Perhaps they want to stay in business
Tim Marman complains about NewsGator's subscription model:
I don't see a lot of value in a separate service manages just a small part of the problem. If you are going to a subscription model, you have to offer something beyond the software itself; you have to offer a service. In this case, I'm not so sure that the service is compelling enough.
I'd invite him to sit down with a piece of paper and a pencil and sketch out how many copies those guys would have to sell at the non-subscription price point every year in order to stay in business. Then maybe he'll fully understand why so many software companies are moving towards subscription models: either they do that, or they go under.
So at the end user level, the question you want to ask yourself is, do I want to see my vendor stay in business or not?
Comments
[Adam Vandenberg] July 8, 2005 17:36:38.491
With so many other free/cheap aggregators, I'm not sure an RSS reader is the place to try going to a subscription model. (Unless people who use NewsGator are absolutely in love with it.) Subscriptions only help the company stay in business vs. selling units if people go for it.