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Tell HN: A Conversation Needs to Be Had over Subscription Software

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Re: Tell HN: A Conversation Needs to Be Had over Subscription Software

#181

Post by rglullis »

coldtea wrote: post #99
Hnrobert42 wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not blaming the victim as there are no victims. OP’s is wrong that SaaS is rent sending. Software should not be free (in cost), yet always receive new features and updates. Indeed, the alternative is the ad-tech surveillance state.

That's a strawman. Who exactly demanded "free in cost" plus "always receive new features and updates"? If the software companies (in mobile in particular) had a race to the bottom, it's on them - and on those (hobbyists etc) that undercutted them (though, if hobbyists can undercut your prices, is your product really worth that much, or could it just as well be replaced with a hobbyist-made app?). Users have since for…

One could argue that MS Office and Adobe products were always "subscription-based", if companies and professionals never left the update treadmill. After all, if all you need is MS-Office 2000 or Adobe Photoshop 6, no subscription is needed and you can still find licenses around.

Re: Tell HN: A Conversation Needs to Be Had over Subscription Software

#182

Post by tchock23 »

pydry wrote: post #32

This appears to me to be less about subscriptions per se and more about how VC and public markets drive tech companies to dial up the rent extraction to 11 at the first available opportunity. At this point it seems like the capital markets have long past moved from symbiosis with the productive economy into parasitism and are now accelerating their killing of the host.

It starts from day one. Pitch decks that don’t have a subscription revenue model are routinely ignored, so founders find a way to shoehorn subscriptions in somehow even though the product isn’t a “natural” fit for subscriptions.

Re: Tell HN: A Conversation Needs to Be Had over Subscription Software

#183

Post by _7jf7 »

cube2222 wrote: post #108

I don't really share OP's impressions. I think the move to the subscription model is one of the best things that happened to our industry in the recent years. It's a model which lets you sustainably sell software and keep working on it, delivering updates, etc. The pay per update model forces the creator to release big feature updates, even if the features are just bloat, as bug fix releases and stability work will u…

> I don't see how these are user hostile.

They lock you in to continuing to pay even when you no longer derive value.

Say you stopped using Photoshop years ago but suddenly need to export one of your old documents. You’re now forced to pay rent to Adobe for at least one month to access one of your own files. And Adobe won’t make it easy to unsubscribe again, which adds to the hassle.

> The pay per update model forces the creator to release big feature updates, even if the features are just bloat, as bug fix releases and stability work will usually sell much worse. That's mostly fixed by the subscription model.

Perpetual fallback licenses[1] solve that issue without forcing users to keep paying rent.

[1]: https://github.com/vitorgalvao/perpetual-fallback-licenses

Re: Tell HN: A Conversation Needs to Be Had over Subscription Software

#184

Post by coldtea »

rglullis wrote: post #181
coldtea wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a strawman. Who exactly demanded "free in cost" plus "always receive new features and updates"? If the software companies (in mobile in particular) had a race to the bottom, it's on them - and on those (hobbyists etc) that undercutted them (though, if hobbyists can undercut your prices, is your product really worth that much, or could it just as well be replaced with a hobbyist-made app?). Users have since for…

One could argue that MS Office and Adobe products were always "subscription-based", if companies and professionals never left the update treadmill. After all, if all you need is MS-Office 2000 or Adobe Photoshop 6, no subscription is needed and you can still find licenses around.

One could argue it.

But they would then have to answer why would non-business buyers, that is, users who did "leave the update treadmill" and bought new updates (or skipped them) at their convenience, suffer the subscription model too?

Re: Tell HN: A Conversation Needs to Be Had over Subscription Software

#185

Post by ndiddy »

joshuaissac wrote: post #41
porcoda wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seriously? Since when could you buy COTS and expect to get the code too? I don’t remember a source archive accompanying the pre-subscription Adobe, Microsoft, or any other major piece of software that is now subscription-ware. That’s pure fantasy.

> Since when could you buy COTS and expect to get the code too? Since the 1950s and 1960s. IBM, for example, provided source code for their products until 1983.[1] The full Apple II source code was included in the Apple II Reference Manual;[2] similarly for the Atari 400/800 Technical Reference Notes.[3] 1. https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=hSBrPSYgjI4C&redir_esc=y (page 59) 2. https://archive.org/details/applerefj…

If anyone is curious what happened in 1983, that’s the same year that Apple Computer Inc. v. Franklin Computer Corp. set the precedent that binary data is covered by copyright (before this case, only source code was covered).

