[HN Gopher] $9.99/month
___________________________________________________________________
$9.99/month
Author : sashk
Score : 255 points
Date : 2022-07-17 18:28 UTC (4 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (basicappleguy.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (basicappleguy.com)
| _Algernon_ wrote:
| My subscriptions amount to b2 for backup (<1$ a month), a Linode
| for projects/experiments from time to time (5$/month). Everything
| else I'd rather pay a flat fee to own it or find a free
| alternative.
|
| The author's list is ridiculous.
| teeray wrote:
| A cheap way I've been keeping subscriptions from getting away
| from me is to log each one in a spreadsheet with name, type
| (monthly, annual), amount, and renewal date.
|
| Using this, I can find things to cancel when I want to sign up
| for something new. It also helps point out opportunities for
| annualizing monthly subscriptions I want to keep for additional
| savings.
| Havoc wrote:
| > and renewal date.
|
| Might just do that. The auto-renews always slip past somehow...
| enos_feedler wrote:
| Most things let you keep access until expiration so just
| default to cancel and see what sticks for you. I always log
| in to cancel most things I start right away.
| CarVac wrote:
| I log all my subscriptions and other periodic income/expenses
| and keep track of my daily net income... when you look at the
| impact a subscription makes per day it makes you _very_ wary of
| them.
| neilv wrote:
| For people using GnuCash, you can define these in GnuCash
| rather than separate spreadsheets/files (menu "Actions >
| Scheduled Transations").
|
| Then, whenever the scheduled time occurs, GnuCash will add the
| right double-entry accounting entries, and notify you the next
| time you start an interactive session.
|
| Like any transactions added manually in GnuCash, these will be
| matched up with imported data (and any transactions in imported
| data that are not already entered manually or by schedule will
| be highlighted as new). The scheduled transactions also show up
| like any other when you reconcile a GnuCash account with a
| statement from the bank/CC.
| annoyingnoob wrote:
| I had the same idea about saving on coffee around 2003. I started
| making coffee at home. But I found that a drip coffee maker needs
| to make a minimum of about 4 cups of coffee to make proper
| coffee. I was only drinking 2 cups, and I was throwing away 2
| cups. This seemed like a giant waste too. I used this to justify
| a fully automatic espresso machine that makes a variety of coffee
| drinks one cup at a time without extra waste. The payoff (in
| savings) of the fancy machine was quite long but totally worth it
| in the long run. The first machine was done after about 12 years
| and I'm on a second one now.
| visiblink wrote:
| This kind of calculation is what convinced me to quit smoking
| before going to university in 1990. Cigarettes were $5 / pack. I
| smoked a pack a day.
|
| $5 x 365 days x 4 years = $7300.
|
| Given that I was saving up the money beforehand, quitting was the
| difference between starting school in 1990 or 1991.
|
| I felt like a 'cold turkey' for about three months. But it was so
| worth it.
| ryloric wrote:
| Covid made me quit, I just couldn't get any cigs at all due to
| lockdown. I was pissed for two weeks, then I just got used to
| it.
| jcpst wrote:
| My wife asked me if I would try and quit when she was pregnant.
| 12 years later, I'm so glad I did. For myself, for being an
| example for my kids...
|
| My friends who still smoke cigarettes are now seeing the start
| of some of the typical health complications.
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| _> Cigarettes were $5 / pack._
|
| I quit in 1980 ($0.65/pack).
|
| They are now close to $15/pack, in NY. I know, because I have a
| family member that still smokes.
|
| This does not even touch the cost to health.
| conductr wrote:
| That $5 number is suspicious to me, or perhaps just
| geographically skewed. In early 90s, I went to the store and
| bought cigarettes for my mom almost daily and I remember it
| being about $2.
| biztos wrote:
| I paid $5/pack for Nat Shermans in SF in 1994/95. IIRC
| there were super cheap brands for around $2 but they were
| skanky, Shermans and Dunhills and American Spirits were all
| around $4-5.
| visiblink wrote:
| The $5 figure was from northern British Columbia.
| Cigarettes were much cheaper in the U.S. at the time
| (Canadians used to bring back a couple of duty-free cartons
| on a regular basis) and in Ontario, where the government
| reduced the taxes to counter smuggling.
|
| Edit: in the link below you can see that over the course of
| 1990, cigarette prices rose from $35 to $48/carton (so
| $4.80/pack if you bought them by the carton) in 1990. They
| were, of course, more expensive if you bought individual
| packs, or if you lived in the north.
|
| https://otru.org/wp-
| content/uploads/2012/06/update_may2002.p...
