• @vga@sopuli.xyz
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    1 day ago

    I wouldn’t mind renting software, if only subscription-based software was such that you only paid the money for the subscription. It would be a fine way of using something for a short term, and a fine way to get some sort of guarantee that the software is maintained.

    But you’ll also end up paying with your data that they sell out.

    • Camelbeard
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      224 hours ago

      Maybe for the short term, but there is software you use every day, for years. Some android apps I have been using since 2014.

      • @vga@sopuli.xyz
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        120 hours ago

        Reverse question: would you maintain a program that you wrote 11 years ago if it wasn’t making you money?

        • Camelbeard
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          214 hours ago

          No, but I also don’t expect that as a user. It is also fine if the developer makes version 2.0 and I can decide to buy the new version or not. Before the internet this was pretty much how it worked, a new version came on a new floppy or disc you’d buy in a store.

          • @vga@sopuli.xyz
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            11 hours ago

            Then again, application software wasn’t cheap. Given inflation, would you pay a thousand bucks for a lifetime license of a piece of software that didn’t get any updates ever?

            • Camelbeard
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              5 hours ago

              I was too young to really buy software but the most expensive game I bought as a kid was 40 guilders. If use and inflation correction calculator and convert to euros that game in 1995 would be 36 euros in todays money, about 40 dollars. This was a gameboy game.

              A pc game back then was between 50 and 60 dollars (converted with inflation).

              But this was all in a physical store, where you would get an actual box, book, cartridge or disc, etc.