How to get Evernote Premium for €20 ($22) a year

Evernote is a great note taking platform, which I covered before in this blog post. A few days ago, they announced a dramatic change to the pricing of their paid plans. In particular, the following changes occurred:

  • Evernote Plus went from $24.99/year to $34.99/year
  • Evernote Premium went from $49.99/year to $69.99/year
  • Evernote Free is now limited to two active devices

Criticism from users

These news unleashed quite a bit of discussion at the Evernote forum, especially because Plus and Premium users who have been paying for years don’t like a 40% increase in prices without any new feature.

Free users are also a bit upset because the philosophy of former CEO Phil Libin has not been respected:

The idea is that we want you to use Evernote forever. Once you’re using it, we want you to keep using it, and it’s more important that you stay than you pay us. We want the engagement. The longer you use it, the higher the perceived value gets. And the higher the perceived value, the more willing you’re willing to pay. It’s up to us to make something that you want to pay for. The percentage of people who pay in the first month is like one half of one percent. But if they use it for a year, that goes up to seven percent. In the second year, it goes up to 11 percent. Our oldest cohort, the people who have been with us five years or so, it goes up to 25 percent.

Of course, some say that free users are only a cost so their opinions are not important, but Phil Libin has been pretty good at explaining the opposite. The strict limit of two devices will break the flow of new users (and potential clients).

I have been a Free, a Plus and a Premium user at different points, hence I understand the concerns of all users.

Different prices in different countries

The Evernote announcement contained a huge hint to something I didn’t fully realize before, i.e. that “regional pricing may vary”. Initially, I though of obvious small differences related to different currencies and rounding numbers. For example, Premium costs $70 in the USA which roughly corresponds to €63. The price in Italy is €60, but it is more or less the same.

This forum post by a Brazilian user revealed that there’s more than meets the eye:

I would NOT pay US$ 70 / year to keep using Evernote, but the Plus subscription here in Brazil is quite affordable, so I’ll keep using Evernote

This is interesting!

Evernote accepts PayPal payments, but only for supported currencies. Unfortunately, PayPal only allows Brazilians to pay using Brazilian Real as a currency. Therefore I took the time to use several servers of the VPN service I use daily, to check prices in the countries listed on the PayPal page.

I discovered that Evernote prices vary a lot between countries. This table shows how much Premium costs in some of the countries where Evernote is cheaper than the USA. The amounts in euros are rounded and those in US dollars are derived from them:

Country Price in EUR
(rounded)
Price in USD
(assuming €1 = $1.11)
Russia € 28,00 $31,08
Taiwan € 38,00 $42,18
Mexico € 19,00 $21,09
Israel € 37,00 $41,07
Poland € 22,00 $24,42
Singapore € 38,00 $42,18
Japan € 45,00 $49,95
Brazil € 22,00 $24,42
Hong Kong € 41,00 $45,51

Basically, a Mexican Premium account has the same features but it costs a third of an American one.

Buying the subscription

I tried to buy a year of Evernote Premium at the Mexican price and I confirm it works. The idea is simple: anyone can use a VPN service to connect to Evernote through a Mexican IP address and pay the 399MXN price.

Therefore, you will need one that supports Mexico. I have written about some VPN services (both free and paid) in the past, but you can actually use any as long as they provide you a server in Mexico. Many commercial VPNs offer a free trial and you only need the service for 10 minutes. 😉

Once your VPN connection is active, head over to the Evernote pricing page and you will see the prices in Mexican Pesos. You can proceed to activate your account and pay through PayPal:

Buying a year of Evernote Premium for €20
Buying a year of Evernote Premium for €20

PayPal will also set up an auto-renewable subscription with the Mexican price, so you don’t need to repeat the process if you plan to buy the subscription again. Finally, you need to wait for a few minutes.

