Ask HN: Anyone tired of everything being a subscription now?

Post by rincebrain » Wed, Dec 21, 2022, 6:15 AM UTC

falcolas wrote: post #280

rincebrain wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Charging a sub for things like heated seats is obviously broken, but I also don't know if people have an appetite for what the upfront costs would be for many pieces of software that are currently subscription based, in order to provide support for any length of time. Look at the pricing for IDA, which tries to balance having an astonishingly good product, but very limited market, for how this can end up distorted wi…

> The same logic holds for things like recurring subscriptions or ad-supported content - much smaller amounts, but many more sources, adding up to mitigate this problem. And at some point your customers are saturated. How many subscriptions before they can't afford another subscription? After all, if they're subscribed to the max, it's not as if their budget will have room for another one next month, or even next yea…

Post by jacobsimon » Wed, Dec 21, 2022, 8:43 PM UTC

coldtea wrote: post #670

jacobsimon wrote: post #457

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Spotify doesn’t need to “get better” - you’re paying the fee for streaming rights to an ever-growing content library. Same with Netflix, etc. There’s also an unspoken but important accounting detail here - if you run an online software business and offer a one-time, lifetime purchase for your product, you are now contractually on the hook to provide that service to customers forever, even if your business stops growi…

> for streaming rights to an ever-growing content library Ever-growing my ass. I've had lots of songs on my playlists removed because they were taken off the platform. And not some obscure acts, for example Westbam's Götterstrasse (which features anybody, from Brian Molko and Iggy Pop to Kanye and Lil' Wayne).

Post by phendrenad2 » Thu, Dec 22, 2022, 5:55 PM UTC

matheusmoreira wrote: post #699

phendrenad2 wrote: post #541

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Globally networked computers exist and they trivially render any information abundant at negligible costs So you'll be okay with me photocopying a printed book you published and giving it away for free, because "trivially" is a relative term, and I can certainly "trivially" reproduce your book a million times (compared to 12th century monks copying holy works by hand)? > Attempting to make it work requires the dest…

> So you'll be okay with me Yes. > And I suppose copyrighted printed books (and poems, and song lyrics) destroyed "free press" as we know it? That's not what I was talking about. The destruction of free computing will come about due to copyright enforcement and the technology necessary for its implementation. Copying is a fundamental computer operation. If I'm in control of the computer, I can make it copy anything i…

Post by togs » Sat, Dec 24, 2022, 5:31 PM UTC

Post by bestnameever » Sat, Dec 24, 2022, 6:58 PM UTC

thot_experiment wrote: post #517

bestnameever wrote: post #456

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Sure but buying a DVD isn't great either as it has a real destroying the earth cost for something that can be delivered to me using a negligible amount of energy digitally. I Then buy the streaming version. If it is available by DVD, then you can probably find it available to purchase digitally.

Really? Just as a litmus test, the last movie I pirated was a 10bit 4k rip of "The Matrix" which comes in at about 40gigs. This is about the level of quality I'm looking for in a file I buy, sorry if I was misleading w/ my mention of DVD. Practically speaking this is similar to having a *.flac of a song, as it enables me to transcode to lower quality versions for use on different devices from a high quality master. I…