AI Is Finally Helping The People

by Alessandro Ebersol (Agent Smith)

AI Helping the populace? Who would have thought …

In early October 2026, the world of proprietary audio, video, graphics, text, and office applications was shaken by the public launch of the Artcraft suite.

What the Artcraft suite is and how it revolutionizes the relationship between consumers and (mega) corporations—which abuse their economic power—is what we will explore next.

Artcraft is a suite of applications created by Brandon Thomas. The project officially began on July 14, 2025, on GitHub, with its first version, 001, released on that date.

Brandon, aided by Anthropic’s generative AI Claude Opus 3.5, created clones of several well-known applications, starting with the Adobe suite. As of the time of this writing, the collection already includes 13 applications, namely:

• PhotoCraft: The image editor you already know how to use. Photoshop clone.


• VectorCraft: Vector illustration. Illustrator clone.


• FilmCraft: Movie and video editing. Adobe Premiere clone.


• LightCraft: Digital photography non-destructive developer software. Lightroom clone.


• PdfCraft: PDF editor, an Acrobat Reader clone.


• EffectCraft: Vídeo compositing and effects designer, clone of Adobe After Effects.


• DesignCraft: Page layout and publishing, clone of Adobe Indesign.


• FigCraft: Interface design editor, clone of Adobe XD.


• WordCraft: Text editor, clone of Microsoft Word.


• SoundCraft: Audio and track editing, clone of Adobe Audition.


• DeckCraft: Slide presentations and editing, clone of Microsoft Power Point.


• CADCraft: Computer-aided design and drafting, clone of Autodesk Autocad.


• GridCraft: Spreadsheets editor, clone of Microsoft Excel.

Brandon Thomas created these open-source clones out of frustration with Adobe's abusive practices. His main reasons were:

• Cancellation “dark patterns”: He has repeatedly been harmed by deceptive design techniques that make it difficult to cancel subscriptions.


• Control over content: The outrage over Adobe’s policies—which force users to accept new terms of service, granting the company the right to access private files and session data for AI training with no opt-out option—was a decisive factor, and take special note of this point: Adobe deliberately trains its AI using content created by its customers, who have paid for the Adobe suite, and yet they end up paying to train Adobe’s AI with their own work.


• Subscription model: The shift from software that users were supposed to “own” to subscription-based models—with constant price increases and exorbitant fees—also motivated the initiative.

After usable versions were posted on GitHub, the project gained more contributors, who are committed to the project, leading to several daily releases of the Artcraft suite.

Dark Patterns: Corporate Trickery

Dark patterns are interface design choices deliberately created to manipulate users and lead them to make decisions they would not make if they had clear information or if the process were simple.

These techniques are often used by companies to create intentional obstacles, such as making it difficult to cancel a subscription or service. A common example cited is when a website or app changes the layout, colors, or placement of “cancel” and “keep subscription” buttons to confuse the user when they try to leave the platform.

Key features:

• Intentionality: Unlike a design flaw, a dark pattern is deliberately designed to benefit the company at the expense of the user's interests.


• Manipulation: Uses knowledge of human behavior to lead the user to take a specific action, such as making an unwanted purchase or accepting terms without reading them.


• Barrier-creators: In subscription contexts, they are known for making it very easy to sign up but extremely bureaucratic or confusing to cancel—a practice often referred to as a “Roach Motel” (or “easy to get in, impossible to get out”).

But despite Brandon and his team's genius, they might get into trouble.

The Risks for Brandon Thomas

Brandon Thomas's project faces several complex legal risks as it seeks to recreate Adobe software; the main challenges include:

• DMCA (Section 1201): The law prohibits the circumvention of “technological measures” that protect access to copyrighted works. Companies often use this section to sue developers who engage in reverse engineering, although there are legal exceptions for interoperability purposes.


• Terms of Service (EULAs): End-user license agreements (EULAs) often contain clauses that explicitly prohibit reverse engineering, decompilation, or attempts to recreate the functionality of the original software. In some cases, courts have upheld these contractual restrictions.


