• magnetosphere
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    1091 year ago

    Actually owning something you buy has become a selling point. Think about that for a minute.

  • @[email protected]
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    801 year ago

    …What are they actually launching though? I mean I love the payment scheme but I can’t get excited over this without an actual good product being sold.

  • Ertebolle
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    1 year ago

    I don’t want to pay once and own it forever, I want to pay once and then in a few years when it’s gotten buggy or incompatible or whatever I pay you some more money for an upgrade. If I use it a lot maybe I pay you more often, if I use it rarely maybe I pay less often, if I’ve got a lot of bills this month maybe I put it off a few months.

    That’s really it - I’ll happily give you more money occasionally if I keep using it, but the burden of stretching that revenue so that you can make your payroll every 2 weeks ought to fall on you, not on me, and if you sit on your ass and barely make any changes for a year I shouldn’t be stuck paying you the same monthly fee while you do that.

    • λλλ
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      31 year ago

      I agree with you on this. Lifetime licenses are great, but not feasible for some software. Anything that needs to be constantly updated needs steady income for developers. But, if their updates don’t provide anything that you need then you should be able to keep using the version you are on for no additional money.

    • @[email protected]
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      21 year ago

      JetBrains did similar with their perpetual fallback license and it did ok. My only gripe with their strategy was it required either the upfront year paid or at the end of 12 months of month to month you would get the license. Issue was the license was from the first month so you would have to go downgrade. I like your idea way more

    • @[email protected]
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      1 year ago

      This: comparing something you buy once, with a license does not make a lot of sense. In SaaS, you get update, support, etc. For something critical, I’d rather get that than something that I buy once and may be buggued in the future.

  • @lazyforaname
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    331 year ago

    “In the early 2000s, we were among the early pioneers leading the industry into the SaaS revolution. Now, 20 years later, we intend to help lead the way out. The post–SaaS era is just around the corner.”

    So, this company helped to get us into this whole subscription thing, and now they’re going to be the white knights to save us from it?

      • @[email protected]
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        21 year ago

        Why stop there? By spending an extra $15 every month you get the new, updated software every time it launches!

    • @[email protected]
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      31 year ago

      It would have happened anyway.

      IT, and other industries have the same seasons like fashion.

      Oh, look, it’s the turtleneck season again!

      And people forget it’s happened many times before, and act like it’s something new every time.

  • @gsfraley
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    321 year ago

    I mean, I get it, but there’s value in paying for support and updates, and it’s untenable for an organization to do that for free. I’m optimistic for software running under this model, I’d 1000% love to go back to the pay once per major version model, but “pay once forever” software leaves some unanswered questions.

    • sebinspace
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      421 year ago

      First question: the fuck are they actually making? They’re so vague about everything except how to pay.

      • @SpaceNoodle
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        121 year ago

        They’ll tell you after you pay them

      • @[email protected]
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        61 year ago

        Typical DHH bullshit. He likes to be contrarian but he never actually follows through.

        He’s a little bitch and both Ruby on Rails and the world endurance championship would be better off without him.

        • sebinspace
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          21 year ago

          Woah woah woah back the fuck up what about WEC?

          • @[email protected]
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            31 year ago

            DHH is a driver for JOTA in LMP2, he was originally a gentleman driver in pro-am like your typical rich tech guy

            • sebinspace
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              11 year ago

              Oh, I never paid attention to P2. They’re like the awkward middle child between the two classes I actually cared about.

    • JoeCoT
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      1 year ago

      Right. I have boxes full of software I bought once, and I have the license to use it forever. But it’s for Windows XP or older. I’d need emulators or WINE to run it now, and it’s not really worth it. For some of it I even paid for a “lifetime” of updates, but that stops working out when they stop updating it. I apparently live a lot longer than 90s and 2000s software companies. Just let me pay for major versions again with a guarantee of updates for X years, and price it according to those expectations.

      37Signals is the company that made Basecamp, and they talk about hosting the software yourself, so presumably they are writing web software that would often be SaaS and letting you host it. So it’s great that you’ll be able to get it for one time purchase. But it definitely needs updates, as libraries change versions, new security flaws are uncovered, obviously for bugs, etc. Buying web application software is only as useful as the length of the updates included. Them providing the source is better, but since that’s not open source exactly a community couldn’t really work together to continue updates themselves.

      • @[email protected]
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        51 year ago

        I apparently live a lot longer than 90s and 2000s software companies.

        In business lingo, that makes you an immortal.

    • @[email protected]
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      71 year ago

      I think there were probably times where software that got shipped actually worked. So you bought it and you could use it, no need for “maintenance”. I generally don’t think that’s the right word since software doesn’t decay on its own, so there’s nothing to “maintain” actively. Apart from compatibility of course, but if that breaks (e.g. with newer OS or hardware), it would make sense to pay for an update if you need it. Makes a lot more sense than those disgusting subscription scams that adobe is pulling off (and every other company seems to follow).

      • @mrginger
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        101 year ago

        There were still bugs. You just learned how to deal with them or work around them.

    • Neuromancer
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      11 year ago

      I agree. Per major version. I have SaaS for things such as word that really don’t change much.

    • @[email protected]
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      61 year ago

      Maybe a software lootbox. So you get a random surprise software, which is worse and more outdated than those on CDs you had glued to magazines.

  • @[email protected]
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    1 year ago

    Few thoughts:

    1. What is being made? Can’t really care about it without having some idea
    2. What makes this company’s version of it worth our interest?
    3. How is it better than the FOSS solutions that in this day and age almost definitely already exist
    4. Why are we to put our faith in this group for pay once software when their two major products are SaaS?
    • @Potatos_are_not_friends
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      1 year ago

      37Signals, the company that made Basecamp, is really good at getting news. They’re a really small company (less than 30 ppl), but the owners are all big in marketing. So they write books about culture and how to run a business, as well as how to get attention.

      This post is again, them finding a way to get attention.

      I neither like or dislike 37Signals. I think theyre neat. But I also read their books like it’s fantasy, as they are telling the business world how to run their companies while also being such a tiny entity.

  • @[email protected]
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    81 year ago

    Sure, but can I:

    • use the software as I like to?
    • see how it works and adapt it to better fit my needs?
    • lend it to my friend to help him?
    • pay someone else to improve this software?
    • FlumPHPOP
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      51 year ago

      Right. Even pay-once software can have a phone home component that disables it if the creator deems it. So really we’re talking about old versions of software that just used offline license keys which were easily cracked.

      I honestly really like the Jetbrains model where they offer a subscription for continual updates but you also get a fallback version you can use forever if you decide to stop paying. It acknowledges that you aren’t costing them money if you aren’t getting the new updates.

      • @[email protected]
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        11 year ago

        I came across a similar pricing model for Prodigy, and it does seem like a sensible option. You pay for updates, but will always be able to use the versions you already have in perpetuity.

  • 257m
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    11 year ago

    FOSS > ONCE > SaaS

    ONCE is a comprimize but it is not an ideal. I would rather have true freedom to use software as I wish.

    • @[email protected]
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      21 year ago

      well sure, as a user FOSS is ideal, but as a developer it’s not ideal you’re not getting paid for your software…

      Just paying a developer once for software you use seems like a decent compromise