Why is everything turning into a subscription and when will it stop?

asim18 said:
Absolutely correct. Messed up thing is Virgin Mobile is doing THREE year contracts now :eek:

Back when I started buying mobile phones the maximum was 12 months, and the phone would last 5 years!
Now your contract will be 3 years, and the phone is useless after 2 years because battery is dead. :D

:(
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Yep first contracts I had were 12 month, then 18, and 24. In between those contracts I usually go sim only on a 30-day rolling deal. My current contract is up next month and I'm already looking at 30 day sim deals or even PAYG as I'm still happy with my current phone.

If 3 year contracts came the norm I just wouldn't touch them.
 
asim18 said:
The amount of people getting shafted is directly proportional to the amount of people getting a benefit.

That's the thing, no one cares about fairness when they're the ones being advantaged.
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What odd "logic"

Its not a zero sum game.

Some subscriptions (like prime) drive loyalty to a place, its like loss leaders for supermarkets. My default position with prime is to get the amazon price then see if i can get it cheaper elsewhere. Sometimes I can so I buy there, but often the leadtime comes into consideration, this is one of the big benefits for Amazon, your drawn to them as if the price is the same you will get it next day, vs how long for someone else. Very few businesses can match Amazon in this regard without paying a fairly hefty (one off) delivery fee.

If I get 6 parcels delivered a month at a cost of £2 each or I can pay £8 for free delivery on as many parcels as I want, its a logical choice. Its got absolutely no link to how many parcels my neighbour gets.
Then with amazon you have to add in all the other services available for prime, and the reduced pricing (I bought something this weekend that was £5 off for prime members) its utterly impossible to say person A gets more benefit than person B
My other half for example reads a lot, so she saves probably £10 a month buying random books in places like Tesco, she just downloads a few kindle books a week (the free ones)

Every product and every service is an individuals cost vs benefit calculation.
There are times when subscription models work well and others that aren't so good, but even this is individually calculated and will probably vary over time.

Your not getting shafted because you use a service less than someone else, your potentially getting worse value for money, but thats a different thing.

We have Sky, its poor value for money for us. I could maybe do without it, although we have no aerial so i would need to think about that or freesat for example. Sky are going to drop the sats completely in future, they will probably change their charging model at that point.
We have Prime, superb value for money, we save at least £20 a month compared to what we would have spent. I dont care if anyone else is saving £40, they aren't shafting me.
We have at times Netflix, but its harder to justify against prime, although the great benefit with all these services is you can binge and drop, so the value for money if you use them correctly can be really high.

I don't really like software subs, they seem overpriced imho. However if you were offered an OS for £2 a month or £799, clearly the £2 a month would be a no brainer. Its again the value for money thats the issue.
 
asim18 said:
Absolutely correct. Messed up thing is Virgin Mobile is doing THREE year contracts now :eek:

Back when I started buying mobile phones the maximum was 12 months, and the phone would last 5 years!
Now your contract will be 3 years, and the phone is useless after 2 years because battery is dead. :D

:(
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You could just replace the battery of course.

The iPhone 3G was £350 for the 8GB model on O2 PAYG.
 
asim18 said:
Milkage milkage milkage. :(

Well yes I've replaced the battery in my 4S about 3 times, but it's not just the battery. Apps and software themselves become more and more bloated to sell newer phones.

Apps get up to 1000 times more CPU hungry while performing the same old basic functions.

https://sensortower.com/blog/ios-app-size-growth
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You can afford to have more sloppy code when hardware performance makes up for it. The price of hardware progress.
 
Mercenary Keyboard Warrior said:
I don't really like software subs, they seem overpriced imho. However if you were offered an OS for £2 a month or £799, clearly the £2 a month would be a no brainer. Its again the value for money thats the issue.
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Not necessarily relevant to contract price but another aspect that people often forget about when measuring contract vs upfront cost is the intrinsic benefit of preferential payment terms. Even if the net cost is slightly higher being able to spread payment over a 24 month period has an intrinsic value in terms of liquidity and buying power. B2B relationships are acutely aware of this and sometimes they will pay more for preferential terms, sellers will also factor their terms into pricing. However in the consumer world spreading the cost is often looked down upon as poor value.
 
I think part of the issue is that we don't have a culture of saving anymore. People generally can't afford to pay up front, so monthly charges suits them better.
 
mrochester said:
You can afford to have more sloppy code when hardware performance makes up for it. The price of hardware progress.
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Surely there are bigger concerns for sloppy code than simple inefficiency. What about security? Or are you actually saying crap developers are fine as long as the hardware can barely run it? :eek:
 
adolf hamster said:
its an excellent business model, as it means you can get guaranteed payment and a known income stream.
. . .
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Too true, for the software vendor it makes lots of sense.

The only time I have encountered it is when people have asked me whether they should buy a copy of MS-Office or pay for Office 365. When I suggest that they should consider using Libre Office they are horrified, insisting that they simply HAVE to use Word or Excel - A fool and his money are soon parted.
 
stockhausen said:
Too true, for the software vendor it makes lots of sense.

The only time I have encountered it is when people have asked me whether they should buy a copy of MS-Office or pay for Office 365. When I suggest that they should consider using Libre Office they are horrified, insisting that they simply HAVE to use Word or Excel - A fool and his money are soon parted.
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its a good point, i'm currently getting 365 for free with my course, but i'm not sure once i'm finished wether to bother paying for a subscription or not. what i will say is better the devil you know and if office is what your used to then it can be comforting to stick to it. it is industry standard for a reason.
 
FortuitousFluke said:
Because some models work out significantly cheaper for the consumer? Netflix for instance let's say I watch 20 films a month, with a rental fee of £0.99 - £3.99, let's call it £1.50 to be generous, that's £30 a month, I pay Netflix £7.99 I think, net saving for me. Same with Audible and Amazon Prime, subscribe and save offers me significant savings on items that I will buy anyway compared to supermarket prices. Where's the downside, they're all 1 month rolling contracts anyway.
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Who on this planet watches 20 films per month?! That’s obscene! I’ve seen about 20 films in the last 20 years.
 
dirtychinchilla said:
I don't see the issue. Yes, I've got a number of subscription-based monthly bills. Are they worth it? Absolutely.

Broadband? Of course.

Sky? I want it...so I'll pay for it.

Apple Music? Well I could get it all for free illegally, but I'm happy to pay whatever it is a month, maybe £8, to get all the music that I could ever want. The database element of it is fantastic.

Netflix? I watch it more than I actually watch Sky, so great.

Amazon Prime? Maybe unnecessary, but I really want to watch The Grand Tour, so I'll pay for it.

Mobile phone? Of course.





Don't you use the internet? Don't you watch TV? Don't you have a phone??

When I want to stop paying, I'll go back to torrenting music and TV shows. But everything else is virtually essentially. I could cut out Sky quite easily, but my fiancée likes it and she's paying the bills too, so who am I to object?
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microsoft will be getting on this soon as windows as a service, how much will you be prepared to pay to keep windows up to date, 10,20 a month?
 
What’s wrong with subscription music?

I get a lot more out of my £10/month on Spotify than I ever would by spending the same buying CDs.
 
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