Re: Tell HN: A Conversation Needs to Be Had over Subscription Software

#186

Post by coldtea »

cinntaile wrote: post #110
coldtea wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a strawman. Who exactly demanded "free in cost" plus "always receive new features and updates"? If the software companies (in mobile in particular) had a race to the bottom, it's on them - and on those (hobbyists etc) that undercutted them (though, if hobbyists can undercut your prices, is your product really worth that much, or could it just as well be replaced with a hobbyist-made app?). Users have since for…

Isn't a big reason for this development precisely that many didn't pay top dollar? There used to be a lot of Photoshop, Windows and Office warez floating around.

No, since that's orthogonal. You can pirate with or without a subscription.

Re: Tell HN: A Conversation Needs to Be Had over Subscription Software

#187

Post by coldtea »

aceazzameen wrote: post #168
gefhfffh wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Including skipping upgrades?

Yes. I don't need every upgrade, especially when 9/10 it includes new bugs on essential productivity software.

Plus today it's easier than ever to make updates (or bunches of related updates) selectable and installable on demand.

So you could skip 90% of the BS updates you don't care for and get the 10% you do, as opposed to pay the full update price or maintain a subscription...

In other words, you could get a base product, they keep maintaining, and even release new versions you can update to for free/cheap, but with features you haven't paid for locked. Then, if you paid for a feature, you get to enjoy it for all free/cheap updates of the program.

Re: Tell HN: A Conversation Needs to Be Had over Subscription Software

#188

Post by aceazzameen »

fleddr wrote: post #42
porcoda wrote: post #18

This sort of began when we all got the impression that software should be free, or that we pay a low price once and get indefinite free upgrades. Given that developers need to be paid, and resources cost money, there needs to be a way to rectify that gap between the consumer and maintainer. At one point we did so by paying for an initial version of software, and then paying for updates. Now that we don’t do that, but…

Or...updates nobody asked for. Quite a few casual users might be perfectly happy with Office 2003, or Adobe PS6, as anything after that they don't need. And not just that, they may not want the UI to be revamped every 2 months. The option to just have stable, working software is increasingly taken away. Not to mention the anti competitive nature of these two parties. They can just bundle an additional app in their su…

They have to justify that subscription right? Every yearly version upgrade of Adobe is filled with productivity-breaking bugs that don't get fixed until months later. Everywhere I've worked, artists know not to update to the latest Photoshop until the first patches are released and it's been evaluated. Why should a subscriber put up with that? The only recourse is to not subscribe, which isn't an option if you're content with a current version of the software.

Re: Tell HN: A Conversation Needs to Be Had over Subscription Software

#189

Post by coldtea »

toyg wrote: post #154
coldtea wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yeah, it's not really about free software; it's about paying salaries Well, that's on the software maker. Why pay salaries in perpetuity for something made and sold once?

Almost no software these days is "made and sold once" because of network support - even the most "local" apps will have stuff like saving settings or document to remote servers, talking to network peers, receiving updates when new OS versions are released, and so on. Anything sold on Apple platforms, for example, nowadays has to be updated at least once a year just to keep up.

A lot of the "network support" is unwanted BS nobody asked for, that could be sold separately (or be open to other providers to offer). Like the BS "Adobe Cloud" they give you when you subscribe to the CSuite.

>Anything sold on Apple platforms, for example, nowadays has to be updated at least once a year just to keep up.

Factually wrong.

Re: Tell HN: A Conversation Needs to Be Had over Subscription Software

#190

Post by rglullis »

This is what you get for not supporting FOSS, especially R&D.

Imagine if every company took 5-10% of their IT budget to sponsor alternatives to the products they need, even if they were not using it. Take every marketing agency that subscribes to Adobe Suite, and get them to sponsor Gimp/Krita/Inkscape/etc. Every startup using Google Apps/Office365/Slack/Dropbox, get them to donate just $5/employee/month to Free and Open alternatives.

It would be a win-win. Best case scenario, the OSS alternative becomes a viable substitute. Worst case, SaaS providers will have to continously push prices down and/or innovate.

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