Subscription software - the big problem with it that nobody is talking about

Subscription software, according to all the companies talking about it, and trying to get us switched to it (whether we want that or not), has a big hidden problem:

*nobody can afford to switch every single piece of software they use to the subscription model*

To illustrate this problem (using estimates, and remember, everything is per year, per PC), let's list "what software we use, every day, whether daily or even just once per week":

1. $100: OS
2. $50: office suite
3. $50: antivirus suite
4. $50: backup suite
5. $25: utility #1 (pick any utility)
$25: utility #2 (keep picking 'em)
...

The above got just one pc to the point where someone can use it. Multiply that by the number of pc's you use in your daily life (physical, virtual, doesn't matter), and times the number of seats in your family (you, spouse, kids).

Now, continue the exercise with those critical software suites (CAD, Adobe whatever, etc.):
6. $50 to $100: your specialty app (CAD, DTP, etc.)
...

If, like me, you ended up with over $1000 per pc (physical, virtual), times a minimum of 4 seats, it wouldn't be long before we're paying upwards of $5000, per year, to move to a subscription model. I can't pay that every year. What I can do is pay for a key piece of software as a one-time purchase, and use it for as long as possible.

What this subscription push is doing is pushing me towards more open-source software, and/or abandoning the use of some key piece of software, until something changes. At the moment, it's do everything as open-source as possible, and minimize the number of purchases of licenses that are not subscription:

- office suite: using libreoffice
- cad: plenty of free options
...

What are your thoughts on this whole "subscription" mess?

Again, it's not "any one piece of software moving to a subscription-model" that is a problem, it's all of them, moving in this direction, that is the big problem. That's $1000's of dollars, every year ... I submit that this is/will be unsustainable, until some solution comes out where all the software vendors work together, vs each trying to grab a piece of the subscription pie for themselves, and leaving us with the bigger problem.

It doesn't bother me to pay monthly for Adobe. I understand that they have to pay their staff to maintain and update their products and that cost money. Right now I pay about 12 dollars a month for Adobe and since I use it daily it's a bargain for me, at least.

I use a free version of office utilities, and all the other tools I use are free. As for the OS, I paid 120ish when I had to get a new copy but with free upgrades to 11 from 10 it's not a big deal.

My PC cost me about 700, and I don't buy new hardware that often. The hardware I have is listed below, My Computer.

I don't know what you expect the vendors to do. They all use a specific code base for their products, and it's not possible for them to share code. Having worked in IT for many years I understand that there is a cost with maintaining and updating products and I accept that I have a price to pay for some of the products I use, for example Adobe

In the end it's up to each person to pick and choose the products they use, both free and subscription. There are still many great free products available and there are others that have a one time fee.

Jeff

I don't pay for any of the software installed on my personal laptop apart from the OS which was technically bundled into the laptop sale price. Everything I use is either open source or completely free.

I'm not against the concept of the "subscription" model in general. But it all boils down to what you get and the value you perceive.

Let's take Microsoft Office for example. Way back in the day, a single PC use copy of Microsoft Office professional was about $450. And let's say you needed it on a desktop and on a laptop. To not violate the license, and assuming you needed the full set of apps that professional offered (versus say home and student or home and business), you would have had to pay $450 x 2, or $900 for your 2 copies of Microsoft Office Professional. (And yes, I know there are shady websites that sell super cheap copies of Office, but none of them are legitimately selling these licenses following the licensing agreements with Microsoft....but most people are willing to give it a shot and look the other way fully knowing that it's not quite legit, etc).

Along comes Office 365, and now for $69 a year, you can get office on your Desktop, on your laptop, on a second laptop or desktop, or pretty much any device you own. So, at $900 for your 2 copies, divided by $69 a year, you can run Office on all of your devices, and always the latest version for 13+ years before breaking even. Let's say 5 years into your subscription, you find you no longer really need word or excel, and instead move to a Mac with their office apps, or Google Docs, or Llibre Office, or whatever......well at $69 x 5 , you invested $345 for what you actually needed versus that $900, you would have paid outright to purchase the software. Of which you cannot recoup, as you aren't allowed to sell it.

Now, let's look at other benefits of Office 365. In addition to actually getting Microsoft Office, you also get 1TB of cloud storage. "IF" you want some cloud storage space, it's hard to find 1TB of cloud storage for the price of Office 365. Today, a 2TB Dropbox plan is $9.99 a month if billed annually. That's $120 a year for 2TB of storage (and that's all you get is storage...you don't get any Microsoft office). So, now 1TB with Office at $69 doesn't look too bad.

Office 365 has a $99 a year plan which gives you 6 user accounts. That's 6 people who can run Office on everything, and 1TB x 6 users, or 6TB of cloud storage space, for $99 a year. If you want to use any of that cloud space, 6TB for $99 a year cannot be beat. I don't think any cloud provider can provide that....and they certainly won't bundle in Microsoft Office with it as well for that price.

