Yesterday, Adobe announced a major overhaul of its software for creative professionals. In a move that abandons the Creative Suite platform in favor of the Creative Cloud business model, Adobe really seems to be pushing its subscription based plans for their software. A few hours after the announcements were made and once people had time to read about it and watch the videos, I decided to have a look at what people were saying on forums and message boards online. Right away, one thing became quite clear: there are some major misunderstandings by many people about how this might affect them and the way Creative Cloud subscriptions will work. 

I have had a subscription to Creative Cloud for a couple months now. At $20 a month (the student/teacher pricing), it is a great deal for me. Even the more expensive price plans (range from $20 to $70 for teams) are in my opinion a good deal for many people. First of all, all updates are free and. You will no longer have to pay to update the software that you already own (even though technically speaking you are rending it with Creative Cloud) for updates. Even major updates will be free. Second, you will have access to the entire lineup of Adobe software. This will be great if you would like to learn how to use applications that previously you might have been hesitant to purchase. Lastly, and what many people don’t seem to understand, is that a subscription to Creative Cloud does not mean you will be running Photoshop “in the cloud.”  The software is cloud-acitvated, so to say. But it is still installed locally and run locally. Every thirty days, the Adobe software manager will check to see if you have an Internet connection and if you are a member of Creative Cloud. But any time in between then nothing really changes. Since becoming a member, I have downloaded most of the Adobe applications onto my computer. I have had fun with some of them that I have not used in the past. Since I mostly use the products geared towards web design, I have enjoyed having access to everything. The announcement yesterday is an expansion of what Creative Cloud already is. Before you start knocking it, understand what it is and give it a try.