Adding to your comment about not actually owning SW, there are a lot of people that seem to be fine with having subscriptions to iCloud, Dropbox, Netflix, Hulu, etc. Why are those acceptable when you can buy movies and TV shows from other services like iTunes Store, Prime Video, and Sony Ultra? And why would they buy a digital copy when they can buy a DVD or Blu-ray copy since having a physical copy is what I've been told since the iTunes Store started. And, yet, we're seeing people movie to subscription-based music, and we're seeing subscription video services rise—which includes YouTube Premium nee YouTube Red—and this move to subscription apps only seems to be happening because Apple saw the trend, not because Apple invented the trend.
Isn't this about the nature of the product? I buy music because I use (play) it many times; I'm happy to rent movies because I only watch them once (and maybe once again after 5-10 years). [Didn't SJ say exactly this some years ago when talking about iTunes policy?]
With software, one typically builds a set of personal files that depend upon that app (say a Photoshop file with PS). When your interest wanes (you buy something new), you probably still need to access the old files. The purchase model lets you 'freeze' the app you had for, typically, years until it naturally stopes working (OS updates or whatever). The subscription model means your files stop working tomorrow - probably unacceptable. So you're forced to continue paying a subscription for something you're hardly using, along with the upgrades that you're not interested in.
There is more here than meets the eye. Some of what's happening now is an evolutionary and natural selection processing occurring with the App Store itself. I believe that a huge number of the apps currently contributing to the absurd numbers attributed to the App Store are primeval in nature. They don't do a whole heck of a lot, they don't require a large development staff to develop and maintain, they are dirt cheap, and they have a small customer base. If they disappeared tomorrow or never received another bug fix or upgrade very few people would notice. The folks who "depend" on these primeval apps would probably not be impacted in any meaningful way when these apps are no longer supported. When I hear the obscene numbers of apps in the App Store stated in a keynote I always assume most of them fall into the primeval category. I seriously doubt that any of these apps will ever employ a subscription model.
On the other hand, once you start moving up the evolutionary food chain into apps that provide significant functionality you are talking about apps backed by a software product development team. Software product development teams don't come cheap - unless they are comprised of some sort of open source initiative or coordinated group of volunteers. Some of these teams are just a handful of software developers. But serious business apps have marketing people, product managers, engineering managers, developers, testers, support & continuation engineers, security experts, and a fair amount of organizational, development, testing, and deployment infrastructure infrastructure and people to support it, like HR, payroll, and accounting. These are serious businesses with serious overhead. The fact that an app runs on a teeny tiny little phone doesn't mean it has teeny tiny little development and support costs. Don't let the size fool you.
Of course the total number of apps at the upper levels of the cost models are relatively few. But there is an expansive gradient of costs and revenues associated with apps in between the primeval apps and the top tier business apps. The higher you go in the app food chain the more revenue you need to sustain the continued development and support of an app. Someone has to pay for this, regardless of what the initial or continuing (subscription) cost of the app may be. Again, it's easy to get fooled in this area because there are some apps that provide large functionality with a very expensive software product organization backing them but are still given away for "free" on the App Store, i.e., everything Google. But we all know how these apps are paid for. For everyone else it all comes down to cost vs benefit and where you want to place your bet.
The reason I mentioned evolution is because once the app developer and the customer enter into a relationship the value of the relationship will be tested and only the ones that provide continuing mutualbenefit will survive. If customers don't get value from an app they will dump it. If developers don't cover their costs and make a profit they will find something else to work on. If you're a business that depends on an app for your business you really want its developer to stay in the game, and subscriptions provide some level of assurance that the developer will stick around. Nothing is guaranteed, but what is more certain is that if the relationship is one-sided the app is at great risk of extinction. Over time many many apps will go extinct and the number of survivors, or at least broadly relevant survivors, will be a much smaller number than what we are seeing today. For some apps the only survival mechanism will be the subscription model.
A few years ago, I wouldn't have considered a subscription for any applications beyond those for PC's, and even then, the few I had were specialized engineering applications, or for awhile, Adobe CC.
