A Critical Analysis of the Subscription Economy
1–10 of 97 posts
Re: A Critical Analysis of the Subscription Economy
#2This is a follow up to my previous article "To Catch A Liar: 1Password Edition" : https://medium.com/@guisebule/to-catch-a-liar-1password-edit...
Re: A Critical Analysis of the Subscription Economy
#3It is hard to classify Microsoft in the "#SubscriptionPsycho" category in regards to Office. They still offer perpetual licenses alongside the subscription model. However I do believe there is a huge marketing failure in making the distinction between the two product offerings.
Re: A Critical Analysis of the Subscription Economy
#4It is hard to classify Microsoft in the "#SubscriptionPsycho" category in regards to Office. They still offer perpetual licenses alongside the subscription model. However I do believe there is a huge marketing failure in making the distinction between the two product offerings.
Re: A Critical Analysis of the Subscription Economy
#5As a counter point, I hope that by paying a subscription, I get a continuous stream of small patches with bug fixes, security updates, and design improvements.
I like the subscription model, especially if it has a free tier, because passionate customers can support the developer team and subsidize less passionate users
Re: A Critical Analysis of the Subscription Economy
#6As a counter point, I hope that by paying a subscription, I get a continuous stream of small patches with bug fixes, security updates, and design improvements. I like the subscription model, especially if it has a free tier, because passionate customers can support the developer team and subsidize less passionate users
> As a counter point, I hope that by paying a subscription, I get a continuous stream of small patches with bug fixes, security updates, and design improvements.
But you do realize that the subscription model is exactly the thing that removes the incentive to do that, right?
Re: A Critical Analysis of the Subscription Economy
#7As a counter point, I hope that by paying a subscription, I get a continuous stream of small patches with bug fixes, security updates, and design improvements. I like the subscription model, especially if it has a free tier, because passionate customers can support the developer team and subsidize less passionate users
> a continuous stream of small patches with bug fixes, security updates, and design improvements
That doesn't require a subscription. Plenty of companies offer a permanent purchase that comes with a year of updates or all minor-version updates or similar.
The option is there to treat it similarly to a subscription, but importantly you never have to pay and what you already own can never be changed or taken away.
Re: A Critical Analysis of the Subscription Economy
#8Or in other words: You should not allow a company to build a monopoly on a skill of yours, because, as it happens with monopolies, they will end up abusing it.
Re: A Critical Analysis of the Subscription Economy
#9While I don't like the move to a subscription model for a lot of software, I really couldn't finish this piece. I don't think it was very well written, mostly because it kept repeating the same points over and over written a little differently. It could have been much shorter.
I don't like the subscription model because in the end, for multiple subscriptions, it all adds up and ends up being more expensive. And that after spending a lot of money on a subscription you still don't own the software.
(Not to mention "season passes" for games.)
Re: A Critical Analysis of the Subscription Economy
#10I know a lot of people here on HN think subscription models are pretty swell - personally I think they're not so great.
Sure, they provide revenue that can support security fixes - but at the cost of decimating the incentive to improve features to generate upgrade revenue.
After all, if spending more on development doesn't raise revenues much, but cutting down to a skeleton team of maintenance developers means that subscription revenue is almost pure profit, there'll always be investors pushing for that.
Seems to me that invites our industry to stagnate and stop producing value, if you don't need to make a better product in order to bring in revenue.