AI Developer Behind Free Photoshop Clones Now Takes On Microsoft Office
It helps that the primary developer behind the open-source ArtCraft suite is 15-year software engineer Brandon Thomas, not a script kiddie with tokens to burn. That bodes well for the future of the project, especially now that the scope has expanded to feature applications similar to Microsoft Office as well.
Regarding the ethicality of his efforts, Brandon Thomas takes a distinctly pro-AI stance. But that also means ArtCraft works seamlessly with many existing AI tools, and in fact its "pricing" model for optional paid subscriptions bundles AI tokens. For people already using those tools, those integrations and bundled tokens can be nice to have.
Thomas' stance on Adobe is one shared by many long-time tech enthusiasts and professionals. Specifically, he rails against dark patterns (designed to trick you into, say, not canceling a subscription) in software development and the potentially predatory nature of Software as a Service (SaaS) as a business model.
If you're newer to the space or simply don't understand the disdain for SaaS business models, it's important to remember that software used to be a standalone product that worked perpetually after purchase and (if necessary) activated it. While SaaS has numerous benefits, a broader industry shift toward subscription fees and copy protection has also taken away much of the convenience and user choice consumers used to have as a baseline. Incidentally, this is also the crux of the controversy behind PlayStation games no longer being sold on physical discs.
In the long term, it's hard to know what to expect from ArtCraft and efforts like it across the open source development community. A number of major projects including the Linux kernel have managed to make good use of AI-powered development for their workflow, though with the caveat that the bulk of these contributions are security gaps found by agents.
On the other hand, we've also seen a number of AI "vibe coded" projects simply be abandoned after initial release, likely due to the inexperience of their creators. That outcome doesn't seem likely with ArtCraft, though Brandon Thomas could be risking legal action from both Adobe and Microsoft due to how closely his wares mirror the UI and functionality of its competitors. Legal action against unfair AI-coded competition could be a very interesting stance for Microsoft to take considering what it has said on the record, though.