With the performance attributes of the iPad Pro, I can see that subscriptions for certain applications would make sense. I can extrapolate forward a couple of years, and expect a keyboard with trackpad, and enough performance to rival a Mac Book; that's an environment that a subscription model could do well with. Perhaps their are some that would work well for the iPhone, but I haven't any need for those, at least that I am aware of.
Still, even interesting applications that have a "pro" subscription model today need to have few constraints from the hardware to be used effectively.
I really like using good quality products but considering Apples lackluster hardware offerings as of lately, or lack thereof, combined with ever rising monthly costs I will look into Linux!
Maybe I can get by with a "shittier" but supposedly free software experience, it will automatically result in a more limited and basic internet usage. Because in reality, I don't need all these fancy visuals and costly add-ons, for me it's just a fun but expensive and rather time consuming hobby that has carried on since I first stated in IT consulting with the Mac Plus back in -86. Perhaps also dump that silly smart phone altogether. Hey, I'd even skip TV while I'm at it.
More time to exercise and make good food. Tidy the yard and renovate the house, find myself a new gf.
I'll just refuse to use most all if this subscription garbage. It's almost as bad as Freemium games. I just refuse to download most all and refuse to pay. So I get to a point can't move forward anymore without paying. I just quite and do something else. I'd rather flat out buy a game.
Exactly, a lot of games that switched from purchase to “freemium” rig the game so you will pay to win instead of advancing by gameplay- otherwise a racket
I guess Tim has decided Apple needs those agency fees on a regular basis. Everybody wants to scratch your pocket for everything.
Shame on Apple. I hate ads in software and hate subscriptions. Let’s go back to paying the developer a decent price for software that has no ads and gets support for more than 5 minutes.
Nooooo... I'm already thinking about stopping subscription on some premium apps that I value, but only use occasionally. I'd rather pay premium than subscribe. Let's say I need to subscribe for 50 apps. *shrug* no no no..
Services, like Dropbox are fine. An app that sits on my phone and I do something witrh, like a writing program or a graphics program, no. Just no. My dad was a mechanic. He didn't rent his tools. I am a writer and an artist, I won't rent mine.
Somebody who either is a developer or knows people who are, tell me something. Isn't this move to subscription based apps just a way for developers to make more money? And to do it knowing they kind of have customers over a barrel in many cases, leaving them no option but to pay up? I really hate this trend. I fail to see what has changed in the app developement world that suddenly these coders are all starving and have to do this in order to survive.
There are several industries that rely on customer inertia to take more money than they would naturally receive (in the UK, insurance is one of those: reinsure with the same company each year and you are guaranteed to be charged more than 'new' customers elsewhere). I fear that software subscriptions will (often, not always) be a step in the same direction.
If a developer is producing a succession of upgrades, why not sell them as regular updates? If there aren't such upgrades (and assuming there isn't a costly service element to the product) then why is the developer entitled to a revenue-stream: they should be earning money from whatever they're doing instead of producing those upgrades?
Disclosure: been there, done that, earned money.
Indeed, yes — paid new versions lets the marketplace decide what updates have value, and keep the dev honest. They aren’t entitled to annual sales just because they’d like them and instead must listen to customers and choose what to work on.
I’m a pro software dev in enterprise and find subscriptions as an alternative to paid new versions quite lame.
I really like using good quality products but considering Apples lackluster hardware offerings as of lately, or lack thereof, combined with ever rising monthly costs I will look into Linux!
Maybe I can get by with a "shittier" but supposedly free software experience, it will automatically result in a more limited and basic internet usage. Because in reality, I don't need all these fancy visuals and costly add-ons, for me it's just a fun but expensive and rather time consuming hobby that has carried on since I first stated in IT consulting with the Mac Plus back in -86. Perhaps also dump that silly smart phone altogether. Hey, I'd even skip TV while I'm at it.
More time to exercise and make good food. Tidy the yard and renovate the house, find myself a new gf.
How's that for a change, Tim?
Cool story, bro. Too bad it’s all a fantasy in your head tho.
I'll just refuse to use most all if this subscription garbage. It's almost as bad as Freemium games. I just refuse to download most all and refuse to pay. So I get to a point can't move forward anymore without paying. I just quite and do something else. I'd rather flat out buy a game.