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| I remember visiting Canada, in the 1970s, and cigarettes
| were about $4 a pack. Everyone used to buy big cans of
| Export tobacco, and roll their own. Apparently. pre-
| rolled cigarettes were taxed heavily, but loose tobacco
| was not. I think this is still the case, in many nations.
| I have a friend from UK, who is always smoking hand-
| rolled "fags."
| conductr wrote:
| Oh wow. Yeah definitely a US thing then. Completely makes
| sense, sadly.
| srcreigh wrote:
| May be a NY thing. I bought Marlboros in Sunnyvale in 2016
| and paid $5-6 USD per pack.
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| NY is _insane_. It 's about taxes. The City is much worse
| than the 'burbs (about $12/pack, out here).
|
| If I go down to MD or VA, they are about $5 less.
| massysett wrote:
| The old quip here:
|
| Doctor: "if you multiply the cost of your cigarettes by your
| consumption, you'd have enough money to buy a Ferrari."
|
| Smoker: "do you smoke?"
|
| Doctor: "No."
|
| Smoker: "Then where's your Ferrari?"
| sergiotapia wrote:
| Is a pack a day normal? During college I would feel bad that I
| had smoked three cigarettes a day. I've since switched to
| cigars, and have about one a month at most.
| josnyder wrote:
| I'm a big fan of privacy.com: they provide me with a spend-
| limited debit card number that varies by vendor. I use them
| especially for newspaper subscriptions that make it difficult to
| cancel and have balloon renewal payments.
| killjoywashere wrote:
| We came to a similar calculus, nearly the same cost of unattended
| subscriptions. Dropped the obvious ones, and for entertainment,
| we usually have 1 a month, and actively decide what we're going
| to bing watch.
| Cockbrand wrote:
| I see a lot of potential for the EU* to mandate an API that each
| company offering software or service subscriptions would have to
| implement. The goal being that every end user can have a central
| point where they could see all their subscriptions and cancel
| them at any point in time.
|
| * or any other powerful government body
| ecedeno wrote:
| I don't know the details behind it, but I can already cancel
| all of my subscriptions through an app (Grip) my Dutch bank
| (ABN AMRO) provides
| sfled wrote:
| Somewhere along the line I automatically started internally
| multiplying monthly payments into yearly payments. It really
| helps when I'm in the decision stage.
| game-of-throws wrote:
| That is an unreal amount of money to be spending on
| subscriptions. I can't imagine paying more for software every
| month than my mortgage.
| dqv wrote:
| ha I think you may be getting the yearly and monthly costs
| mixed up. Under $126/month for a mortgage sounds like an
| amazing deal
| game-of-throws wrote:
| Oops you're right, I take it back. $1500/year is still pretty
| steep though.
| bombcar wrote:
| Not as much as many pay for their cell phone, tbh.
| system2 wrote:
| Where do you live that you can pay $1,500 per month mortgage? I
| am assuming out of the states?
| dqv wrote:
| Before 2020 that was pretty easy to accomplish. My home in
| the Raleigh-Durham area is under $1500/month including taxes,
| homeowner's insurance, and HOA fees.
| system2 wrote:
| That's almost twice cheaper than California studio rent. No
| wonder why people are leaving the big cities. Thank you, I
| was considering moving out of California and I might if the
| mortgages are still like that in other states.
| gtm1260 wrote:
| Highly recommend an app like truebill or something that analyzes
| your bank account! I found subscriptions to things I had totally
| forgot about etc. and saved a significant amount of money right
| away.
| noirbot wrote:
| How much value does this provide vs. just checking over your
| account history every month? It feels like a pretty high price
| to pay in terms of access to your data just to have them check
| for things that you could probably do by exporting a CSV and
| searching for things.
| travisjungroth wrote:
| I've found it's not worth it. What I've had be most impactful
| is just to look at all the transactions on my accounts every
| paycheck. I notice subscriptions to cancel, spending I want
| to change.
|
| I don't think looking at sums is actually much more powerful
| than looking at items. The count carries a weight. There's
| also no chance of analysis paralysis, slicing and showing
| things a hundred ways to avoid the heart of the matter. It's
| just you and the transactions. It leads to less understanding
| but better decisions.
