In the point of the original comment, it absolutely is. They said:
> Thing is, I don’t believe in owning software forever anymore. Things loose their value too quickly: what would an Office suite from 2005 yield me now, other than the need to run an ancient VM to produce files nobody else could work with? Am I ever going to play the copy of Dungeon Siege again that I bought in ca. 2002? No. It looks unbearable today.
The point as I understood it was: why would I pay a high fixed fee to own a software “forever” if I am not really going to use it forever? At some point, a subscription will be cheaper overall. Because people buying an office suite in 2005 for a fixed fee aren’t using it anymore, they can also use LibreOffice now. So if they had a choice between “one time $500” or “$5 per month”, the monthly option would have been better. Software not degrading because it’s digital doesn’t change that.
> Thing is, I don’t believe in owning software forever anymore. Things loose their value too quickly: what would an Office suite from 2005 yield me now, other than the need to run an ancient VM to produce files nobody else could work with? Am I ever going to play the copy of Dungeon Siege again that I bought in ca. 2002? No. It looks unbearable today.
The point as I understood it was: why would I pay a high fixed fee to own a software “forever” if I am not really going to use it forever? At some point, a subscription will be cheaper overall. Because people buying an office suite in 2005 for a fixed fee aren’t using it anymore, they can also use LibreOffice now. So if they had a choice between “one time $500” or “$5 per month”, the monthly option would have been better. Software not degrading because it’s digital doesn’t change that.