[mattjenner]

Dear innovative people: think of a better model.

1. Free = problematic with the lack of money

2. Freemium = looks good if the balance is right

3. Ads = Mostly works but the model is flawed and skewed

4. Subscription = Love/Hate currently trendy but too relied on

5. Pay-what-you-can = Fans provide the service for everyone

6. Premium only = Only what it's worth, when it's worth

7. Enterprise = S'ok because my company/org pays for it

8. Tokenised = S'ok because the next person pays for mine...

9. Charitable / foundation = Someone more wealthy pays

10. None of the above = For now somehow it works

There are probably 10 more models already, 10 more out there and 10 more coming soon. Get thinking, stop complaining.

[xg15]

How about good old "pay for it once, then own it"?

[isoprophlex]

Sorry, no, ridiculous idea. We've hired some MBA's and they say it'll be "milk your customers for that monthly recurring revenue", or bust.

/s

[neximo64]

If there's no support and no updates. Can't work with web apps unless there's a version restriction/time limit.

[matwood]

This works as long as customers can't complain the app is broken when a new version of the OS comes out.

[chrisseaton]

How can you own an online service?

[bagaswastu]

It goes into the premium category only

[chunkyguy]

And who pays for the maintenance and bug fixes?

Softwares can't sell like hardwares. When you buy a toaster for example, after the warranty expires you pay for every time you take it out for repairing. With softwares customers expect a life time of warranty, bug fixes and improvements.

[InvOfSmallC]

It would be nice, Intellij does something similar where you pay for one year of updates. If you stop paying it still works. But in general if it's an evolving product, I don't think you can avoid a rolling payment.

[AH4oFVbPT4f8]

How does that work when there is a vulnerability or updates that are required? How long does the company have to support the software?

[koolba]

If there’s backing services associated with it such as data storage then the duration of the asset and liability don’t jive.

[shapefrog]

Would you like feature updates with that purchase?

[xtracto]

>. Ads = Mostly works but the model is flawed and skewed

I would argue that it has been proved that this model doesn't work, because it unalgins incentivess between the developer and the user: the developer will look tho maximize revenue, catering to better paying ads and more clicks/interaction with them, while the User will try to get more usage from the main app.

I want applications that give me an EXE that I can use forever , even if the company disappears. And then the option to pay yearly or monthly for updates to said Exe (even as replacement EXEs) that give me more functionality, bugfuxes and secfixes .

[signaru]

Another idea: pausable subscription (like cancelling then re-subscribing, but without the hassle or stigma). I think I've seen a music plugin do this before. It's the idea of losing money to "idle time" that makes me allergic to subscriptions. You'd have to be a business that constantly uses the product for that to make sense.

The opposite effect is you are pressured to keep using the product and I feel my friends are losing valuable time because of their Netflix subscriptions.

Pay-per-use might also be a similar option, and I'm happy with many web services working this way.

[charcircuit]

Pausable subscriptions sounds hard to market. If netflix said that you need to pay $0.10 / hr people would be less comfortable with spending time on the platform. Every time they watch something they need to make a mental decision of if this episode is going to be worth paying $0.10 or if I should just browse TikTok for free.

[mxander]

I am surprised that the model of one off payment plus subscription after is not more common. I am happy to pay for ongoing support and updates to latest OS plus whatever MODEST margin, but I don’t really want to pay for product development cycle of features I might not even want or need. Some apps are just good as they are, I don’t want to pay for constant reinvention of UI or gimmicky features that developers feel like they have to add to justify subscription.

I’d love to say pay for a feature set that I really like and pay a “lower” subscription for it for ever. Even if at some stage I am forced to upgrade because developers have too many versions that they need to maintain.

[webmobdev]

Let me add some more fuel to the debate - How can software-as-a-service be regulated in a way that it balances consumer rights and the rights of a business? Perhaps:

1. Every SaaS business should be compelled to offer both a subscription price and perpetual license at a fixed price.

2. The fixed price of a perpetual license should not be more than 10x or 20x (?) of the monthly subscription price.

3. If a user has opted for subscription payment, they should get a perpetual licence after they have paid a certain subscription amount over a period that is not more than 2x or 3x of the fixed price of the perpetual license.

4. SaaS businesses should not be allowed to hold users data hostage if the user decides to end the subscription. (This can be tricky if the data is in some proprietary format).

5. As much as possible, the SaaS should be able to run offline on a user's computer without needing to offload computing to servers.

Ofcourse, most of the above are practical only for software that you can actually run on your computer and don't require massive computing powers from data centers that some services may need. But then again, that's exactly the kind of software that don't need to be SaaS at all in the first place, as the article too points out.

[manigandham]

Regulation is the worst solution to any of this. Let the free market figure it out and you'll find enough competition if there really is enough demand.

[hendersoon]

The answer is simple. Release a new version every year and sell it for a reasonable amount of money.

[tmikaeld]

Pay-for-use is a fair and transparent variant, don't use the service? don't pay.

[StevenWaterman]

Metered usage, pay for what you use

[spaceman_2020]

Could you theoretically tokenize individual features? Only pay for the features you need, as and when you need them.