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About subscription software and how it came to be the necessary evil
I had some thoughts about the topic and came to the conclusion that subscription model is the way to go. Nonetheless it will be the viable way for hardware as well.
And it will be in some ways beneficial to the users.
In a market where the consumer is driven to crave the newest product available sometimes out of necessity, most of the times to testify the owner’s status quo, product makers shall adequate, pulling out new shiny toys with a ever increasing pace, if they don’t want to perish when compared to the competitors. Cars get a reissue every year, operative systems too(and the latest trend is doing it "for free"), software gets new features, televisions get bigger, brighter and more detailed, washing machines have a smaller impact on the resources needed, clean faster and better and so on.
But production, more precisely invention and innovation, has its times and inherent costs. And workers must be paid, monthly in most cases, to be able to afford the product they worked for and keep the wheel cycling and reinoculate their work in the chain.
This cycle tho, as I was saying before, isn’t static: it actually is a "upward" spiral towards "the future", "the progress", all in all pointnting to that unknown "better" that will always be right there, around the forever next corner.
On more concrete, material ground technology became a vital part of the contemporary human existence, like water, electricity, a vehicle, gasoline and so on, as part of a enabling kit for the social animals known as men. So technology became a real need instead of a mere tool, not really an option if we want to be part of the mankind and partecipate in its deeds, and as every vital need it is perpetuating itself.
Summing up these two bits it comes out that we won’t just need technology but we will need MORE technology, as far as human imagination will allow: more performing personal devices, domotics, AI, oil-less vehicles, space travel and so on and so on and so on.
So when compared to a few decades ago where you could live happily and proficiently without IT its becoming clearer and clearer that it is not the case anymore. So we will definitely need to be provided with costant updates, costant upgrades to effectively be human, perpetual fixes for our physiological dependency to technology. And subscriptions, leasings, loans and so on will therefore be the necessary evil to keep us connected, in synthony with the rest of mankind and at the same time those will keep the workers, whose are us, fed.
PS: I hope I didn’t got lost in translation and this "tl;dr" post will make sense to some, giving some food for thoughts.
PPS: No, I’m not a crusader for subscriptions.
Comments
Or just learn how to be self-balanced prosumers (half maker, half costumer) and make things for last instead pursue a neverending rat race full of bugs.
Less is more. I said less not none.
Commerce, industry and invention has survived and thrived for at least a couple of thousand years without subscription.
Are you sure? Taxes, religious offers, temporary rents, food, water and so on can be compared to some stent to a subscription form.
Subscriptions for services are ok in my book (Netflix, PS Plus, Dropbox, Apple Developer Account, etc.). Subscriptions for products feel awkward, so product marketeers need to try a bit harder to redefine their product value propositions into proper services ("we'll give you annual updates" is not a good enough proposition for me yet).
But who knows, perhaps the generation now growing up with "everything is a subscription" will have less resistance against it than us old gits and we just need to get over ourselves.
What if instead of "we’ll give you annual updates" the proposition became "we’ll give you all the updates you will need"? Which will be sort of a scam because the consumer will be induced to believe to the he will need updates. But all in all aren’t most of us audiobuser making feature requests, bug fixes(which could and shouldn’t be there at launch but could also be introduced by third party updates), in other words asking for product maintenance which actually is a service.
I can’t possibly pay a subscription for something I haven’t touched for several months or even a year or so. With apps, I might use one for a brief bout then forget it exists for a very long duration. I will pay for using it for only that brief duration, not the long cessation, obviously, but of course I want to see the updates come in as usual – they remind me it exists and act as promotional material.
I quite like the rent to buy idea that some companies are experimenting with. Especially for stuff that would be out of my budget. Trying to get money together for the soon to be released ableton update that I pre-ordered but it won't be easy. If I had the option to pay it off over 6 months even if it cost a little more money then I would be very happy to do so.
I like the “pay-per-duration-used” model (chronometer based). I think it is normal to pay a recurrent fee for something I use a lot, maybe with a max per year fee to avoid exploding budgets. On another hand, I don’t want to pay on a regular basis for something I use twice a year.
Now is it technically feasible?
It's all about the hardware. My 34 year old hardware sequencer works flawlessly with a hardware synthesizer I bought in December 2017. Never once has it needed an update and it works flawlessly.
it's all bolloks
An iOS app I bought in 2014 will no longer work with my iPad if I update to to the latest operating system ...
Whole thing is a sham. None of these companies have our wallets/options in their best interests. Only their own. A good product will continue to have new customers. Those new customers will cover any continued minor r&d costs/resources involved with updates or whatever.