• Copyright and User Interface: There is a risk of allegations that the clone reproduces elements protected by copyright law, such as the user interface or specific menu hierarchies. Although cases such as Google v. Oracle have established limits on the protection of APIs, Adobe could attempt to seek protection for visual and design elements.


• Lobbying and Legislative Changes: According to Louis Rossmann (a consumer rights activist), the greatest risk is not just the current law, but the possibility that large companies will push for reforms (such as compulsory licenses or broader software patents) to raise barriers against open-source alternatives.

To mitigate these risks, developers often use the “clean room” strategy (clean room design), in which the team analyzing the original software is isolated from the team writing the new code, in an effort to ensure that only public features and specifications are used, without copying the original source code.

However, there are legal provisions that cover what Brandon is doing, and they relate to fair use.

Fair Use in Reverse Engineering

Despite the risks Brandon and his team face, U.S. law—specifically Section 1201 of the DMCA—permits reverse engineering under certain specific conditions. The legislation authorizes anyone who has the legal right to use a program to circumvent digital locks for the sole purpose of identifying and analyzing components necessary for interoperability between independently created programs. Now, porting the Adobe suite to Linux has long been a demand from the entire community, and now, thanks to Brandon Thomas’s work, it achieves what Adobe never wanted to do—but, as far as we can tell, it would be entirely possible. Adobe simply did not do it due to collusion (with Microsoft/Apple) and market monopolization. And this reason—creating a clone that works on Linux—could legitimize the entire Artcraft suite.

Furthermore, there are several important legal precedents, such as the Sega v. Accolade case, where the court ruled that decompiling software can be considered “fair use” when it is the only way to access a program’s ideas and functional elements for a legitimate reason.

Although caught off guard, Adobe may fight back and launch a very strong counterattack.

What Adobe Can Do

It is quite plausible that Adobe and other software companies will push for legislative changes to curb the emergence of open-source clones. These clones erode the market “moat” that protects Adobe’s business model, so the company may seek to:

• Lobbying for stricter software patent laws: An attempt to eliminate judicial limits on the patentability of abstract ideas, citing the “Patent Eligibility Restoration Act of 2025.”


• Compulsory licensing: The creation of a model in which, even if developers are able to create alternatives, they would be required to pay royalties to the original company, similar to what happens in the music industry.


• DMCA Reforms Through International Treaties: The use of organizations such as WIPO to circumvent the U.S. Congress by creating more restrictive laws that protect their “digital locks.”

Adobe's Blatant Hypocrisy

The company's current situation clearly constitutes a case of double standards, creating a significant imbalance between Adobe's corporate power and user rights.

The conflict of interest:

1. Content Use for AI: Adobe has updated its terms to allow access to users’ private files and session data (through both manual and automated means) for the purpose of training its artificial intelligence models. The most critical issue is that the company did not offer an opt-out option, forcing users to accept the new rules or risk losing access to their own work.

2. Protection against competition: At the same time, Adobe uses provisions in its Terms of Service (specifically Section 17b) to expressly prohibit users or third parties from reverse engineering or creating alternatives (clones) to its software.

Why it’s unfair:

• Permission asymmetry: Adobe claims the right to use others’ work to improve its products (via AI), but denies consumers the right to analyze or recreate systems to ensure interoperability or avoid abusive practices.


• Ecosystem lock-in: It can be argued that these practices create an artificial “moat” around the brand, preventing free competition and keeping users locked into expensive subscriptions and hidden cancellation fees.

Brandon Thomas’s effort to use AI to create open-source clones is a heroic response to this system, representing an attempt to restore balance in a market where copyright laws and contractual policies are being distorted in favor of corporate profit rather than consumer freedom.

But wait, there’s more … Not only was Adobe software re-created — and in Rust (of all languages)—but the PlayStation 5 was also jailbroken, using artificial intelligence.

Sony and PS5 Jailbreak

The PlayStation 5 was recently jailbroken, and this development has incredible implications for PlayStation 5 owners.

Thanks to the jailbreak, the PS5’s capabilities have increased exponentially:

• Access to game libraries: With the jailbreak, it’s now possible to access stores where users can get PSN items for free and play a huge variety of games from different platforms: Nintendo Switch, Xbox, and many other consoles can now be emulated on the PS5.