Office 365 also lets you share with friends and family. So, you can take $99 a year, divide by 6 people and that comes out to $16.50 per user. For $16.50 a year, you get the full office suite on an unlimited number of devices and 1TB of cloud space........you can see where I am going, it's dirt cheap.


i think one thing with subscriptions that people don't talk about it, is the inability to pirate software as easily. Way back in the day, a great number of people weren't paying $450 for Microsoft Office Professional, or $650 for Photoshop. They were getting it from shady warez sites on the internet with either cracked copies, license generators, etc. No question whatsoever that when Adobe went pure subscription model, many just stayed on their super old version, or moved away from Photoshop as they weren't willing to pay that cost for the subscription model. But I think it bummed out a lot of people that there wasn't an easily attainable "free" version of Photoshop they could just find on the web.


I'm absolutely onboard with the open source option. Tons of great stuff out there, and maybe it's not exactly the same, or the UI could be better, but nobody is forcing me to buy a certain piece of software unless I deem it's worth it to me.

Yeah, it gets expensive but I 100% insist that if I cannot afford a piece of software I will not use it.

I use free software where I can, but in a lot of categories I find nothing available for free that I like.

I have said it before, and I will say it again:

A drug habit would have been way cheaper than this computer habit

It used to be that companies negotiated pricing so that large ones with 30,000+ PC's, laptops, etc. could pay a reasonable price for the software, MSDN, support, etc. Many STILL took an OS release and "modified" it for their specific corps use.. such as no admin rights, no win update capability, etc.
And that's just the OS.
Add in AV (virus) software, problem resolution, elevated access and.. cha-ching.. up goes unit cost.
But that is commercial.. so along comes the subscription model for the rest of us, to recoup commercial losses.

I can understand it with smaller firms (phone apps?) where the initial "one time" cost would be prohibitive for many - developers gotta make a living too, but.. !
However, point taken. It's the unintended consequences to the consumer aspect.

Example:
I upgraded my PC earlier this year, re-installed office 2013.
Yes, I've been using it that long as it does everything I need from Word, Outlook, Excel, etc. - plus I don't care to pay $100 a year for Office 365.
I re-entered my license key. All good. Last week after the last MS upgrade (KB5043076) the key vanished and Office de-activated itself.
It wouldn't activate on-line (too old) and I had to do research to find telephone support, finally able to get it activated.
This is the other type of unintended consequence when one uses older software.
I paid for it back then. It works.
I don't want to be FORCED to upgrade to a "residential" subscription model to get the latest bells and whistles (which are often window dressing and code bloat) that I simply don't use, need or want.

Long time dev here. </end_rant>

I work on a few open source projects, and I talk to other devs as a part of that. I can tell you for certain that there are money problems on that side of the house also. Lots of people just take and take from open source projects, asking for support and sometimes new features, without ever supporting the project. This often leads to developer burn out, and they walk away.

It is an unfortunate trend for the typical home user. You may have heard the expression that "water finds it own level". We there will be good competitors who offer reasonable priced products. They will gain market share, and the greedy vendors will loose market share.

Do your research in finding alternatives and maybe make some compromises. Most of all, do not support the greedy ones.

50ShadesOfDirt said:

Subscription software, according to all the companies talking about it, and trying to get us switched to it (whether we want that or not), has a big hidden problem:

*nobody can afford to switch every single piece of software they use to the subscription model*

To illustrate this problem (using estimates, and remember, everything is per year, per PC), let's list "what software we use, every day, whether daily or even just once per week":

1. $100: OS
2. $50: office suite
3. $50: antivirus suite
4. $50: backup suite
5. $25: utility #1 (pick any utility)
$25: utility #2 (keep picking 'em)
...

The above got just one pc to the point where someone can use it. Multiply that by the number of pc's you use in your daily life (physical, virtual, doesn't matter), and times the number of seats in your family (you, spouse, kids).

Now, continue the exercise with those critical software suites (CAD, Adobe whatever, etc.):
6. $50 to $100: your specialty app (CAD, DTP, etc.)
...

If, like me, you ended up with over $1000 per pc (physical, virtual), times a minimum of 4 seats, it wouldn't be long before we're paying upwards of $5000, per year, to move to a subscription model. I can't pay that every year. What I can do is pay for a key piece of software as a one-time purchase, and use it for as long as possible.

What this subscription push is doing is pushing me towards more open-source software, and/or abandoning the use of some key piece of software, until something changes. At the moment, it's do everything as open-source as possible, and minimize the number of purchases of licenses that are not subscription:

- office suite: using libreoffice
- cad: plenty of free options
...

What are your thoughts on this whole "subscription" mess?

Again, it's not "any one piece of software moving to a subscription-model" that is a problem, it's all of them, moving in this direction, that is the big problem. That's $1000's of dollars, every year ... I submit that this is/will be unsustainable, until some solution comes out where all the software vendors work together, vs each trying to grab a piece of the subscription pie for themselves, and leaving us with the bigger problem.

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Windows/other OS doens't cost $100 per year

Originally bought Office 365 when i purchased Laptop in 2017 for 5 years---Family version. ((extended til 2025 when 5 years expired in 2020) But i'd always find a way to renew Office as do use OneDrive 1TB storage, and Word, Outlook, Excel at times


Might stick with Acronis True Image for my system backup needs---can't afford Macrium Reflects One Time purchase charge for 4 PC's, and then get Reflect X for 3 years, sure that program uses less resources possibly, and more familar with, but for now sticks with what i have.