Rent to own is obviously fine. And Subscription packages as an OPTION is fine. A good thing actually. But if companies pursue subscription as the ONLY option, it’s a joke... I don’t want to continuously pay for access to a bunch of stuff I might not even use, just in order to have access to the things I’d like to buy. When I buy something I buy it for what it is. If I want to add to it later if a new version is released then thats something that I’ll choose to based on whether the update additions interest me. New ableton or photoshop versions for instance.
If every softsynth, fx, daw and sample creator charged subscription we’d be screwed. I’d have like 20 monthly dev subscriptions rolling out for eternity. Or just end up limited to focusing on 3 or 4 brands/subscriptions and missing out on a ton of great software.
Sorry but it’s total BS....
No, it needs a bigger paradigm-shift, not just a new description. More like: you pay Apple a flat monthly fee for an all-inclusive "iOS Creative Pro" subscription and you get to use all the apps that fall into that particular category. Apple then pays royalties to developers according to some fair(*) distribution system.
(*) this is the difficult bit. It would at least make the system transparent and tolerable for consumers, but some serious thought would need to go into making the system attractive to product developers as well. We've learned from the music industry that flat-rate consumption services like Spotify are often not very good for the artists and don't encourage 'niche thinking'.
As long as that subscription includes the iPad/iPhone and updates to that too, then it is a true service model and more attractive......However there is one major caveat to this....anything I produce I would want to be able to backup/export in a format that I can transfer to a different creative service offered on a different platform in the event that iOS became defunct or the 'other' service was better or cheaper or whatever reason but in MY control not theirs.....no holding stuff to ransom like you get at the moment with contract phones...even after your contract completes, you have purchased your phone and fulfilled your obligation to stay on that network for 2-3 years, if you want to use that handset on a different network, you have to pay them to enable you to do it.
Thing is though, I’m pretty set with what I have now on iPad. And it’s cost me like £130 for apps. I’ll probably spend more but not very significant amount or often. How would any kind of ‘all music apps’ subscription fee work out in a way that was cheap enough for it to be a better option for someone like me than just using what they have bought and cherry picking new apps? whilst still giving devs enough cash/split between them to be better for them than getting paid per purchase? I suck at economics but seems like it would possibly just be lose/lose?
If a subscription came with a perk/service or was the perk/service itself (online storage, cloud-based device syncing, a rent-to-own end goal, ever-evolving content), it can be justified, especially if it’s an optional subscription. However, paying a subscription just to locally store one’s work on their device of choice is the biggest money-grubbing scheme there is. “We must think about the poor developer’s time and money” is a strawman argument I hear all the time. Okay, how about this for a strawman - What about the consumer who wants to make her own sustainable income from her own creative talents, passion, and drive? What if she falls on hard times and struggles to stay afloat? Do you expect her to just give up using her software for a month simply because she couldn’t pay what could quickly amount to three figures per month?
Indeed that’s a scam and a big fat lie. Some companies say, “The reason we went the subscription route is to provide more frequent updates. Instead of waiting a year, you’ll only wait a few days.” So far, despite the fact I don’t use it, Ulysses seem to have kept to their word while offering cloud device syncing. Celsys haven’t kept to their word. Their Clip Studio Studio hasn’t been updated in over two months (while users still ask them for a more mobile-friendly UI for devices that are NOT a 12.9” iPad Pro, for Files support, drag-n-drop, etc). An example that hits closer to home - GooseEQ. That hasn’t been updated in over 5 months with premium features like mid-side EQing. You could argue that a monthly subscription helps pay for a developer’s time and money and that the software development IS the service, but what good would it do if the developers simply sit back and do nothing? Do we pay them monthly just to sit and twiddle their thumbs for months on end then?
A good product will continue to bring in new customers. A good/significant update will bring in further new customers via fresh buzz and new features. A very significant update should be charged for as a new version and will bring in both existing and new customers.
A lot of the time it gets implied that first wave customers should somehow be relied on to cover all future costs/resources or something equally ridiculous.
Hard work and imagination whilst also making things that people will actually want/find useful should generally result in steady, good income if a dev is talented and making things that no else is, or making them better. And no having to worry about paying staff/shipping/premises/insurance/manufacturing etc.. Average and/or very niche apps/devs will probably struggle. But that’s the way it is in any creative field. Why would/should coding be any different?
Not before the legal warranty time expired so 2 years in Europe...> @cuscolima said:
https://cycling74.com/forums/why-we-are-trying-optional-subscription-pricing
We could also make a case for the unsustainability of today’s App prices (coupled with the ever increasing expectations of users regarding more pro-level features and continued support and updates over multiple years), so the app landscape will not be the same five years from now. It can’t be.
So my expectation is that ‘maintaining the status quo’ will not be an option for much longer. However, I don’t necessarily think subscriptions are the [only] answer.
