In case you missed it, IntelliJ is now free. JetBrains has adopted the freemium strategy: a free version and a paid enhanced version.
At one level, the strategy responds to the fact that the arguably best two IDEs are already free. So, the free version helps get their foot in the door, and maybe you'll get hooked.
JetBrains's free version is offered under an open source license, a critical factor. Clearly, this is actually all about a user-developed add-ons strategy. It's called "the community version" after all.
So, this isn't quite freemium, it's actually open core licensing.
The unanswered question about open core licensing is whether the original developer (JetBrains in this case) can offer enough additional bang to encourage users to pay. At the same time, they want their users to donate valuable features for free.
Open core licensing is a fairly new free strategy, and it involves walking a real tightrope. On the one hand, a strong user community means a strong platform, but less likelihood that the the proprietary version stands above far enough to elicit upgrades. Meanwhile, the core version looks better if the community doesn't add as much, but then the platform doesn't add up to much.
Firefox and iPhone has taught us that add-ons make the platform far more valuable than the platform by itself. Chrome and Android will emerge as serious competitors, in large part because they will have serious add-ons as well.
Similarly, IntelliJ has to compete with Eclipse. Trying to spark a community as robust as Eclipse's presents a major challenge by itself. Unlike Eclipse, they also have to simultaneously try to keep ahead of it. It will be interesting to watch how IntelliJ, and open core licensing, evolves.
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