| ryandrake wrote:
| How does one forget about a subscription? Doesn't everyone
| periodically review charges to their credit cards and bank
| withdrawals to make sure they make sense, and to pay bills that
| are due? If not, how do you know day-to-day how much money is
| available in your account or discover fraud? I'd be bouncing
| checks left and right if I didn't keep a close eye on my
| balances.
| drc500free wrote:
| I'm not living paycheck to paycheck, so I'm not in the habit
| of looking at every transaction. The monthly/quarterly budget
| and subscription reviews that truebill prompts are massively
| helpful.
|
| It is a bit aggressive in classifying recurring charges as
| subscriptions, but that's better than the alternative.
| capableweb wrote:
| I took a look at Truebill, and expected to find a list of
| supported banks somewhere, probably prominent on the landing
| page, as how are they supposed to be able to analyze my bank
| account otherwise?
|
| But, there is no such information. Applications that reads data
| from banks keeps doing this, missing to display the single most
| important piece of data before I signed up.
| nchase wrote:
| Truebill supports most banks in the US.
|
| Source: I work for Truebill.
|
| We use Plaid for this support - there's more detail here:
| https://help.truebill.com/en/articles/931156-i-can-t-find-
| my...
| [deleted]
| nharada wrote:
| I'm surprised that this crowd in particular is so incensed by
| someone paying $125 bucks a month for their software. If anyone
| knows how much it costs to make good software and run a company
| that operates and maintains, I'd think it would be HN.
| jnovek wrote:
| I can't speak for others, but I have limited, volatile income
| and subscriptions aren't a realistic option for me. One-time
| purchases are much more realistic.
|
| I don't care for subscriptions because they lock out those of
| us with limited means.
|
| Edit: even so, I still have $16/mo in subscriptions on my
| phone. :-/
| tootie wrote:
| Enterprise software can easily be 5 figures a month for even
| moderate usage.
| newaccount74 wrote:
| Because the marginal cost of selling a license is often close
| to zero, and companies often add pointless cloud features to
| lock people into subscriptions they don't want.
|
| It's possible to write software on your own or with a small
| team, and sell it for low prices, and make a decent income from
| it. I know it's possible because I've been doing it for a
| decade.
|
| But somehow over the years software developers have moved
| everything to subscriptions, prices are going up, and everyone
| competes for the attention of the people with lots of
| disposable income.
| rglullis wrote:
| I wouldn't put Disney+, Netflix and the other streaming service
| in the "software" bucket. I'd rather pirate than paying for
| these, but if people are paying these to get rid of Cable, I'd
| say it's more than justifiable.
|
| But what really drives me crazy is that if you asked people
| "Can you look at the actual software you are paying and take
| 20% to donate to developers of open source alternatives?", they
| would find all types of excuses.
| otterley wrote:
| It's been this way for years. HNers have a particularly
| egregious sense of entitlement around software, which is ironic
| because writing software pays their own bills. Perhaps a larger
| proportion of them nowadays are writing services that
| advertisers, rather than customers, are paying for, and so they
| don't see the cognitive dissonance.
| rootsudo wrote:
| Because most people don't realize how these fees compound. The
| realization is why people are incensed.
|
| Which really makes you wonder, what businesses just survive by
| just this SAAS model that couldn't before in perpetual
| license/pre smart phone world.
| otterley wrote:
| You would also think that HNers, being programmers, know how
| to do basic arithmetic.
| PragmaticPulp wrote:
| Tech-oriented internet commenters have very different behaviors
| and spending patterns than typical consumers. We occupy a
| unique position in that so many of our tools and technologies
| are freely available on the internet. Many people also grew up
| during periods where piracy was rampant and even the paid tools
| and media could be acquired (illegally) for free if you knew
| where to look. People stuck in this bubble tend to resent any
| requests for paid software, especially when it goes beyond one-
| time payments of nominal amounts.
|
| It's a bubble. Outside of the bubble there are quite a few
| people who don't mind paying subscription fees for software
| that delivers value. HN is not a good place to gather market
| sentiment or perform product research for this reason.
| ricardobeat wrote:
| It's easy to lose perspective, but that amount is 5% of the
| average net income in the US.
| temp_praneshp wrote:
| Any reason to believe that's true for the subset of US
| residents that are on HN?
| noirbot wrote:
| Sure, but not the average net income for people on HN
| probably, or the author's. The entire article is about them
| realizing they're probably spending too much!
| ghaff wrote:
| It also probably not that different from what a person making
| that average income pays for their cell phone and possibly
| cable TV every month.