Unfortunately this seems to be the case, however. When I released the free 2.0 updates for Ruismaker and Ruismaker FM it was only good for karma, not for business. Not even a blib on the sales dashboard.
In other words: that very significant update probably gained me goodwill with existing customers, but didn’t bring in a significant number of new customers.
So, indeed, all my statistics indicate that development investments for the entire lifetime of the product must be covered by the first wave of customers (basically: the first 4 weeks after launch). iOS is not the healthiest market for developers right now
If an app is killer then I figured it would have a steady stream of new customers? Same as good/unique hardware? Octatrack, op1... Still selling well... If there's no longevity to an apps appeal or sound quality that will catch eye of new customers eye then it doesn't really warrant continued purchases/income? Confusing how your stuff has hit a slump tho seeing as it's top drawer for quality in ios
New musicians, new humans, new iPad owners? If an app is unique and/or best at what it does then these new customers should want it and buy it? And big updates that fix omissions that stopped people buying it previously, or add stuff that really steps up the game, that should bring sales too I would have imagined?
First wave will always be the big one but it should be pretty steady afterwards too I'd have thought? I can't argue with your figures though!
Maybe soms devs are too generous with gradual updates and should just hold em all back and wow people with major v2's. And charge discounted IAP for existing customer upgrade and also make it a separate purchase for new customers (same as other desktop software upgrade options being cheaper for existing owners?)
But really most ios updates don't tend to feel like a new app like you'd expect from a v2. They're normally just icing around the edges or keeping things working with everything surrounding..
Not saying this about all devs/updates. But the majority for sure aren't making traditional v2 style significant updates for free or often.
There's also the niche thing.. I make quite niche music, write/produce constantly, tour my ass off and barely make ends meet and I'd also say I was 'average' among people doing the same thing on same scale.. That's just how it is. I could try and make more money by trying to sellout and write commercial 'hits', but it doesn't interest me to try and that market is insanely flooded in any case and to be honest I don't have the natural talent to stand out in that field.. These are just the ways of the world I guess...we choose to do these things with our lives, knowing the logistics, or we choose to do something else...
FWIW in an ideal world you deserve to be making a decent living from roseta alone
Ah, this is disappointing, @brambos... I was really hoping that with the iOS Musicians FB group growing from 5000 to nearly double that in a matter of months, you and other well regarded developers would be seeing a continual uptake in your apps. I really hope it happens for you all and that this business can become a little more healthy.
A lot of 'things' sell because people want them, not because they need them, you go for a subscription model, you'd better make sure people need what you've got.
Not complaining at all, it's just something that needs to be considered when defining product/pricing strategy. I don't know other devs' results but I wouldn't be surprised if this is a platform-wide phenomenon. Usually after 6-10 weeks any app's sales slow down to a trickle - certainly not a steady stream. I suppose that there are exceptions, such as DAWs and fan-favorite synths
Rozeta is my attempt at designing a 'slow burner' product which will hopefully remain current for a bit longer than the other apps (it has to be, because its iOS11 requirement and the 'newness' of the AU MIDI concept were obviously initially going to be disadvantages for mass adoption, compared to a typical synth or effect plugin).
Anyway, back to the subject at hand, the current economics of the App Store make it financially difficult for bigger companies and indie developers residing in countries with a high cost-of-living. So unless the pricing model changes drastically, it will become even more a playing field for hobby devs 'doing it on the side'.
Auxy have done just that.
How would you describe the ‘pricing model’?
Today? People seem to expect the perks of a subscription model (frequent free updates for at least 5 years and 24/7 support) but with a one-time payment equivalent to a fancy coffee/double-whopper/2 scoops of Haagen Dasz
@brambos I think you could easily charge a bit more for your apps, just wait until I complete the collection first!
Seriously though, thanks @mschenkel.it for starting this topic as it's interesting to ponder how this market can sustainably move forward in a way that's equally interesting for musicians/consumers/noodlers and for product developers.
I also thought the market would be a lot healthier for developers as the attitude of an iPad as a toy or novelty seems to be changing.
@brambos You have built a great reputation, hopefully your bank balance will reflect this as more musicians add iOS devices to their setup.
I would be happy to pay for IAP to dev any app with updates. Bitwig do a yearly subscription that works well would consider that for a comprehensive app but monthly puts me off.
Slightly off topic, but governments around the world, should really be seriously considering the " Universal Income" model for all citizens. Something akin to this will have to happen at some point this century, as AI robots provide more and more of our services, and produce more and more of our consumer goods. If a basic income were to be paid to all, people would be free to develop their skills and talents away from the pressures of the market economy. This would render such things as subscription models on ios unnecessary, and create a more level playing field for large & small developers alike, in this, and all other areas of human endeavor and creativity......................