14 DAY TRIAL // The good times are certainly over for Flash developers after Envato announced they plan to shut down ActiveDen, the Internet's biggest online marketplace for selling and buying Flash resources.
Launched in 2006, ActiveDen was launched bearing the name of FlashDen, which the company had to change in 2009, at Adobe's request.
The site was Envato's first marketplace and was a huge hit, helping the company fund and launch other marketplaces, which in the meantime have become more successful, mainly due to the fact that they revolve around modern technologies and not a closed ecosystem like Flash.
Here we mention ThemeForest, CodeCanyon, and AudioJungle, all top choices for users wanting to download website templates, themes, scripts, and audio files.
ActiveDen managed to sell over $11.5 million / €10.2 million during its 9-year lifespan, as Collis Ta'eed, Envato's CEO and Founder reveals.
Nobody can deny its success and usefulness, despite the fact that most people came to hate the technology at its center. All of this can be seen from the chart below, which shows how ActiveDen's monthly revenue evolved since its creation, and how sales plummeted after HTML5 started gaining more traction and Steve Jobs penned his epic and now legendary "Thoughts on Flash" rant.
What's next for ActiveDen users?
Now with the official announcement being made, ActiveDen users must know that starting with October 21, the site will stop accepting new files for sale.
The final stage is set for February 2016 when Envato will fully retire ActiveDen, meaning that users won't be able to make new purchases, and access will be shut down to existing purchased files.
This means that if you have any particular Flash files you bought and think you still need in the future, you'd better download them now before the site goes dark.
If you still want to sell Flash items, there are still some underground marketplaces where you can still do that. But as a personal advice, honestly, just give it up! Flash is almost dead anyway!