| bussierem wrote:
| No, according to https://www.census.gov/library/publications/
| 2021/demo/p60-27... the median household income is the US is
| $67,521 in 2020, which $125 a month is about 2.2% of. If you
| look at "real median earnings", you get a number of $41,535
| which comes to 3.6%. Except that number includes "all workers
| aged 15 and over" which includes high schoolers part time
| work, so it's a highly skewed statistic when talking about
| people who might pay for software or a monthly sub like this.
|
| Neither of those numbers comes close to 5%, which would be a
| net income of $30,000/y.
| robocat wrote:
| The USA usually reports household income as you do, which
| contains about 2.5 people.
|
| So per-capita income is far less than the $67k figure you
| picked, and 5% is about right.
|
| In addition, using the mean (average) is deceptive, because
| it is skewed by the few people that earn a lot (Jeff Bezos
| walks into a bar). Using the median would make more sense
| (although the person you replied to hasn't, probably
| because it is harder to find).
|
| The mean on HN is possibly higher, making the point moot?
| There are a lot of international commenters that could
| swing the number down.
|
| Side note: if you want to compare how well you are
| personally doing you need to compare by other factors. Age
| cohort especially matters for income and wealth comparisons
| - even for software dev?
| bussierem wrote:
| > In addition, using the mean (average) is deceptive,
| because it is skewed by the few people that earn a lot
| (Jeff Bezos walks into a bar). Using the median would
| make more sense
|
| Confused by this comment -- the source I linked IS using
| median, not mean. I guess that does mean (heh) that the
| number isn't skewed as much by higher numbers, but can
| still be skewed by the larger number of part-time high
| school kids too.
| mixmastamyk wrote:
| Depends. Was the software commoditized in the 90s or a trivial
| feature that should be included in the OS?
|
| Or is it serving a lucrative niche that pays for itself every
| day in productivity? Need to be clear before making a
| judgement.
| bgirard wrote:
| Maybe both of these two things can be true at the same time.
| This might be a sign that society is spending too many
| resources operating software companies for silly things when
| they would be better spent else where.
|
| Looking at the costs and voting with your dollar, like OP did,
| is your responsibility as a consumer to drive efficient market
| and resource allocation.
| msbarnett wrote:
| I once had people screaming bloody murder at me here on HN for
| suggesting that, for a professional North American software
| engineer making a typical US SWE income, a _one-time_ $150
| purchase of a tool you would use daily in your professional
| capacity was totally reasonable.
|
| There's a baffling disconnect here between how people perceive
| their own value of time while feeling entitled to the product
| of others' time for essentially nothing.
| exogeny wrote:
| It's not baffling if you think you are better, and therefore
| your time is more valuable, than everyone else.
|
| And there is nothing more accurate about the average HN user
| than that.
|
| Especially me. I'm the best and smartest.
| burntoutfire wrote:
| Do surgeons purchase any od they equipment they use on the
| operating table, or does hospital provide it all?
| gumby wrote:
| Chefs provide their own knives. A lot of blue collar jobs
| require purchasing the uniform. Managers and execs in some
| industries still buy "work clothes" and though work pays
| for their travel they still buy luggage etc.
|
| I keep my work on work owned hardware and my personal stuff
| on my own computer/phone etc. That means paying for my own
| 1password etc (I only use free dev tools, as it happens)
| msbarnett wrote:
| I would imagine that depends on whether they're employed by
| a hospital or incorporating themselves and running their
| own private clinic.
|
| If you're a salaried SWE, obviously expense the $150. But
| for a contracting SWE? $150 is really _nothing_ compared to
| what a woodworker, wedding photographer, welder, or most
| any other self-employed professional has to spend on their
| tools.
| ransom1538 wrote:
| Auto mechanics, chefs, the entire construction industry,
| usually provide their own tools. Skilled labor tends to
| value and keep their tools.
| yomkippur wrote:
| dagmx wrote:
| Because everyone wants to get paid but reduce their payments.
| E.g keep their money
|
| This same thing comes up anytime the topic of paid IDEs comes
| up, and people will act surprised that people pay for Jetbrains
| IDEs
|
| I think it's understandable when we consider most people
| struggle to meet ends meet, especially in their college and
| formative years.
|
| However really if something provides value to your life, it
| should be rewarded , especially if that value is higher than
| the cost.
|
| E.g Jetbrains IDEs pay for themselves every week in time saved.