Exactly, a lot of games that switched from purchase to “freemium” rig the game so you will pay to win instead of advancing by gameplay- otherwise a racket
I guess Tim has decided Apple needs those agency fees on a regular basis. Everybody wants to scratch your pocket for everything.
Shame on Apple. I hate ads in software and hate subscriptions. Let’s go back to paying the developer a decent price for software that has no ads and gets support for more than 5 minutes.
Except that iOS apps started that way and nobody wanted to pay more than a buck or two. Five was considered expensive. 30+ was very, very rare.
Apple and the developers can go and screw themselves.
It’s completely irrelevant if I pay the same or more with regular upgrades or not, what no sane person will do, is allow their data to be held hostage. With subscription software, your computer becomes a doorstop, when you can’t pay. Have an accident, lose your job, etc. and your apps stop working, because you can’t pay your subscriptions. You may not be able to access vital data to write job applications or file insurance claims, because the software you use, stops working.
Similary for cloud based services: have fun when Evernote, Dropbox, etc. go out of business, or decide to change their offerings. Years of work could be gone.
At least with conventional software, you can continue using old versions, when money is tight, or if you don’t like how a new version is dumbed down. e.g. still using Aperture until Photos gets better, or I find a suitable replacement with similar workflow that’s either open source or not subscription based.
Comments
With software, one typically builds a set of personal files that depend upon that app (say a Photoshop file with PS). When your interest wanes (you buy something new), you probably still need to access the old files. The purchase model lets you 'freeze' the app you had for, typically, years until it naturally stopes working (OS updates or whatever). The subscription model means your files stop working tomorrow - probably unacceptable. So you're forced to continue paying a subscription for something you're hardly using, along with the upgrades that you're not interested in.
With the performance attributes of the iPad Pro, I can see that subscriptions for certain applications would make sense. I can extrapolate forward a couple of years, and expect a keyboard with trackpad, and enough performance to rival a Mac Book; that's an environment that a subscription model could do well with. Perhaps their are some that would work well for the iPhone, but I haven't any need for those, at least that I am aware of.
Still, even interesting applications that have a "pro" subscription model today need to have few constraints from the hardware to be used effectively.
Maybe I can get by with a "shittier" but supposedly free software experience, it will automatically result in a more limited and basic internet usage. Because in reality, I don't need all these fancy visuals and costly add-ons, for me it's just a fun but expensive and rather time consuming hobby that has carried on since I first stated in IT consulting with the Mac Plus back in -86. Perhaps also dump that silly smart phone altogether. Hey, I'd even skip TV while I'm at it.
More time to exercise and make good food. Tidy the yard and renovate the house, find myself a new gf.
How's that for a change, Tim?
I guess Tim has decided Apple needs those agency fees on a regular basis. Everybody wants to scratch your pocket for everything.
Shame on Apple.
I hate ads in software and hate subscriptions. Let’s go back to paying the developer a decent price for software that has no ads and gets support for more than 5 minutes.
Let's say I need to subscribe for 50 apps. *shrug* no no no..
I’m a pro software dev in enterprise and find subscriptions as an alternative to paid new versions quite lame.
Cool story, bro. Too bad it’s all a fantasy in your head tho.
Except that iOS apps started that way and nobody wanted to pay more than a buck or two. Five was considered expensive. 30+ was very, very rare.
It’s completely irrelevant if I pay the same or more with regular upgrades or not, what no sane person will do, is allow their data to be held hostage.
With subscription software, your computer becomes a doorstop, when you can’t pay. Have an accident, lose your job, etc. and your apps stop working, because you can’t pay your subscriptions. You may not be able to access vital data to write job applications or file insurance claims, because the software you use, stops working.
Similary for cloud based services: have fun when Evernote, Dropbox, etc. go out of business, or decide to change their offerings. Years of work could be gone.
At least with conventional software, you can continue using old versions, when money is tight, or if you don’t like how a new version is dumbed down. e.g. still using Aperture until Photos gets better, or I find a suitable replacement with similar workflow that’s either open source or not subscription based.