I just read Michael's post "Won over to the cloudy side" and want to make a comment.
I can see why the subscription model is so attractive to providers and can be attractive to customers too. As Michael says, it was the inclusion of virtually all of Adobe's products in one subscription and his decision to use Premier Pro that finally pushed him into subscribing to the Creative Suite. The subscription model can be cost effective. However, my point is that subscriptions mount up! One or two may not be too bad, but if every provider uses this model it will start to become too expensive for the ordinary, non-professional user. The trouble is that if you stop subscribing, you lose access to the software (or other service). I use many different software packages but not all of them too frequently. Some of them I like to keep up to date, others I'm not so bothered about. But if I do need them, they are still there.
So while I can see the option to subscribe may be valuable, I do not want to lose the option to make a one-off purchase. Would it not be possible for providers to support both models?