You will receive a confirmation email from Evernote telling you that you that your profile has been switched to Premium. That’s it, you don’t need the VPN anymore. 🙂

Come avere Evernote Premium a €20 all’anno

Evernote è un’ottima piattaforma per prendere note, di cui ho parlato in precedenza in questo post. Alcuni giorni fa, hanno annunciato un cambiamento drastico ai prezzi dei loro piani a pagamento. In particolare, ci sono state queste modifiche:

  • Evernote Plus è passato da $24.99/anno a $34.99/anno
  • Evernote Premium è passato da $49.99/anno a $69.99/anno
  • Evernote Free adesso è limitato a due dispositivi attivi

Critiche dagli utenti

Queste novità hanno scatenato un bel po’ di discussioni nel forum di Evernote, specialmente perché gli utenti Plus e Premium che hanno pagato per anni non apprezzano un incremento dei prezzi del 40% senza nessuna nuova funzionalità.

Gli utenti Free sono anch’essi un po’ contrariati perché la filosofia dell’ex amministratore delegato Phil Libin non è stata rispettata:

The idea is that we want you to use Evernote forever. Once you’re using it, we want you to keep using it, and it’s more important that you stay than you pay us. We want the engagement. The longer you use it, the higher the perceived value gets. And the higher the perceived value, the more willing you’re willing to pay. It’s up to us to make something that you want to pay for. The percentage of people who pay in the first month is like one half of one percent. But if they use it for a year, that goes up to seven percent. In the second year, it goes up to 11 percent. Our oldest cohort, the people who have been with us five years or so, it goes up to 25 percent.

Ovviamente, alcuni dicono che gli utenti free sono solo un costo e quindi le loro opinioni non sono importanti, ma Phil Libin ha saputo spiegare bene il contrario. Il limite stretto di due dispositivi distruggerà l’afflusso di nuovi utenti (e potenziali clienti).

Sono stato un utente Free, Plus e Premium in momenti diversi, quindi capisco le preoccupazioni di tutti gli utenti.

Prezzi diversi in nazioni diverse

L’annuncio di Evernote conteneva un enorme indizio su qualcosa che non avevo capito appieno prima, vale a dire che “i prezzi per regione potrebbero variare”. Inizialmente, ho pensato alle ovvie piccole differenze relative alle varie valute e all’arrotondamento dei numeri. Per esempio, Premium costa $70 negli USA che corrisponde circa a €63. Il prezzo in Italia è €60, ma è più o meno lo stesso.

Questo messaggio sul forum di un utente brasiliano ha rivelato che non bisogna fermarsi alle apparenze:

I would NOT pay US$ 70 / year to keep using Evernote, but the Plus subscription here in Brazil is quite affordable, so I’ll keep using Evernote

Questo è interessante!

Evernote accetta pagamenti PayPal, ma solo per le valute supportate. Sfortunatamente, PayPal permette solo ai brasiliani di pagare usando il Real Brasiliano come valuta. Quindi ho speso un po’ di tempo per provare vari server del servizio VPN che uso quotidianamente, al fine di verificare i prezzi nei paesi indicati sulla pagina di PayPal.

Ho scoperto che i prezzi di Evernote variano un sacco tra le nazioni. Questa tabella mostra quanto costa Premium in alcuni dei paesi in cui Evernote è più economico che negli USA. Gli importi in euro sono arrotondati e quelli in dollari americani sono derivati da essi:

Nazione Prezzo in EUR
(arrotondato)
Prezzo in USD
(supponendo €1 = $1.11)
Russia € 28,00 $31,08
Taiwan € 38,00 $42,18
Messico € 19,00 $21,09
Israele € 37,00 $41,07
Polonia € 22,00 $24,42
Singapore € 38,00 $42,18
Giappone € 45,00 $49,95
Brasile € 22,00 $24,42
Hong Kong € 41,00 $45,51

In sostanza, un account Premium messicano ha le stesse funzioni ma costa un terzo di uno americano.

Comprare l’abbonamento

Ho provato a comprare un anno di Evernote Premium al prezzo messicano e confermo che funziona. L’idea è semplice: chiunque può usare un servizio VPN per connettersi a Evernote con un indirizzo IP messicano e pagare il prezzo di 399MXN.

