This is not blaming the victim as there are no victims. OP’s is wrong that SaaS is rent sending. Software should not be free (in cost), yet always receive new features and updates. Indeed, the alternative is the ad-tech surveillance state.
If the software companies (in mobile in particular) had a race to the bottom, it's on them - and on those (hobbyists etc) that undercutted them (though, if hobbyists can undercut your prices, is your product really worth that much, or could it just as well be replaced with a hobbyist-made app?).
Users have since forever paid top dollar for shrink wrapped and then downloaded software like MS Office or Abobe Creative Suite and co, that now is nonetheless "subscription based".
Professionals who make their living using Photoshop usually don't have much trouble with the cost, whether paid monthly, or occasionally when a new version has a feature they care about.
Being able to bring in some more casual customers with a lower initial cost is just a bonus.
But they would then have to answer why would non-business buyers, that is, users who did "leave the update treadmill" and bought new updates (or skipped them) at their convenience, suffer the subscription model too?
There is nothing stopping Joe-who-only-pays-full-licences to continue using his MS 2007 Office suite, is there?
Products get deprecated/go out of support all the bloody time - there is nothing wrong with that: should Ford have to "support" the Edsel or Model T today "for free"? Why?
Or you can sidestep the whole thing entirely and use/fund/ promote Free Software. Your "small monthly amount" will go a long way and you will be free to pick and choose as you want.
So you could skip 90% of the BS updates you don't care for and get the 10% you do, as opposed to pay the full update price or maintain a subscription...
In other words, you could get a base product, they keep maintaining, and even release new versions you can update to for free/cheap, but with features you haven't paid for locked. Then, if you paid for a feature, you get to enjoy it for all free/cheap updates of the program.
One way to increase recurring revenue when you have a captive audience (i.e. they can't refuse an update) is by adding adware to your software. I think SaaS is the driving force behind the ad-tech surveillance state, not the thing that will save us from it.
That sounds like an extension of "you wouldn't download a car".