> Hot take: Subscription models actually reflect the costs of software development better than an one-off purchase. They link the value provided by updates/maintenance to a tangible cost.
I don’t agree with this at all. I believe subscription models encourage laziness and/or introduction of unnecessary or complex features (to show that busywork is being done).
Sell a license for applications with support included for a year or whatever, like developers used to and still do. If you continue providing more value to customers, and if you aren’t too greedy to introduce new versions and upgrades for trivial updates often, why would the majority of your customers not purchase a paid upgrade every couple of years or so?
I feel there are many areas that are saturated and that developers struggle to figure out how to add more value...or rather, extract more money from customers (1Password in recent years is an example of this, in my experience).
>> But you do realize that the subscription model is exactly the thing that removes the incentive to do that, right?
> Can you name a single case where this has happened with subscription software, though?
Every single one of them. It's just a matter of logic that that incentive is removed. There might be other incentives that still keep them innovating or whatever (like, say, competition, if it's reasonably possible to migrate away), but that one just logically isn't.
> what exactly does moving from a purchase to a subscription benefit me?
It keeps the vendor financially healthy, stable and willing to keep developing the stuff you use.
Would you want to dedicate your work into a product for meagre & sporadic standalone payments pressuring you to endlessly churn out marketable feature upgrades with little time for maintenance work just to barely make ends meet? No? Then why on earth do you expect other software vendors to do that?
Even Bitwarden pushes subscriptions.
I'd love to see how many developers who complain on HN about subscriptions actually make a living primarily from selling standalone software to consumers.
> 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?
> There's absolutely cases where software should be a subscription model and there's absolutely cases where it shouldn't be.
My thoughts on this:
1. How long would it take a team of 4 people to build this with just the features I need for a single user?
2. How much would it cost to contract a team to build that (ball bark)?
If it can be done on a single person's salary, I'm not paying a monthly subscription, no matter how inexpensive. I'm also not contracting that work either, but I might be tempted to compete with them if my employer let me (they won't).
Only certain things make sense as a subscription, and those are things that have an infinite (or practically infinite) cost to the consumer, thus they should have an amortized infinite cost.
as a customer, i don't have the choice to not pay for such upgrades but continue using the old one.
And yet, the SaaS subscription cost is charged continuously whether the customer likes the upgrades or not.
So no, i don't agree with the SaaS business model. It's more extractive. The point of buying a piece of software is the same as buying capital equipment - purchase once, and have it work "forever" (and since software doesn't rot like real equipment, this should be even more true).
What i would pay a subscription for is live/in-person support.
> ore importantly, subscriptions are immoral because the end result is robbing users of any sense of ownership. And as a software developer, you no longer feel compelled to innovate, to improve, in order to convince users to upgrade. I for one hate renting things, I prefer ownership.
Sure as long as you also accept that you are not owed bug fixes it updates. If you however believe that with system upgrades you should get corresponding app upgrades, then it starts to sound more like a service. I like subscription because I want developers to treat this as a service: support, fixes, features, etc.
> if there's some business model out there that delivers what customers want ... while also delivering profits to shareholders.
Of course there is, but that's why software in a box cost hundreds or thousands of dollars per version, with minimal bug or security updates thereafter. The grass is always greener, yeah it's a pain in the ass having a ton of $10/mo subscriptions. But I'd much rather have that - as both a consumer and a developer - than have $800 single-sale purchases.
> One time payment is a lot more attractive to me than a subscription. I'm beginning to despise subscription software
As an aside, i don't mind the middleground for subscription; buying once to own it, but getting updates for only 1 year. I've experienced this with TablePlus and DataGrid and it's been pleasant.
I agree, i dislike subscriptions and i avoid them now. But i don't mind paying for updates at all. If anything it feels reasonable and inline with my desires as a consumer - continued support.
Too many products i've bought feel abandoned in favor of an upcoming 2.0 to again get money out of me. Give me rolling evergreen releases with a sub-like, but let me own what i've bought so i can be sure it will always work for me. Seems like a good compromise to me.
> I understand the rationale for these companies to push for subscription models to pump their PE ratio and get that predictable revenue bump. Adobe famously went from $15 billion to $400 billion by switching to subscription services rather than selling CS licenses.
For Adobe it makes sense. Like, the full CS suite is 50-60€ a month... that was probably 10k worth of purchases before. Even as a student, you can usually afford a CS subscription, whereas you all but had to pirate it under the old model.
Personally I would prefer something like the IntelliJ license model - subscribe for 12 months, and you get the last version you had permanently if you cancel the subscription.
For games though? For the calculation to make sense even remotely, the monthly subscription game would need to be in the cents, maybe a dollar a month. Everything else is just a ripoff.
> But are you happy to pay for better architecture that doesn't have shiny new features? Or support for new X (depending on the product this could be image formats, it could be architectures)? etc
Depends on what product, and my use case.
> To be clear I am not saying I want subscription based software, but I understand the business argument for it.
Has nothing to do with more supported X or better architecture, its just about money. In fact SaaS offerings are often compromised and worse of than when they were standalone (at least in my experience with software that made transition from standard releases to subscription).
