𝗔𝗗𝗢𝗕𝗘 𝗝𝗨𝗦𝗧 𝗖𝗔𝗡𝗖𝗘𝗟𝗟𝗘𝗗 𝗨𝗡𝗟𝗜𝗠𝗜𝗧𝗘𝗗 𝗔𝗜 𝗖𝗥𝗘𝗗𝗜𝗧𝗦 𝗙𝗢𝗥 𝗖𝗖 𝗣𝗥𝗢 𝗨𝗦𝗘𝗥𝗦

Their second "unlimited generations" promo in two months—but this time they quietly removed an entire subscription tier from eligibility.

This isn't about Adobe making a mistake. It's a symptom of a much bigger industry pattern.

𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗰𝗹𝗼𝘂𝗱-𝗳𝗶𝗿𝘀𝘁 𝗔𝗜 𝗺𝗼𝗱𝗲𝗹 𝗶𝘀 𝗵𝗶𝘁𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗲𝗰𝗼𝗻𝗼𝗺𝗶𝗰 𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗹𝗶𝘁𝘆. When platforms need back-to-back unlimited promos, it signals that compute costs vs. creative demand weren't properly modelled. This is happening across the industry—Adobe's just the most visible example right now.

But here's what the data is really showing us: the hardware economics don't add up.

Creative teams are running £5-8k pro laptops and desktops that sit at 15% utilisation while paying monthly for cloud credits. We're rendering locally for C4D and Redshift but sending simple image generation to external servers.

The industry is optimising for the Build layer (developer infrastructure) when creatives actually need hybrid workflows that leverage local compute we've already purchased.

ComfyUI, Stable Diffusion, local LLMs—these tools are maturing into professional-grade alternatives that respect both hardware investments and operational budgets.

The credit fragmentation problem (separate buckets for Midjourney, Runway, Adobe, Stability) is real. But the structural issue is deeper: 𝘄𝗲'𝗿𝗲 𝗽𝗮𝘆𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘀𝘂𝗯𝘀𝗰𝗿𝗶𝗽𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗳𝗲𝗲𝘀 𝘁𝗼 𝗿𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗽𝘂𝘁𝗲 𝗽𝗼𝘄𝗲𝗿 𝘄𝗲 𝗮𝗹𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗱𝘆 𝗼𝘄𝗻.

𝗤𝘂𝗲𝘀𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗰𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗲 𝗼𝗽𝗲𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀 𝗹𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗲𝗿𝘀: What percentage of your team's compute capacity is actually being utilised in your AI workflows?