Adobe Launches Creative Cloud, Moves to Subscription Software Model

Adobe began shipping, in a manner of speaking, its new Creative Cloud design application package Monday evening. Creative Cloud was first announced in May and includes Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator, Dreamweaver, and more. It does away with traditional perpetual software licensing in favor of a software subscription model.

Adobe releases its Creative Cloud app suiteAdobe releases its Creative Cloud app suite

The Creative Cloud apps are available only as a download, and all current subscribers have access to the new software versions without any extra fees. One of the features Adobe touts as a benefit of CC subscriptions is that users always have the most current app versions as soon as they are available.

Creative Cloud, formerly Creative Suite, includes Adobe's popular graphic design, Web design, and video editing applications. Along with Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator and Dreamweaver, it also includes Flash, Premier, After Effects, Lightroom, Acrobat, along with several other apps, and for the first time, it includes InCopy, which previously was available only as a stand-alone purchase.

Adobe is also including online collaboration, publishing and sharing tools in part through Behance, TypeKit fonts, one-off app creation for the iPhone and iPad, and 2GB of online file storage.

Adobe customers that aren't ready to make the jump to the CC subscription model can still buy a perpetual licence for Creative Suite 6, although the company isn't promising any future support for the older versions of its apps. Creative Cloud users that aren't ready to make the jump to the brand new app versions have a year before they're required to upgrade, too.

Pricing for Creative Cloud starts at US$49.99 a month, or $19.99 a month for a single app. Traditional license CS6 users can sign up for the full Creative Cloud package or an individual app for half price for the first year.