Additionally in my experience with software that went that route (standard paid releases to subscription) that just signals that the customer milking has become, and pretty much any new feature is looked at from how can we milk it standpoint.
No. I routinely buy software and lifetime subscriptions in the $10 to $100 range without batting an eye, but if I had to pay $5 a month for every piece of software or service I use, I would spend thousands of dollars every single month and it'd be ridiculous even if I'm lucky enough to be able to afford that.
There's a place for recurring subscriptions and a place for fixed priced software that is supposed to work for eternity, even if without upgrades.
Don't blame the consumer if they don't want to pay $5 a month for a standalone app.
> Subscriptions align developer and user interests and produce better products and less wasted money in the long run.
In theory, maybe. In reality, I doubt it. Personally, I don't feel my interests are very much aligned with, or even cared about by, subscription software developers.
> I would much rather have 20 apps that I pay $10/mo/ea for than to buy one new $600 app a quarter and hope the developers I bought from years ago still care about me even though they will never make another dime.
Here's the thing, though: in that latter case, even if the devs no longer care about you, you still have the software, and it still works. Conversely, subscription devs may "care" about you until they get bored, or get acquihired, or run out of money, etc. and then suddenly you no longer have the software. Or they'll start making some silly or abusive changes, and then you'll be wishing the devs no longer cared.
This is to say: there's a risk attached to subscriptions (or, put another way, extra value in one-time purchase model).
Also, too little is being said about the other cost of subscriptions, which does not show up on the sticker price: each subscription is a business relationship. A relationship I need to keep track of, and which regularly reminds itself on my existence (unless the vendor is making money on forgotten subscriptions - then it stays perfectly quiet) - costing me time, effort, and occupying my memory. Importantly, it's also a relationship I don't want to have in the first place.
When I go to a grocery store to buy some bread, I want to... buy some bread. I don't want to enter into a relationship with the bakery, or their supplier. Today, I get the bread, they get the cash, and that's the end of it. Tomorrow, I may come back to the same place, or go somewhere else. It's the same with software: I may pay once, or top it up repeatedly, but all I care about is software - I don't give two damns about the company making it, or other products they have. I never, ever want to think about them. Subscriptions force me into such relationships. I have a limited capacity for them - my phone operator, utility companies, HOA, etc. are already enough.
Going back to the bakery example, theoretically I do enter a relationship with a seller every time I buy something from a physical or on-line store - a relationship I can use to e.g. get my goods fixed or my money back if something is wrong with the purchase. However, this is fully covered by consumer protection regulations, which means I can safely ignore those relationships - they literally reduce to "keep a proof of purchase, read up on relevant procedure when the vendor fucks up". Subscriptions would be nicer if they worked this way too.
>Software has expectations that it can and should be changed after purchase through updates/patches/upgrades/saas products. That creates an ongoing cost a physical product doesn't have.
Nowadays businesses use this to create a constant revenue stream from what used to be a single purchase. It's not to service the product, its to continue to soak money from the people who do end up spending on it.
Aside from security updates most software I have, I just want them to stop. No changes, no design upgrades, no "we changed this tier of our pricing" etc. Most of that stuff is working against the customer not for them. Your SaaS model is so you can make money, I have no incentive to pay more than I have to.
> I feel like they could have a sustainable model if they had a more expensive one-time purchase and every few years released a new major version that required a one-time purchase again.
And people complain about this also. If everyone is going to complain anyway, they might as well go to subscription which is best for the business.
> People who would happily spend $20/month for a good code editor will love the change to a subscription model in the long run, because it lets you invest more effort in making the product great.
That’s almost double what I pay for Jetbrains’ stuff and I figured the forced subscription from Jetbrains was 3x what I had been paying by skipping 1-2 versions between updates.
You’re right about changing the customer base though. All the suckers that can’t figure out prices just when up 3-4x seem to love subscriptions and financially flippant people like that are probably the best customers to have.
And Jetbrains is the only subscription software I’ve used that doesn’t keep adding bloated trash features to justify their subscription.
> because I saw too many software companies go out of business because not enough people wound up upgrading to the next major version
Really? How many companies did you see do this? Because I see lots of companies still around who have been selling software for decades. Because the marginal cost of software is near zero it’s possible to make money off upgrades and new products because it’s not a linear function of labor to customers.
I think it’s more profitable to charge as a service. Adobe and Microsoft weren’t at any risk of bankruptcy when they switched to subscription.
I don’t agree with this at all. I believe subscription models encourage laziness and/or introduction of unnecessary or complex features (to show that busywork is being done).
Sell a license for applications with support included for a year or whatever, like developers used to and still do. If you continue providing more value to customers, and if you aren’t too greedy to introduce new versions and upgrades for trivial updates often, why would the majority of your customers not purchase a paid upgrade every couple of years or so?
I feel there are many areas that are saturated and that developers struggle to figure out how to add more value...or rather, extract more money from customers (1Password in recent years is an example of this, in my experience).
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