Roboform Password Manager i extended all the way to 2026 thus far lol, might extend further when Christmas Comes

Another Subscription i make sure to keep up is Malwarebytes Premium


Just subscribe to what i find value for now and what i can afford, if i can't afford something in future, then will find an alternative i suppose

50ShadesOfDirt said:

What are your thoughts on this whole "subscription" mess?

Click to expand...

We are not there yet. Maybe in few years, thus far there are free version, ad-supported, etc.
I currently pay only for MS365 Basic and Netflix subscriptions, since everything else is free.

Eventually it will sort itself out, if people are not willing or able to pay. Just like streaming services, they are currently at the tipping point, getting more and more expensive, restrictive and you can not really afford all. What you are referring to is more about a few greedy companies like Adobe or HP and this title is pretty much self-explanatory, you do not own your HP printer!

Quandary said:

It is an unfortunate trend for the typical home user. You may have heard the expression that "water finds it own level". We there will be good competitors who offer reasonable priced products. They will gain market share, and the greedy vendors will loose market share.

Do your research in finding alternatives and maybe make some compromises. Most of all, do not support the greedy ones.

Click to expand...

i believe that open source software will have to change its approach and start to charge one off fee's.
example .. Libre Office which is a very good set of office tools for everyday users but for Libre Office to survive it will need to cover costs.
just because its open source doesnt mean it shouldn't be paid for and i think that they and other open source software will have to head in that direction. thats just my thoughts.
best of luck. Steve ..

BunnyJ said:

I don't know what you expect the vendors to do.

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I expect them to allow you to buy a version and own it. And choose when to update it. Not being forced into a subscription as being the only method. Every product should be purchasable and not forced as a subscription being the only option.

It's funny we are talking about subscriptions, because my Amazon Music Unlimited Family plan just renewed. It's $169.00 a year. A part of me says Yikes when I see that bill come through.

But then I consider that myself, my wife, my son, my daughter and my dad are all included in my plan. My son and I have music playing constantly, and aside from this subscription we don't spend money on music at all. Years ago, I used to buy music on CD quite often. Without a doubt, I always spent more than $169 a year on CD's and only had access to the ones I bought, now I can practically listen to everything, everywhere I go. So, end of the day, totally happy with this subscription.

It's time however to sort out the mess that has become the Cable TV bill. Since cutting the cord and everybody and their brother having a streaming service, i probably have more content than I did before, but I also spend more money on it now that I used to.

Another hidden problem: some software companies have done away with the "one-time purchase". I keep running up against companies who have indeed done away with the single one-time purchase, and expect me to join their subscription plan. I politely write them an email explaining why I can't do that, and they politely write back "tuff", without really extending me any kind of option other than subscription.

I write back again thanking them for their time, mentioning that I"ll look elsewhere, and ... crickets ... so, they lost a piece of business, and are OK with it, because they want everyone driven to this subscription model.

On the exact license costs, please insert your own numbers, and feel free to submit your estimate of *total costs* for one seat in your home, and how many seats you really have. So, yes, an OS might not be $100, but hey, it might be more, depending on what you are doing.

Open source, here we come ...

The subscriptions I have I really do like and are all well worth the price.

Microsoft 365 Family - Microsoft Office and 1TB OneDrive
Adobe Photographer Plan - Lightroom/Photoshop
Finviz Elite - Real-time market features
Amazon Prime
YouTube Premium

TraderGary said:

The subscriptions I have I really do like and are all well worth the price.

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Some are def worth it. But I feel like a lot of them only went that way due to greed, not providing value.

And it is true that there starts to become a point where if everything goes this model, life will be very hard, especially for low income families. It already is, but even more so.

What happens when your old one-time purchase stops working when a new version of Windows is released? Does anyone remember Quickbooks when Vista was released?

andrew129260 said:

Some are def worth it. But I feel like a lot of them only went that way due to greed, not providing value.

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I'm not being forced into any of my subscriptions. If the value is there, I subscribe. Period.

andrew129260 said:

And it is true that there starts to become a point where if everything goes this model, life will be very hard, especially for low income families. It already is, but even more so.

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And some of us have done well and can enjoy the fruits of our efforts.

Porthos said:

What happens when your old one-time purchase stops working when a new version of Windows is released? Does anyone remember Quickbooks when Vista was released?

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Well, you can keep using it on an older version of windows, or use compatibility mode on a newer version of windows. Or use a virtual machine, etc etc. You at least have options. Even if support ends, there is nothing stopping you from using it in some way.

TraderGary said:

I'm not being forced into any of my subscriptions. If the value is there, I subscribe. Period.

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For now. I would argue Adobe apps are essentially being forced to have subscription due to their monopoly on the market. Car subscriptions are trying to be forced by the market. A lot of things are moving there with no other alternative.

TraderGary said:

And some of us have done well and can enjoy the fruits of our efforts.

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For sure. But not everyone can.