Among the most significant changes with this year’s Elements releases has little to do with new features but instead concerns the ways users purchase and own the software. While prior versions of Photoshop and Premiere Elements have been lifetime licenses — the user buys the software and then owns it indefinitely — this year’s release has moved to a three-year license term.
Adobe used to house all the licensing mechanisms in a single file named
amtlib.dll. The people who cracked it just nulled out the function. And since it was the same for every piece of software, just repeat the null process for each one. Bam, the entire suite for free.When Adobe switched from CS to CC subscription, it was cracked in 24 hours. Largely because they didn’t change much.
Adobe then axed the crippling DLL file and baked the mechanism right into the executable. A patcher tool was released that could crack each one. The upside is you could install and keep them updated from the CC Desktop and just run the patcher each time. Sometimes you had to wait for an update to the patcher. So before you clicked “update” you had to double check to make sure it worked.
To stop the free trial abuse (which is how people installed anyway) Adobe started requiring billing information during setup before you even get to downloads.
Later on, Adobe prevented users from updating apps if there wasn’t an active subscription.
The patcher eventually stopped working because it was abandoned (this around 2019 when I gave up using it because Resolve and Affinity were more affordable and met my needs.) Months later someone else picked up the patcher development. There’s also pre-cracked versions you can download and install.
I’ve not touched Adobe since and find Resolve to be significantly more stable and at $300, much more affordable. The Affinity Photo and Designer apps are great and affordable too at $170 for the bundle.