Quindi, avrete bisogno di uno che supporti il Messico. Ho scritto di alcuni servizi VPN (sia gratuiti che a pagamento) in passato, ma in realtà ne potete usare uno qualsiasi fintantoché vi fornisca un server in Messico. Molte VPN commerciali offrono una prova gratuita e avrete bisogno del servizio solo per 10 minuti. 😉

Una volta che la vostra connessione VPN è attiva, recatevi alla pagina delle tariffe di Evernote e vedrete i prezzi in peso messicani. Potete procedere ad attivare l’account e pagare con PayPal:

Buying a year of Evernote Premium for €20
Comprare un anno di Evernote Premium per €20

PayPal inoltre attiverà un abbonamento con rinnovo automatico usando il prezzo messicano, quindi non dovete ripetere il processo se progettate di comprare l’abbonamento ancora. Infine, dovete aspettare alcuni minuti.

Riceverete un’email di conferma da Evernote che vi dice che il vostro profilo è stato convertito in Premium. È tutto, ora non vi serve più la VPN. 🙂

The top 10 applications for exchange students

Being students means to have to handle many things and all different: it is necessary to coordinate studying and amusing and being able to do it in a simple and fast way. This is especially true when you are abroad and there are more things to do than usual.

As you know I spent January in Aabenraa in order to learn a bit of Danish, and now I attend the university in Lyngby. In these two months I have been able to observe some tools that are used by my peers, as well as to talk and exchange tips about that.

I noticed that virtually all of us use more or less the same programs for our students’ routine because the laptop is a fundamental component not only for studying, but also for communicating. What matters most is that most of my friends don’t study IT, so I saw with my eyes the “normal” use of the computer as a tool and I decided to write this list of 10 applications.

As you will see, they are almost all web 2.0 services, for productivity or communication. The list is a “mix” between what I have seen to be used by everybody and some tools that I use and I would like to suggest. Put these 10 programs and services in your virtual luggage and you will be perfect exchange students. 😉

The common aspect of all the points in the list is only one: convenience. The average student does not have much time to waste, doesn’t need super-advanced features, wants to manage everything with a few clicks. For sure you already know some of the things I will list, but I would like to know why and for what we use them.

1. Ubuntu

ubuntuIt’s true, I start immediately with something that not everyone uses, but in my opinion it’s a pity. 😛 Ubuntu is an operating system alternative to Windows or Mac OS X. It’s fast, free and without viruses.

I think it’s ideal for students because it’s modern interface is designed for the daily tasks that all students do: surfing the net, chatting, writing documents, creating presentations, listening to music, watching a movie. All of this in an extremely covenient way and with the possibility to install thousands of software with a click. Try it!

Official site
Guided tour

2. Google Chrome

chromeThere are some browsers that are more widespread than others, but I was surprised to see that 90% of the students I have met use Google Chrome. It’s a quite high percentage!

I have always used Firefox, but I tried to think why Chrome is so common. Finally I understood that it’s because of its convenience. The fact that Firefox is more powerful and extendable for specialized tasks is not important, what matters to many is just that the browser loads quickly.

The fact of having an integrated PDF reader is another advantage. Personally I started to use Chromium because it is its open source version, but now I have installed Chrome for its PDF support and the flash player that works a bit better.

Official site

3. Dropbox

dropboxThis web service gives 2 GB of free space in the cloud, that can be easily extended by inviting friends to join. You can have access to your files safely using the web interface and automatically synchronize them with the client for all operating systems and for mobile devices.

In addition to synchronization, it also gives you the automatic backup of files up to 30 days before: if you delete or edit a document by accident, recovery is just a click away! Also, the sharing features are very useful. The best thing to do is simply creating a University folder in Dropbox and saving everything in it.

Official site

4. Evernote and Clearly

evernoteIt’s difficult to exactly define Evernote. It isn’t only a website in which you can write notes, but it also includes a client software for Windows and Mac (under Linux I use the web interface and I am fine), apps for phones and tablets and extensions for the browser. Notes can be divided in notebooks — for instance one for your documents and one for every class you follow — and labeled with tags.

