that treats it's users in that way, with my very important information when they have deliberately made it hard to impossible for current users to get their own information out and then seem to treat new users with utter contempt. 50 notes and 1 notebook, just look how much inconvenience you are causing many of your current users, Oh but they don't count because they don't pay do they, I wonder why? are you joking? Even though I'm a paying customer I'm actually interested in Evernote not dying and it can only do this with a constant stream of new users.

This is just my personal point of view, I know other people will hate all this, that's their right, luckily no one is forced to listen to anyone else, just do your own thing as I will, depending on how much they try to put up my subscription and the value that has for me with all the new features that so far are absent as far as I'm concerned. I could not name one new feature, just steps backwards.

[Boot17 1,539]

16 hours ago, Wanderling Reborn said:

and the existing paying customers are already paying, why provide them with an option to pay less ?

I think exactly this. Even pre-Bending Spoons, Evernote stopped allowing new sign-ups on the lower cost Plus plan around 2018 (?) I believe and then stopped allowing new sign-ups on Premium once they introduced the higher cost Personal and Professional plans. If they now introduced even a lower paying tier than Plus, you might get some free users to start paying that, but you'll also get a lot of $129 per year people thinking at some point they could also get by on just that. Without that lower subscription lifeline, you have to choose between staying or going and they know that those of us that are invested will most likely stay (as long as that price isn't too outrageously high -- which it now is for some).

[gazumped 12,075]

57 minutes ago, MrIllustrator said:

one of the excellent free alternatives?

The 'free' alternatives either show you adds,  sell upgrades as part of their process,  or sell your activity data to others to fund their services.  Evernote do not.

On your other point I've already seen one user say "50 notes is fine - I only need 36" - and it is enough to see how Evernote works.  If you want to use even part of the full service and you need more than 50 test notes,  then you need to subscribe.

[Boot17 1,539]

1 hour ago, MrIllustrator said:

I'd left when they doubled the price and only came back when they offered me a 50% discount only 2 months after I'd left, what does that tell you?

It tells me their plan to entice you to come back and get a little more money from you worked. 😉

Sure, you cancelled and got a cheaper rate to come back because you were only willing to pay a cheaper rate, but many don't cancel and just pay the higher price. 

FWIW - I also cancelled and then resubscribed at a 40% discount (but I also fully intended to stay subscribed either way).

1 hour ago, MrIllustrator said:

until the money grab without explanation

They did have an explanation though? https://evernote.com/blog/evernote-pricing-upcoming-features-update

Surely not a good enough explanation for many, but it was an explanation.

[Wanderling Reborn 186]

3 hours ago, Boot17 said:

I think exactly this. Even pre-Bending Spoons, Evernote stopped allowing new sign-ups on the lower cost Plus plan around 2018 (?) I believe and then stopped allowing new sign-ups on Premium once they introduced the higher cost Personal and Professional plans. If they now introduced even a lower paying tier than Plus, you might get some free users to start paying that, but you'll also get a lot of $129 per year people thinking at some point they could also get by on just that. Without that lower subscription lifeline, you have to choose between staying or going and they know that those of us that are invested will most likely stay (as long as that price isn't too outrageously high -- which it now is for some).

Exactly. Evernote had insufficient free-to-paid conversion rates ten years ado, when the mobile device market was going through explosive growth, and there was little competition. They are not going to perform the growth strategy any better now that the market has stagnated (ok, matured…) and there’s a lot of competition. They do however have a large number of deeply invested paying customers for whom no other service will replace Evernote because no other service is a copy of Evernote. Raising prices is a natural strategy - as long as they are careful enough and don’t lose too many paying legacy customers (and they won’t, not at these price levels). 

We are already seeing a lot of such rent-seeking behavior, and it’s only going to get worse as the market, realistically, matured about seven years ago. The old “charge little, bring in more” model was a pyramid scheme fueled by the initial smartphone and tablet boom.  

[Wanderling Reborn 186]

10 hours ago, gazumped said:

The 'free' alternatives either show you adds,  sell upgrades as part of their process,  or sell your activity data to others to fund their services.  Evernote do not.

On your other point I've already seen one user say "50 notes is fine - I only need 36" - and it is enough to see how Evernote works.  If you want to use even part of the full service and you need more than 50 test notes,  then you need to subscribe.

Sure. But for a very large number of customers. ads, upsells, and / or privacy issues are not as important as features and cost. I mean, how many Evernote users have Gmail ? Talk about data mining...

When Evernote appeared, or rather when I was looking for my first mobile-accessible data organizer around 2010-11, there was precious little competition. You had Google Keep (which is actually an excellent service, data mining concerns aside, but back then, from what I remember, little more than sticky notes). You had Onenote, which would have been my natural choice since I've already heavily used it at work, but it was hopelessly underdeveloped on mobile (even on their own Windows Mobile platform, it was almost feature-less). You had Springpad, which I actually liked a lot (it was sort of a cross between Evernote and Keep) but they went to some stupid Instagram-like visual design before going belly up. That was really it... The market was growing like crazy, and Evernote was what everyone talked about and the first thing people tried.

