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Ask HN: Does Monthly Pricing Suck For Desktop Apps?

2 points by husky ↗ HN
I don't think so - but this is the pushback I've noticed when talking to users.

They are perfectly happy to pay this way for a web app but seem unhappy to consider it for desktop apps even though it has a number of benefits:

- Monthly pricing allows you to spread the cost of the software and if you don't like it you only pay as long as you used it - The software developers can offer silent updates quickly and often to keep adding features and fixing bugs - The software developers are only maintaining one master branch of code - keeping their costs lower which can be passed on to the customer - Most users are paying a regular payment anyway: a product cycle is around a year with most desktop products - after that you have to buy a new version to get new features

Why is this and will it ever change?

7 comments

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mehrzad
If I have something natively running on my computer, it's mine now. I don't like to pay for it more than once.

This is what goes in my and users' minds, most likely.

t0
Yes, it's changing. But it depends on the software and whether it's specifically built to work around monthly payments. As an example, Diablo III was beatable in a few days and left you with absolutely nothing to do afterwards. Whereas a game like World of Warcraft has you paying monthly for several years to play a seemingly never-ending game.
tgflynn
There are lots of expensive software products that I may have an occasional need for but not enough to justify purchasing a license. For example :

- Microsoft Office

- Various (possibly obsolete) versions of Windows

- Non-Express versions of Visual Studio

- Matlab and Toolkits

- Mathematica

- Photoshop

- SolidWorks

One reason for this is that I tend to do a lot of short-term freelancing projects, some of which may require access to these products.

Monthly licensing for products like these could be very useful, either locally or in some cases via a remote VM.

Unfortunately only the IP owners could make this happen and they don't seem to have much interest in that type of business model.

chc
This difference is what puts the second S in "SaaS" — apps are traditionally products that you buy, not services you subscribe to. When I buy a copy of Sublime Text 2, I then own a copy of the program — it's mine, full stop. But nobody believes they own Basecamp; they just have an account with 37signals' service. If somebody feels like you're selling an app but pricing it like a service, that dissonance reads as unfairness.
stevenameyer
Completely agree. If I am going to pay an ongoing fee I need to feel like I'm getting ongoing value for the money. I don't like the dynamic of having to continue to pay for something that I already have in my possession in it's entirety, it feels like someone is collecting my money for no continued work.
1123581321
The desktop subscription model is to sell the software for a one-time fee and then sell support annually (or monthly.) If the software uses a web service then the service is likely an additional subscription fee, or it might be bundled with support.

The only desktop software model that people will pay for without support or a web service is the frequent upgrade model. Microsoft Office and operating systems are the most famous examples of this model. Starcraft II is a example from the gaming world.

poppysan
Adobe has a monthly payment pay-as-you-go option with their suite of products. They have a pre-existing client base, but this also allowed for people to use as needed,as well as lowering the barrier to entry for product purchase.