| Many apps I subscribe to easily provide higher value to me than
| they cost.
| burntoutfire wrote:
| When I use usem, I mainly do that on the job and Jetbrains
| IDEs provide value to my employer, not to me.
| kaashif wrote:
| I agree - my employer pays for IDEs and developer tools
| without question, and the main benefit goes to them. Some
| of it comes back to me in promotions and bonuses, but not
| all or most of it.
|
| Me paying for tools to increase my productivity at work
| might still make sense if it helps my pay increase, but
| it's even more worth it for the employer to do it.
| zxexz wrote:
| I pay for the Jetbrains all products pack, $250 a year. I
| spend on average 3-4 hours a day in their products. That $250
| is pennies compared to the amount of value I create with the
| various JB IDEs.
|
| Good software - like IntelliJ, GoLand, etc. - don't just act
| as a tool to get the job done, they act as a force multiplier
| enabling vastly better UX, tooling, etc. compared to
| competing software. I can't imagine relying on Eclipse or
| VSCode for my work nowadays - I could do it fine, but it
| would feel like cutting an arm off.
| throwaway675309 wrote:
| One thing that a lot of people don't know about the jet
| brain subscription is that the all product price goes down
| each subsequent year that you continue to subscribe, which
| is a great incentive. At this point, for me it's only $150
| a year.
| zxexz wrote:
| I was curious and checked, looks like my discount is 40%
| now! What a great incentive.
| mister_tee wrote:
| JetBrains is increasing pricing in October (for example
| $150 to $173 for All Products pack with that discount)
| but they announced this over three months in advance, on
| their blog and on Twitter, and are allowing everyone to
| prepay for around three years to lock in current rates.
|
| good way to treat customers IMO.
|
| https://blog.jetbrains.com/blog/2022/06/29/increased-
| subscri...
| ssivark wrote:
| Assuming the median person is willing to spend ~$1440 on a
| laptop every 3 years which amortizes to $40/mo, to justify
| another $120/mo would require those services to 4x their
| productivity/satisfaction compared to getting a computer in the
| first place. For trade to truly be useful, it needs to provide
| surplus value for all parties involved; and I don't think most
| subscription services make a compelling case to consumers at
| large.
|
| Maybe for those who have lots of money to spare, they might be
| willing to pay as much for incremental increases in
| convenience, but I doubt that applies to most people -- even in
| rich countries.
|
| ----
|
| This is markedly different from the sentiment expressed in an
| Alan Kay quote (paraphrases): Most people spend about as much
| in their computer as they do on television, and use it about
| the same way. [He] would consider a good computer more valuable
| than a car, for the possibilities it entails [but no
| hardware/software creator seems to be operating with that level
| of ambition in providing users that much leverage].
| bscphil wrote:
| I would be _stunned_ if the median laptop purchased from Dell
| cost more than $750 before tax or was used less than three
| years. I think you 're significantly overestimating that -
| maybe it's the median cost of a MacBook, but with the $1K MBA
| as good as it is, I even doubt that.
|
| > Maybe for those who have lots of money to spare, they might
| be willing to pay as much for incremental increases in
| convenience, but I doubt that applies to most people -- even
| in rich countries.
|
| The cost of a product is more closely related to the cost
| (e.g. labor) of producing it than how useful it is. My
| mattress was purchased online for less than $200 and shipped.
| It's lasted almost a decade before showing any signs of age.
| That's maybe $25 a year for something I spend almost a third
| of my time using! By _that_ standard, I shouldn 't even be
| willing to buy a computer, which has a higher cost / value
| ratio.
|
| Doesn't really work like that, of course. Competition acts to
| keep prices down, but this only operates _within_ a product
| market, not between different markets. Most stuff is much
| cheaper than would correspond to the use we get out of it,
| thankfully. Expensive writing tools are targeted towards
| people who can definitely afford them, and they manage to get
| away with enormous profit ratios in part because they 're in
| niche markets with little competition between products.
| They're a rare exception where the price has trended closer
| to the value to users rather than the cost of production.
| [deleted]
| sylens wrote:
| Two things from this article stick out to me:
|
| 1) The author was paying for both Bear and Craft. To me, they
| serve the same purpose - Markdown notes editors with a sync
| component. I tried both out (and liked both) but have since
| settled on Obsidian because I like being able to see my notes as
| .md files on a device I own.
|
| 2) The author mentioned Microsoft Office was a lifetime purchase
| in 2021 which confused me - are they are referring to Office 2019
| instead of Office 365? I don't believe O365 offers a lifetime
| option.