• Emulation and compatibility: It has been demonstrated that a jailbroken PS5 can run original PS2 discs and even emulators for the PS3 and other systems, defying Sony’s policy of limiting access to older titles through streaming services.


• Moral and technological reflection: This is not just about piracy, but about technology’s natural response to the erosion of consumer rights regarding digital products. This trend is a way to rebalance the “pendulum” between companies and users.

But how did AI help jailbreak the PS5?

Artificial Intelligence didn't magically “break” the PlayStation 5, but it acted as a catalyst for manual labor that was already possible before. The process unfolded as follows:

• Reverse Engineering Optimization: The technique of reverse engineering for game consoles has been around for decades. AI helps by automating repetitive and tedious tasks, such as analyzing binaries, trial and error on specific functions, and code mapping, thereby speeding up what would otherwise be a much slower process for humans.


• PC-based: The PlayStation 5 has an architecture very similar to that of a standard computer (PC). Much of the work involved in “unlocking” or porting games involves remapping calls from Sony’s proprietary systems to universal libraries, such as Vulcan.


• Task Completion: About 90% of the work (such as shader translation and CPU adaptation) had already been technologically solved by emulation communities years ago. AI helped solve the “last 10%”—or rather, the remaining 5%—of the complexity required to integrate these solutions into the console’s specific hardware.

But why did an entire community rally around jailbreaking the PlayStation 5? A simple, straightforward answer: FAFO, Sony.

Sony did not include backward compatibility — which had been a tradition since the PlayStation 2 — and promised to do away with physical discs, leaving users dependent on its online store as the only way to access their games. And, by the way, Sony doesn’t have a good track record with its online store, having deleted 550 movies that were legally purchased by its customers. And most of those customers weren’t reimbursed — a low move for a corporation like Sony (or maybe not; Sony has always been a scoundrel, ever since 2005, when it infected millions of CDs with rootkits).

Now, the PS5 runs all games from previous generations, plays discs and emulators, and even has a “pirate” online store with free games. Don’t even get me started on payback …

The 2-Ton AI Elephant in the Room

What we’re witnessing is the result of the backlash of the consumers, based on years of neglect, and greed of large corporations. The bad deeds of the Big Techs are coming back to haunt them.

From Adobe’s well-deserved downfall — it had already been losing ground to Canva, a great online, cross-platform service with integrated AI that generates professional-quality graphic designs — through the successive price hikes for the Adobe suite, its refusal to release its apps for Linux (something its customers had been asking for on the Adobe forum for AGES), its draconian policies regarding terms of service — which now force customers to let Adobe train its AI using users’ work, for free, created with the suite they paid for — It’s almost as if every one of the company’s customers is paying to train Adobe’s AI. And let’s not forget to mention Sony, which has fallen out of favor with its customers and consumers after a succession of abuses, negligence, and unprecedented greed.

But all these events, which are happening almost simultaneously (and the situation is so fast-paced that if you blink, you’ll miss what’s going on), have their roots in two things: copyright laws being abused by large corporations, and the disregard and negligence with which these large companies treat their paying customers, since these companies have gone from being legitimate businesses to extorting their users.

Copyright laws should have been reformed by now, but with corporations like Disney lobbying to extend copyright protection to nearly 100 years, what chance do we have of having laws that are fairer and reflect the current reality? And, even worse, now with AI, no one will be able to claim intellectual property rights anymore, since training AI systems with copyrighted material will allow them to create derivative works with no connection to the originals. But now, ordinary people are fighting back and pushing back—and they’re also using artificial intelligence to their advantage. After all, if the big techs can do it, why can’t the average Joe?

However, this trend of using AI for the benefit of users could trigger an unprecedented backlash from large corporations, leading them to finally regulate AI.

Well, it will be very interesting to see the mental gymnastics Adobe’s lawyers perform as they try to criminalize AI in court, while at the same time the company exploits its users’ work, and they have no option but to comply, or risk losing access to their own work.

But since President Trump himself has said he won’t regulate AI — that he’ll encourage its use and development — only the future will tell what will happen. Still, it’s satisfying to see AI helping ordinary people, for a change.

This article was written with the help of AI … for a change.