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Ask HN: Is anyone making money selling traditional downloadable software?

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Re: Ask HN: Is anyone making money selling traditional downloadable software?

#31

Post by tonetegeatinst »

kelseydh wrote: post #24
seba_dos1 wrote: post #12

Yes, game developers.

Even when you buy a game by disc nowadays, you are forced into waiting an hour to install cloud updates.

We need to get tape storage more accessible to the average folk.

Its so mind shattering just how dense tape is even without compression.

Tape isn't even that expensive compared to SSD storage or the old reliable rust, its the tape reader that costs an insane amount.

Their are tops of DVD, CD, and vhs readers but somehow we can't make affordable LTO tape readers that don't cost less than a PC or a GPU.

Re: Ask HN: Is anyone making money selling traditional downloadable software?

#32

Post by satvikpendem »

fullstackchris wrote: post #21
lefstathiou wrote: post #6

My brother acquired an aging app (from an aging founder) built on Delphi used by many dozens (or low hundred) of the world’s leading shipping, energy and commodities companies, used as a standard to calculate “laytime” and “demurge” (myriad of fees associated when a ship docks into a port). It used to cost $5k for a perpetual license tied to usb based key that had to be plugged in to activate. If you wanted to use on…

Nitpick here: both models are still SaaS, the only difference is the first way was deployed via (desktop?) app and the second via web. But indeed, web is typically the most flexible option unless you are leveraging something on the OS that would otherwise be cumbersom or impossible via web (not often the case)

How is the first one SaaS? It's a perpetual (seemingly one time) license they said.

Re: Ask HN: Is anyone making money selling traditional downloadable software?

#33

Post by worthless-trash »

bsnnkv wrote: post #14

I started selling commercial use software licenses on 01 January 2025 for installable/downloadable software I have been developing for about 5 years. The software targets Microsoft Windows. As the software is of the nature that it will require updates indefinitely (as OS updates come and go), and given the fact that the license is specifically for commercial use, I decided to go with a subscription model instead of a…

When you started this, did you target a specific area that needed your skillsets or knowledge or did you research and find an area that needed better software ?

Re: Ask HN: Is anyone making money selling traditional downloadable software?

#34

Post by massysett »

satvikpendem wrote: post #30
lefstathiou wrote: post #6

My brother acquired an aging app (from an aging founder) built on Delphi used by many dozens (or low hundred) of the world’s leading shipping, energy and commodities companies, used as a standard to calculate “laytime” and “demurge” (myriad of fees associated when a ship docks into a port). It used to cost $5k for a perpetual license tied to usb based key that had to be plugged in to activate. If you wanted to use on…

Thanks for stating this. Some customers (who are often the vocal minority) don't like SaaS likely due to subscription fatigue but most don't realize the amount of manpower it requires to continuously update software that will atrophy without them, not to mention adding more features. The business reality is often not understood by the users and that's why every company is moving towards SaaS, it allows the company de…

Some users do not want updates.

I understand that updating software takes manpower. Same for running servers for sync or online information or similar.

But I might rather pay once for something that works on my machine as it is now. I need no servers or sync. If I need an upgrade later, I’ll buy it.

I do buy some software as a service but for other software if there’s a subscription I just don’t buy.

Re: Ask HN: Is anyone making money selling traditional downloadable software?

#35

Post by turbojet1321 »

msds wrote: post #8

I'm not running the show, but I am working at a place that does this. One time fee for a perpetual license for the current major version, free support, and historically ~6 years of updates per version. Users tend to be quite happy about it, and we're profitable enough to pay comfortable salaries and have...a lot...of runway. Of course, this model is possible because there was never any outside investment.

I used to work somewhere that had a similar licensing model. I believe it was perpetual access to all updates (minor or major) released within 12mths of purchase, along with free support. Once your 12mths were up there were no further updates.

Last I heard, they were still successfully running a (small - 3 or 4 dev) business on this model.

Re: Ask HN: Is anyone making money selling traditional downloadable software?

#36

Post by bsnnkv »

worthless-trash wrote: post #33
bsnnkv wrote: post #14

I started selling commercial use software licenses on 01 January 2025 for installable/downloadable software I have been developing for about 5 years. The software targets Microsoft Windows. As the software is of the nature that it will require updates indefinitely (as OS updates come and go), and given the fact that the license is specifically for commercial use, I decided to go with a subscription model instead of a…

When you started this, did you target a specific area that needed your skillsets or knowledge or did you research and find an area that needed better software ?

I needed the software for myself so I ended up developing it. Turns out a lot of other people wanted it too :)

I have been very clear with the community from the beginning that this is software that I develop first and foremost for myself - new features and bug fixes get prioritized largely according to this.

Additionally, support is not offered as part of the commercial use license and is largely community-driven. Nevertheless, I still spend many hours a week helping out both personal use and commercial use users.

Re: Ask HN: Is anyone making money selling traditional downloadable software?

#37

Post by satvikpendem »

massysett wrote: post #34
satvikpendem wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for stating this. Some customers (who are often the vocal minority) don't like SaaS likely due to subscription fatigue but most don't realize the amount of manpower it requires to continuously update software that will atrophy without them, not to mention adding more features. The business reality is often not understood by the users and that's why every company is moving towards SaaS, it allows the company de…

Some users do not want updates. I understand that updating software takes manpower. Same for running servers for sync or online information or similar. But I might rather pay once for something that works on my machine as it is now. I need no servers or sync. If I need an upgrade later, I’ll buy it. I do buy some software as a service but for other software if there’s a subscription I just don’t buy.

Depends on the size of the company. Perhaps you're simply not the target customer for that company, you self-select out of their customer pipeline which makes it easier for them to handle costs, as it is more expensive to maintain separate SaaS and one-time versions (essentially on-premise, which is often much more expensive and for enterprises who can afford them due to said hassle). However, some solo devs and smaller companies do exist that make only one-time purchase products, because they don't have much overhead.

Re: Ask HN: Is anyone making money selling traditional downloadable software?

#38

Post by Tsarp »

Side project not a business. I have a tiny dictation app for Mac on the app store.

One time payment since it runs whisper locally. Autoupdates through the app store, and I have a lot of folks emailing me positive, negative and improvement feedback.

It is a lot of randomness. Some weeks are low and when it got a small mention in a popular article I saw a sudden inflow of traffic, downloads and purchases.

So far Ive been ok paying the apple tax. Its a little hard going through the hoops to get it through the app store( I kinda understand why they do a lot of it ) but it provides a lot of free discovery and I spend 0 time on payments, refunds, disputes, handling a CDN to distribute binaries etc. Negative reviews without basis are the only thing that bother me, for some reason I seem to take it personally.

Re: Ask HN: Is anyone making money selling traditional downloadable software?

#40

Post by satvikpendem »

Many, especially in the indie hacker space, such as BoltAI, NomadList, etc . It works because the dev is a solo developer and does not necessarily need much money for expenses compared to a company hiring many employees, the money from all the solo dev's customers is likely enough to retire on.
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