[kmfrk]

Wouldn't Adobe stand to lose a lot of money, since people can use the upgrade path instead of a full purchase?

I imagine that would be a stopping block to making earlier versions free or very cheap.

[maxerickson]

They only offer upgrade pricing from CS5. They stopped offering upgrades prices to CS3 and CS4 owners at the end of 2012:

http://www.adobe.com/products/creativesuite/faq/upgrade-poli...