Never use any subscription based software in which you create data you want to keep! They have no incentive to allow good export options, you often loose all or most data that you kept in it. You have no alternative to go back to if the service is stopped!
Just Pay the Subscription
81–90 of 121 posts
Re: Just Pay the Subscription
#82No, no, never. Subscriptions never benefit the consumer. They all work exactly the same way: - Get the user hooked into their ecosystem - Slowly make the service worse / more expensive / different over time - The user is paying for a subscription which feels like an investment, so they put up with more crap than they would otherwise. Trust me. If you have a subscription for something, and you like it, it will change…
As I said in a different thread[0], the fact that some subscriptions are predatory doesn't mean subscriptions are necessarily predatory. > If you have a subscription for something, and you like it, it will change under your feet. It will get worse, and in effect, it will be taken from you. Then I can move on and find something else. If I really think I can't, then it's probably providing me with something I find valu…
>As I said in a different thread[0], the fact that some subscriptions are predatory doesn't mean subscriptions are necessarily predatory.
"Some" is doing a lot of work in that sentence. Subscriptions are structurally designed to extract payment for non-use. the whole point of the model is to be predatory.
You pre-pay for some allotment of resources but get nothing back for unused resources. And the main profit comes from the gap between what you paid for and the actual usage. And that's just in the best case scenario there the company is not running at a loss just to squeeze you later even harder. The entire model only works if people throw their money into the void.
If a provider genuinely wanted to cover the costs my usage imposes on them, they would bill me for usage. That's the honest version: you used X, here's the bill for X. Instead, subscriptions deliberately decouple what I pay from what I consume, and they always decouple it in the vendor's favor, never mine. I never (well i think Kagi[0] actually is different, one outlier) get a refund for the month I didn't watch anything or the API calls I didn't make.
[0]: https://getlago.substack.com/p/why-kagi-launched-no-use-no-p...
Re: Just Pay the Subscription
#83First, a big part of subscription is the fault of Google and Apple, and that is not given enough credit. There are plenty of non-subscription software models that obviously work. But Apple and Google don't let them work, because of money. Yes, you need infrastructure and you need to keep paying for it ... because Google and Apple make it so. There is no reason apps can't work standalone, they're just making this hard on purpose.
Second all the arguments against subscription software also apply against essentially every AI service everywhere.
Re: Just Pay the Subscription
#84Is this REALLY a software developer making robocalling software complaining about intrusive ads?
REALLY?
Yes ... yes it is.
I mean is there any doubt at all what companies will use this software for? (and of course, zero attention given to the fact that robocalling is illegal in most places. For good reason. Using this software is a crime. Which means scummy salespeople and scammers are the only ones going to use it)
Re: Just Pay the Subscription
#85Earlier quoted context omitted.
As I said in a different thread[0], the fact that some subscriptions are predatory doesn't mean subscriptions are necessarily predatory. > If you have a subscription for something, and you like it, it will change under your feet. It will get worse, and in effect, it will be taken from you. Then I can move on and find something else. If I really think I can't, then it's probably providing me with something I find valu…
>As I said in a different thread[0], the fact that some subscriptions are predatory doesn't mean subscriptions are necessarily predatory. "Some" is doing a lot of work in that sentence. Subscriptions are structurally designed to extract payment for non-use. the whole point of the model is to be predatory. You pre-pay for some allotment of resources but get nothing back for unused resources. And the main profit comes…
>You pre-pay for some allotment of resources but get nothing back for unused resources.
I dunno. This just doesn't quite compute to me as some universal principle.
I paid $30 for a year of Strong (an iOS fitness app), for example. What do you see as the "allotment of resources" there? They're delivering maintenance upgrades and feature releases periodically that I'll use any time I log a workout; the app runs on a phone that I own; the data is presumably sitting on a server of theirs, so it needs to be ready for whenever I want to use it.
I've logged ~40 workouts so far, so let's hope I stay consistent and end up with 80 for the year. That's ~38 cents per workout.
I just don't feel ripped off here, especially since I moved off of a fitness app that I liked less and cost $50/year, the price has stayed the same over four years while improving steadily, and I'm not aware of anything that does what I want for a better price. I'm not sure I'd even want some kind of metering system; psychologically I don't like the idea that I'd have to spend a second thinking about if I want to pay more to log more workouts.
Re: Just Pay the Subscription
#86No, no, never. Subscriptions never benefit the consumer. They all work exactly the same way: - Get the user hooked into their ecosystem - Slowly make the service worse / more expensive / different over time - The user is paying for a subscription which feels like an investment, so they put up with more crap than they would otherwise. Trust me. If you have a subscription for something, and you like it, it will change…
As I said in a different thread[0], the fact that some subscriptions are predatory doesn't mean subscriptions are necessarily predatory. > If you have a subscription for something, and you like it, it will change under your feet. It will get worse, and in effect, it will be taken from you. Then I can move on and find something else. If I really think I can't, then it's probably providing me with something I find valu…
> Then I can move on and find something else.
This is a highly suboptimal solution to a problem that doesn't have to exist. If the application as it exists meets my needs, but an update makes it worse, I should be able to keep using the good one.
If I just buy the application rather than license it, it won't change unless I choose for it to by buying the next version. That is ideal.
There are a number of reasons why I avoid software subscriptions, but this is one of the biggest ones.
Re: Just Pay the Subscription
#87Every other business has figured out a way to operate on a single transaction model where I give them money and they give me a product and that is the end of our relationship until I need something else that they make. Somehow we have managed to operate in this manner for hundreds of years. Why is software development any different?
> Why is software development any different?
It's not. Software subscriptions are a relatively new thing. For a long time before this madness came around, software companies made money hand-over-fist by just selling software in the normal way.
Re: Just Pay the Subscription
#88Earlier quoted context omitted.
>As I said in a different thread[0], the fact that some subscriptions are predatory doesn't mean subscriptions are necessarily predatory. "Some" is doing a lot of work in that sentence. Subscriptions are structurally designed to extract payment for non-use. the whole point of the model is to be predatory. You pre-pay for some allotment of resources but get nothing back for unused resources. And the main profit comes…
>You pre-pay for some allotment of resources but get nothing back for unused resources. I dunno. This just doesn't quite compute to me as some universal principle. I paid $30 for a year of Strong (an iOS fitness app), for example. What do you see as the "allotment of resources" there? They're delivering maintenance upgrades and feature releases periodically that I'll use any time I log a workout; the app runs on a ph…
Why does a fitness tracker need continuous development? How on earth is something whose main competition is a $5 notebook and a $1 pen worth $50/yr?
A fitness tracker is exactly the sort of software I would expect to pay once for. It doesn't need some compute-heavy backend. It shouldn't need any backend at all. The entire application is window dressing for a SQLite database.
Re: Just Pay the Subscription
#89At least in my case, when I lament the fact that everything is becoming a subscription I'm not judging independent developers who charge a subscription for their mobile or web apps. They need to stay abreast of an endless treadmill of bugs, security issues, and API changes and may have servers to maintain as well, and all of that costs money.
But I do pine for the days when I could buy all the software I needed in a box like any other product and use it for decades with no updates or UI changes whatsoever. It's not the fault of independent app developers that I don't live in that world anymore.
Re: Just Pay the Subscription
#90Is this REALLY a software developer making robocalling software complaining about intrusive ads? REALLY? Yes ... yes it is. I mean is there any doubt at all what companies will use this software for? (and of course, zero attention given to the fact that robocalling is illegal in most places. For good reason. Using this software is a crime. Which means scummy salespeople and scammers are the only ones going to use it)
I don't know what you're referring to but I own a podcast app and have nothing to do with robocalling