Russel Williams, “Adobe Principal Scientist,” interviewed in Photoshop is a city for everyone:

"People take an artist toolbox and use the tools in totally bizarre ways," he says. Adobe can’t simply decree how people use its product; as with a city, users find their own way through it. That makes it hard to establish just what Photoshop is — it has to be something for everybody.

Photoshop has since long filled the basic needs of most users, but there’s a limit to what is relevant to most users. The massive amount of features is what has caused Photoshop to flourish, but if Adobe keeps its habit of saying yes to everything, it will eventually be its demise. Photoshop doesn’t have to be something for everybody—most people I know use Photoshop despite the amount of features it houses, not because of it. New features are getting more and more niched with every release, and the complexity and feature bloat is adding to the hefty price tag. And judging by the statements from Adobe in the article, it doesn’t seem to be getting any better.

Photoshop has for long, despite its amount of features, been able to be the best alternative within each niche—there really hasn’t been any good alternatives. But more focused apps like Pixelmator and Sketch are steadily getting better at a faster pace than Photoshop is keeping up. Hopefully it won’t be long before users will stop asking themselves “Is there a good alternative to Photoshop?,” and start asking themselves “Why should I pay $980 more?”