I think its rude to call me naïve, Levi, just because I don’t share your opinion on Adobe’s marketing strategy.
I don’t believe Adobe are trying to stop all pirates (the cost for that would await the benefit), but £16 a month for a student license is enough to tempt them to pay. Adobe may not be hunting down every single person that uses a pirated copy, but I don’t believe they want to make it too appealing to download a cracked copy either*.
The downside of a subscription, which is why this thread was started, is that Adobe can take away software and force upgrades. You no longer have a perpetual license. And I said in a previously the big reason for the change to subscription is Adobe want to keep people paying them, there is no option for a one-off fee. But I don’t believe Adobe doesn’t give two hoots about people copying their software and that wasn’t part of the consideration to move to subscription based. After all they want people, as many people as possible, to pay for their software including future designers. And that is what that achieved, both students and pros paying - as I said years ago none of us bought design software (too expensive), now many students are paying for a subscription. So by making it affordable students are less likely to download a dodgy copy and more likely to purchase a monthly subscription. In the end it all boils down to money, Adobe want to make as much as possible but that’s how businesses operate.
Personally I’m tempted by Affinity Designer, the small one-off fee compared to Adobe’s monthly is a big reason. No worry about needing to keep paying just so I can open my files. Plus, I only make illustrations for myself, I’m not a pro so cross-compatibility with other designers isn’t an issue. I’d like to see Affinity become stiff competition to Adobe – companies have no need to change when they have a monopoly.
*Yes, I know it exists and where to get that – I’m not as naïve as you think. I also know said software tends to be buggy and contains malicious code.