Now, you have a whole lot better Onenote mobile clients, Keep has matured and AFAIK supports PDFs and text OCR, you have Notion, Obsidian, Bear, UpNote, Joplin, Zoho (that has quietly matured into a pretty decent thing from a quick glance), and some more obscure services like ClickUp which offer data management on top of their project management tools. I am sure there's a few I forgot about. More importantly, there are pretty robust OCR and search tools built into cloud storage services like Onedrive / Google Drive / iCloud - have that existed 12 years ago, I'd probably never look elsewhere. So while the "free" or less expensive alternatives may not work for you or other people like you who have grown very reliant on EN and the specific ways it works, they are going to absorb the bulk of new potential users coming onto the market - simply because a free tool that works well enough will suffice for most.

[Paul A. 677]

16 minutes ago, Wanderling Reborn said:

I mean, how many Evernote users have Gmail ? Talk about data mining...

FYI, Google hasn't scanned Gmail content for advertising purposes for over 6 years.

[Wanderling Reborn 186]

On 10/31/2023 at 8:41 PM, mackid1993 said:

I also want to add, there is NO cloud. Just someone ELSES computer. Using a free cloud service for anything remotely important is extremely poor information security practice and anyone who does that and then complains about it really should take the time to educate themselves about Information Security.

I don't trust my critical data to anything that I don't pay for or host on my own network. That is also why I use only paid email with multiple custom domains that I own and have full control over the DNS of. 

Those using Evernote free or any free cloud service for anything besides recipes for banana bread are taking a massive risk.

Everything is on someone's computer. The difference is, when you store info in the cloud and maintain local backups, your data is spread across multiple computers, so it has better chances of surviving in case of a server / drive failure. Personally, while all major services have had data loss accidents, they are still far better set up for both preventing the losses and recovering from them, than an average person or a small business. I have my data on three separate removable drives, on two different computers, and on Onedrive. Onedrive has saved my behind several times over the years. Anything I don't want them to see goes into an encrypted Cryptomator vault. 

If by "Information Security" you mean controlling access to your data... well email always has at least two recipients. Unless you have strict control over what addresses you are emailing, most emails you send or receive will go through MS or Google servers on the other end. I myself use Proton mail, but I am not kidding myself - it does not buy me privacy, just makes it a little safer on my end. It is still possible for every email I send or receive to be compromised on the other end.

[Wanderling Reborn 186]

3 minutes ago, Paul A. said:

FYI, Google hasn't scanned Gmail content for advertising purposes for over 6 years.

"For advertising purposes" is the key here. They announced back in the summer of 2016 that they would not use email scans to personalize ads, not that they would not scan emails for any other purposes. Google's FAQ today states "we do not scan your emails to show you ads". Which begs the question, are they scanning them for any other purposes (virus scanning obviously, but also criminal content, AI training etc.)

[Paul A. 677]

4 hours ago, Wanderling Reborn said:

"For advertising purposes" is the key here. They announced back in the summer of 2016 that they would not use email scans to personalize ads, not that they would not scan emails for any other purposes. Google's FAQ today states "we do not scan your emails to show you ads". Which begs the question, are they scanning them for any other purposes (virus scanning obviously, but also criminal content, AI training etc.)

They don't scan personal user content for AI training, per their privacy policy. They do use publicly available information for AI training. They scan for viruses, spam, CSAM, for attachments so they can link to Drive or Photos, for user-specific AI features, and so on. Nothing nefarious.

[PinkElephant 8,838]

For me it is simple: If I look at the quarterly earnings reports, Google makes his income from targeting its users with tailored advertising. That’s what makes the money.

I don’t care about the nitty bitty details of how they do it - I simply assume they will collect every single bit of information they get, and try to connect it with my „anonymous but individualized“ twin in their data hoard.

So it is very simple: Avoid services with that income structure as much as possible. Who has a GMail or Google account (same with Meta/FB) has voluntarily given up control over his data and digital life.

It doesn’t matter how fine tuned their terms of use are worded to leave exactly the loopholes they need for their business. Just follow the money trail.

[Wanderling Reborn 186]

5 hours ago, Paul A. said:

They don't scan personal user content for AI training, per their privacy policy. They do use publicly available information for AI training. They scan for viruses, spam, CSAM, for attachments so they can link to Drive or Photos, for user-specific AI features, and so on. Nothing nefarious.

They also allowed users to turn off location tracking yet tracked them anyway, by deliberately burying two different settings in different places in User Settings, both had to be manually turned off otherwise they still tracked you even if you explicitly disabled location tracking in one place but didn’t know about the other setting.

https://apnews.com/article/828aefab64d4411bac257a07c1af0ecb

So, is there a comprehensive list of everything that Google does scan your emails for, or are they just saying what specific use cases they are not implementing ? 
They didn’t stop email scanning out of the goodness of their hearts, they were being sued and faced a potentially disastrous damage if they lost the class action lawsuit filed on behalf of the millions of people who were not Gmail users and who never agreed to Google’s T&Cs but still had their emails mined. (Of course there was no guarantee that this particular lawsuit would succeed, but it was just a first salvo). 
They are also being sued for mining user data in Incognito mode in Chrome, and tying it with that specific user’s data profile. Google’s response? “Well we never said that we won’t track you in Incognito mode”. 

https://techxplore.com/news/2023-08-google-toss-lawsuit-potentially-incognito.html

I don’t think they are trustworthy, period.