Subscriptions raised that to $240 a year, a 480% increase. Further, since subscriptions were added no features I want have been added. But, I can't just stop and use some version, stop paying and the software stops working.

I see no evidence that Adobe's subscription model has let them invest more effort in making the product great. In fact it's the exact opposite. Before they had to add some features to entice you to pay for the upgrade. now they can just do nothing because you're "renting" the software.

That remains to be seen, actually. There used to be an "Adobe pipeline" where kids in high school and college would pirate Photoshop, become familiar with it, then be ready to use it when they got a real job. That pipeline shut down when Adobe moved to a subscription model: now all the kids use Figma instead. It'll take a little while to bubble up, but eventually all these design shops are going to find that their new hires know how to use Figma and not Photoshop, and start wondering whether Adobe software is worth the cost on top of retraining.

None of this shows up in quarterly reports but it's a real phenomenon and it will catch up to Adobe sooner or later.

That’s almost double what I pay for Jetbrains’ stuff and I figured the forced subscription from Jetbrains was 3x what I had been paying by skipping 1-2 versions between updates.

You’re right about changing the customer base though. All the suckers that can’t figure out prices just when up 3-4x seem to love subscriptions and financially flippant people like that are probably the best customers to have.

And Jetbrains is the only subscription software I’ve used that doesn’t keep adding bloated trash features to justify their subscription.