TL;DR<p>Blogs - "You can grab yourself a free, legitimate copy of Photoshop and the rest of the Creative Suite 2, right now, direct from Adobe. No catch."[1][2][3]<p>Adobe - "You have heard wrong! Adobe is absolutely not providing free copies of CS2!"<p>1- <a href="http://www.gizmodo.co.uk/2013/01/grab-photoshop-and-cs2-for-absolutely-free-right-now/" rel="nofollow">http://www.gizmodo.co.uk/2013/01/grab-photoshop-and-cs2-for-...</a><p>2- <a href="http://lifehacker.com/5973750/download-adobe-creative-suite-2-including-photoshop-and-illustrator-for-free" rel="nofollow">http://lifehacker.com/5973750/download-adobe-creative-suite-...</a><p>3- <a href="http://www.petapixel.com/2013/01/07/adobe-may-be-offering-a-free-and-legal-download-of-creative-suite-2/" rel="nofollow">http://www.petapixel.com/2013/01/07/adobe-may-be-offering-a-...</a>
Lots of comments here say that this doesn't really change anything for Photoshop, but I think that it does. Compare downloading a cracked version to downloading this version.<p>The cracked version might contain terrible malware. It might still contain activation code that will phone Adobe with your serial number. You probably downloaded it from BitTorrent, which we know is easily trackable. If a serial number is still required, you will be using a number that is well known as a pirated number.<p>This version will not contain terrible malware (it may even come with updates from the vendor!) It has been modified by the people who wrote it to definitely not contain activation code. You will have downloaded it directly from Adobe at their request, along with their other paying customers. If your serial number is ever reported, you are indistinguishable from a legitimate user. The bar has been raised from "this IP reports a pirated copy" or "this IP downloaded a pirated copy" to individually auditing possibly legitimate customers in person. Adobe can't even include the hash in the list of hashes that will trigger ISP copyright enforcement alerting systems such as "six strikes". Unlike existing cracked versions, the risk for using this is very low.<p>I too was expecting an interesting business announcement when I clicked the link, and I too was disappointed. However, if you think this is a harmless mistake and no different from the existing Pirate Bay release, you aren't thinking very scrappy. This could easily make CS2 the version of choice for students and startups. (And Mac users can run it in VirtualBox on WinXP)
It might have been a screw-up, but Oracle does the exact same thing for all their products: you are free to download and install everything you want (and they provide universal license codes for acquired products that might still need them), but you're not actually allowed to <i>run</i> anything past 30 days (with some exceptions, like Enteprise Linux, SQLDeveloper, XE etc). Nothing in the software actually forces you to stop, but should Oracle sue you, you're screwed. It's a win-win for everyone: users can easily train themselves, and Oracle gets mindshare and goodwill without renouncing their expensive support contracts and license renewals.
IBM has done this forever. Its called soft licensing. (or at least that is what their term was)<p>It not a free copy. If you use this and they have proof, you would be sued for violating the licenses. Its the same as stealing. Just because they aren't locking you out doesn't mean you can use it.
So, Adobe is providing copies of CS2 that are activation free and are providing the serial numbers with the download? So it's basically an honesty system not to pirate it?
What I find surprising is that the download page itself contains no mention whatsoever of licensing. It lists the system requirements and has a big graphic up the top apparently attempting to upsell you to CS6 / Creative Cloud.<p>Would it have been so hard to say something like, 'These downloads and keys are provided for users who already possess a valid CS2 license. If you have not paid for any of these products, you are not entitled to use them.' ?<p>Makes me lean more towards publicity stunt.
Why have they not changed the information on their download page yet? <a href="http://www.adobe.com/downloads/cs2_downloads/index.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.adobe.com/downloads/cs2_downloads/index.html</a><p>For news sites that have not redacted or said something about this error, many of their readers are still going to be pushed towards downloading a free 'legitimate' program.
For older Macromedia products they just provide special serial numbers:
<a href="http://helpx.adobe.com/x-productkb/policy-pricing/macromedia-legacy-activation-error.html" rel="nofollow">http://helpx.adobe.com/x-productkb/policy-pricing/macromedia...</a>
Looks like they released a statement via their blog <a href="http://blogs.adobe.com/conversations/2013/01/update-on-cs2-and-acrobat-7-activation-servers.html" rel="nofollow">http://blogs.adobe.com/conversations/2013/01/update-on-cs2-a...</a>
What's the legality of this? Would it be illegal for me to download proprietary software from the owner's domain if the owner didn't mean to make available for free?<p>If a movie studio broadcast a brand-new movie over the air for free by mistake, would it be illegal for me to record it? Would I have to delete it? I'm pretty sure I couldn't put it up on a server for free download, otherwise I could do that with NFL games right now.<p>Does the fact that they require a license key (or make you click a box saying "I own a license") change this from legal to illegal?
A good marketing ploy to save money by decommissioning their Validation servers. Would be interesting to see the cost of maintenance versus.<p>Having said that, this is bad for the GIMP guys
I have to believe that Adobe did this on purpose, at least from a marketing standpoint. If they indeed didn't want blogs releasing this as "free" all of these major publications (LIKE FORBES) would not be using that word in the headline.<p>I think the PR team at Adobe labeled this as free or, at the very least, pitched at reporters that way, and I frankly don't think this is a problem or that they're upset about it.
Seems an honest mistake, although it would be brilliant marketing to release CS2 for free or very cheap because people (companies) who pay $1000+ for Adobe CS would not still be stuck on CS2...
If problems is shorthand for "has a lot of cease and desist paperwork to file" I agree.<p>I'm not clear what Adobe did wrong here, other than actually try to not completely screw people running very old versions of their software.<p>Sadly, no one would seriously make an accusation that they were screwing up if they had just shut off the validation servers and posted an note to their knowledge base, ID #FU-CS2-15-01734-81-CS6-plz.
<i>What is true is that Adobe is terminating the activation servers for CS2 and that for existing licensed users of CS2 who need to reinstall their software, copies of CS2 that don't require activation but do require valid serial numbers are available.</i><p>==From Adobe
"Failure is the opportunity to begin again more intelligently."
Henry Ford<p><a href="https://twitter.com/Adobe/status/288382433391435777" rel="nofollow">https://twitter.com/Adobe/status/288382433391435777</a><p>If this is meant to be related it's borderline genius.
[that page](<a href="http://www.adobe.com/downloads/cs2_downloads/index.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.adobe.com/downloads/cs2_downloads/index.html</a>) is still up for me with serial #. I didn't even purchase CS2.
So, CS2 is free but it is actually not free? Interesting that they would make CS2 free as it is only compatible with PowerPC based Macs.<p>Should have just made CS4 free and had more people jump onto the upgrade bandwagon!
I never advocate changing titles, but this one is in need of work. It took me a bit to realize what was going on.<p>Also, this seems like a non-issue. As I understand it, they've built a version that doesn't require activation and takes a special serial number, so they can phase out the CS2 activation servers. Some blogger (shocker, at Gizmodo) being fast and loose with the facts, well, got that wrong. Other blogs copied that mistake (a real problem in the "blogosphere"), Adobe took down the page that was linked, Monday rolls on. We're talking about software that won't even run on an Intel Mac here, people.<p>The rest of this story is, "hey, check out the beating Adobe is taking on their forum!" Thanks, blogs. You win again.
Oh, so they have a special copy of CS2 with a key that will allow it to work since Adobe's activation servers are down. That having been said, it is <i>intended</i> for users that already hold a CS2 license.