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Comment by tezzer | Hacker News Reader

Maybe I'm not suited for the modern world, but I paid for Office and Adobe Creative Suite and BBEdit and I expect to be able to use them indefinitely, unless I want a feature upgrade. I don't want a toothbrush subscription or a laundry soap subscription and I don't want a Photoshop subscription.

I worry about what happens to the things I've created should my subscription lapse. I'd rather budget for a one-time purchase than have a yoke around my neck forever. A tiny yoke, sure, but add that to all the other ones and they are taxing to carry around.

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Toothbrushes should have tiny removable heads, containing essentially only the bristles, which slide in and you replace when you need a new one. Definitely for the Sonicare type. Maybe even for all toothbrushes. This approach would reduce their cost even further and reduce more waste in landfills, but I guess they want to make money and I'd expect the bristles only to be priced at like $1. The rest is just plastic but when it's a "toothbrush" they can charge $10 for it but I want the cartridge for 10 dollars for 10 refills, or cheaper.

I mean, some people might like subscribing for soap and stuff, maybe they actually track how often they need to replace it. I bought some of those razors from a subscription service and they send shampoo and I realized I probably don't run out of a bottle more than once per year. I think the large bottles have lasted me as long as 5 years.

The onus of updating software for new platforms and against security problems creates new costs for software vendors. With the increased operational costs of developing software there needs to be new revenue streams. I for one am not opposed to paying small monthly fees for software that I use regularly.

The easiest way around this is to offer 1 year support or 1 major version support with the initial purchase. Then for people or corporations that want to have continuous support then they could pay for it.

This is especially true on iOS, where the vendor likes changing the APIs and rules at short notice.

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