The real potential of Evernote shows up when you use it along with the two official browser extensions. The first is called Web Clipper and allows you to “clip” a part of a webpage and save it with one click inside Evernote, when it immediately becomes indexed and searchable.

clearlyThe second extension is called Clearly and allows you to have a readable and distraction-free view of any articles you find online. The extension isolates the important content and eliminates all the rest, allowing also to save the page in Evernote and automatically deciding the most relevant notebook.

The Evernote extensions for Chrome work a bit better than the Firefox ones, and it’s one of the reasons for which I switched to Chromium at the beginning. I use them to save all the documents related to my Erasmus, as well as pieces of Wikipedia pages or other information that can be useful for studying. Probably I will write a more deep article and I will give you more details. 😉

1 month of Evernote Premium for free
Web Clipper
Clearly

5. Wolfram|Alpha

wolframalphaAt first sight it may seem that this computational search engine is useful only for people studying maths, computer science or engineering. It’s true, You can perform very complicated computations with it, but that’s not all!

Wolfram|Alpha includes search functions for many other fields: statistics, geography, chemistry, music, linguistics, astronomy, earth sciences, medicine… the list of examples is very long. I have been using this site from where I was in the last years of high school and I can guarantee that it is very useful.

Official site
List of examples
Guided tour

6. DuckDuckGo

duckduckgoWhat would you think if I told you that my favorite search engine is not Google? Just so, most of the times I use DuckDuckGo, a very convenient search engine that gives a very useful feature: the instant answer.

When you search for something that can cleary be found on Wikipedia, StackExchange, Wolfram|Alpha, Twitter or many other sites, DuckDuckGo shows it to you as the first result in a highlighted box. This saves a lot of time.

Also, if you don’t like DuckDuckGo results you can simply ask to search using another service: just add a “!bang” to the search query: for example !google, or !yahoo, or !maps, or !youtube, or… well, you got it. 😛

Official site
Introduction video
List of !bang shortcuts

7. Facebook

facebookSome love Facebook, others hate it. Many use it to “waste time” between games and funny pictures. The reality is that this social network reveals its real usefulness when you are abroad, I noticed especially after the Danish course.

Facebook is fundamental for keeping in touch with friends in your country and the “colleagues” that then spend the Erasmus in other cities. By living abroad you will end using Facebook for silly things (if you are already members) and you will start to use it for what it was designed: communicating, staying updated about events and handling your network of friends.

Official site

8. Skype

skypeOf course going abroad means keeping in touch with people in your own country. There are many VoIP services, but Skype is for sure the most famous of all. It allows you to perform free chats, calls and videocalls through the Internet using a computer or smartphone.

In addition to this, if you are in need, it gives a low cost call service to landlines and mobile phones. Ironically from when it has been bought by Microsoft it has had a more updated Linux version, not bad!

Official site

9. Spotify

spotifyGiven that it recently launched also in Italy, I think it’s the best moment to talk about it! Spotify is a music application that combines social features with a huge songs library. The best thing is that by using the program and an Internet connection you can listen to millions of tracks for free.

There are some limitations on how much monthly hours you can use and some advertisements, but they absolutely don’t give hassle and you can exactly choose which songs to play, skipping from one point to another in any moment. if you are in one of the 24 countries where it is available, try it and you will not regret!

Official site

10. Rejseplanen

rejseplanenThis application is dedicated to those living in Denmark, but I am sure that there exist some similar in many countries. In general, you should search a service that allows you to search the trains and buses you need in the country where you study.

Rejseplanen allows to set two arbitrary addresses of departure and destination and shows some suggested connections, with the possibility to see the tariff zones in which Copenhagen is divided. If you don’t live in Denmark you can try the site and the application of the German railways, containing the routes of all Europe.

Official site
DB Bahn (trains across all Europe)

Conclusion

It’s obvious that everyone chooses and uses the tools that he/she likes most, but I tried to write a generic list including applications and web services that can be useful to the majority of exchange students. What other tools do you suggest? Write them in the comments. 😉