71–80 of 438 posts
Starting a software business, the sort that used to be based on the shareware model, or one time fees, can be enough to sustain a small or one person team. But that's not enough for the startup crowd, they're looking to be millionaires.
Most subscriptions are just way too expensive! I make good money, but I can’t afford to have 10 subscription services for 9,99 per month. I have a few for 0,99 per month.
> I make good money, but I can’t afford to have 10 subscription services for 9,99 per month. So 100 a month total? Surely that's not any kind of issue if you're making good money? I get tons of value from the services I subscribe to.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
How can you own an online service?
You own a license, instead of paying for a license in perpetuity.
For scale, I've been using VIM for almost thirty years. Twenty years is not an exaggerated number.
I don't mind subscriptions, I actually prefer them for many things. Especially for software I rely on I want the developers to consistently earn money so they keep motivated to work on it, do maintenance and fix bugs. I don't pay for software, I pay for the thing it allows me to do. Me paying a subscription fee creates an incentive and responsibility to keep things working. If there is a backend component to its even…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
How about good old "pay for it once, then own it"?
If there’s backing services associated with it such as data storage then the duration of the asset and liability don’t jive.
The problem is that a lot of things that aren't a service are being rebranded "as a service" just to extract free revenue.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, Jetbrains' model is one of the better ones in that. At least your money doesn't completely vaporize with that, even though you'll still lose a year of features and improvements once you cancel.
You’ll lose it now, but under the old model you would never have had those features and improvements. While it took a community outcry, I think Jetbrains now has the best subscription model, that’s a positive for both users and the company.
They could just let me keep the version I already have and block me from future updates. The way, they set it up right now, they are deliberately causing some disruption when unsubscribing.
I don't mind subscriptions, I actually prefer them for many things. Especially for software I rely on I want the developers to consistently earn money so they keep motivated to work on it, do maintenance and fix bugs. I don't pay for software, I pay for the thing it allows me to do. Me paying a subscription fee creates an incentive and responsibility to keep things working. If there is a backend component to its even…
Dear customers: we know. But our businesses are viable as subscription services, and not as one-off or ad-hoc puchase models. We know because we tried them. So we're catering to the people who are OK with buying a subscription because there are enough of them. Sorry if that doesn't suit you.
> But our businesses are viable as subscription services, and not as one-off or ad-hoc puchase models. Doesn't explain businesses that had been per-purchase for a long time and are now still switching to subscriptions though. (E.g. photoshop, jetbrains...)
Want to run an ad? Prices have gone way up because you're the only one that's clinging to the old model. Want to pay premium to hire someone better? You can't, your competitor can because they have turned to subscriptions. In many cases your hand is forced.
Customers vote with their wallets and social shares. If you find a product that it a one time purchase, then you should share it, post about it since you will be rewarding the company, for they sure are not able to compete on customer acquisition.