14 DAY TRIAL // Adobe is killing off the Creative Suite, its main cash cow, in favor of Creative Cloud, the web-based service it debuted not so long ago.
This is not as radical a shift as it may seem, since Adobe isn't abandoning the product suite that made it famous, and it's not abandoning desktop software in favor of web-based offerings.
Rather, it's abandoning the retail mode, and it will no longer be selling software in a box, or as standalone downloads for that matter.
Instead, it will be offering a subscription service that will grant access to the apps you choose, alongside with some of the cloud offerings already part of Creative Cloud. Access to Behance, a site Adobe purchased late last year, is part of the deal.
What this means is that the next Photoshop, the next Illustrator, the next Dreamweaver, and so on will only be available via the cloud subscription-based service.
What's more, Adobe seems to be abandoning version numbers. Users will get new features and updates as they are completed, always running the latest version of whichever app they need, as long as they pay their subscription.
The complete edition of Creative Cloud, with every app previously part of the Master Collection, will cost $49.99 (€38.22) a month. Creative Suite 3 and above owners will get the first year for $29.99 (€22.93) a month.
If you only need one app, Photoshop for example, it's $19.99 (€15.29). Obviously, if you use more than two apps, it's cheaper to get the complete edition. There is also educational pricing, which is lower, and team pricing, which is higher.
The pricing discussion isn't new; Creative Cloud has been around for a while already. For some, the subscription will make sense in that it will be cheaper than buying the software at retail prince and then upgrading whenever it's possible. For others, it will be more expensive.
As for the Cloud part of Creative Cloud, it's not much. Users will be able to store their work in the cloud, for better access and backup, which will make it easier to share across Windows, Mac OS, iOS, and Android.
They will also get access to the online portfolio site Behance where they can showcase their work. Existing users of Creative Cloud haven't exactly been blown away by the cloud features. Storing files online and sharing them can be done via Dropbox or any other cloud storage service.
But since there won't be any option not to use the Creative Cloud, if you want the latest Adobe apps, you might as well use the cloud offerings.