| blackdogie wrote:
| I tend to try to cancel some of mine a few times a year and renew
| the next I need them. That might be a two weeks (save 5%), a
| month (save 10%) or more.
|
| This is also another reason (besides the credit card savings) why
| SAAS companies offering yearly deals really makes sense.
| dvt wrote:
| > My current subscription tally came to $1,500 ($1,520 to be
| exact) per year
|
| Maybe I'm the crazy one, but how is this a lot? First, almost all
| of the apps are used by multiple people (Apple One Premier, the
| VPN, MLB, NHL, etc.). Second, let's assume a family of four with
| a US average salary of $55k for both parents. We end up with a
| household income of $110k, so the subscriptions are 1.3% of gross
| income. This is barely a blip on your financial radar.
|
| If your household income is $200k or above (which, let's face it,
| most HNers probably do earn), worrying about these subscriptions
| (which in this case would be <0.6% of your gross income) would
| literally not even be worth thinking about.
|
| I know HN has a thing for penny pinching, but if you're trying to
| build wealth, this ain't it.
| Sebguer wrote:
| The median _household_ income in the US is $67k, not 110k.
| dvt wrote:
| Come on, please don't play these kinds of games. This
| includes single people (in which case you wouldn't need the
| shared Apple plan, among other things.)
| makoz wrote:
| The median _family_ income in US appears to be 84,000 in
| 2020 [0] if that helps.
|
| [0] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEFAINUSA672N
| epups wrote:
| $1,500 invested yearly, at 7% interest, generates ~60k in 20
| years. So even at your inflated income estimates, this is
| definitely worth thinking about.
| pbasista wrote:
| > trying to build wealth
|
| The reasoning behind many people claiming that ~$1500/year for
| software subscription services being "too much" is, in my
| opinion, not based on the intention to save money.
|
| Rather, it seems to be the realization that these subscriptions
| cost way more than the perceived value of the benefits they
| bring.
|
| In other words, spending $1500 a year for e.g. a health
| insurance might be reasonable. But spending the same $1500 for
| a year-long subscription of toilet paper might not be.
| ericd wrote:
| Keep in mind that salary is top line gross, before
| federal/state taxes, retirement savings, healthcare deductions,
| etc. Then, you take out housing, food, transportation, and
| other more necessary expenses. Frequently, by the time you do
| all this, you'll find that small recurring discretionary
| expenses can make a surprising difference in the amount you
| have left. $1500 is a large percentage of many people's free
| cash flow.
|
| If you're in a high tax bracket, it's a bit sobering to realize
| that a $5k/mo apartment in a high tax state represents ~$120k
| of pretax income.
| pacifika wrote:
| You should run a poll on that income assumption.
| lentil_soup wrote:
| > If your household income is $200k or above (which, let's face
| it, most HNers probably do earn)
|
| What? Not everyone here lives in the US
| thrdbndndn wrote:
| Agreed.
|
| To be totally fair, I don't think $1500/yr is a small number,
| but the author subscribes to so many stuff. I can't get close
| to that even actively trying. I think most of people would end
| up with something close to $500/yr which is even more
| reasonable.
| xboxnolifes wrote:
| I feel like it depends on what we want to call an app
| subscription. I feel like most people I know from my parent's
| generation pay close to $1,500 a year on TV cable service
| alone. Considering how much of the author's spend is sports
| and streaming services, that feels fair to consider TV cable
| in this context.
| andix wrote:
| If you're deciding to buy a subscription you should calculate the
| price for 2 or 3 years. So it is comparable to other things you
| buy. New phone (I will use it for 3 years): 1000$. Some weather
| app, 2.99 per month, so 107$ for 3 years, is it really worth it?
| davidkuennen wrote:
| I find subscriptions interesting. Basically any business that
| wants to survive since forever used subscriptions.
|
| The term subscription for monthly or yearly payments labeled as
| that just receives a lot of hate.
|
| But what about the washing machine we have to buy again after X
| years? The iPhone we have to buy again after X years or any other
| product we use? Basically all subscriptions in disguise. Name one
| company that was successful in just selling their product one
| time to a customer.
| Tepix wrote:
| If i sell you lunch, is it a subscription just because you will
| eventually eat again? That doesn't make sense. The important
| criterion is that a subscription will make you pay
| automatically without you making another choice.
| [deleted]
| jjice wrote:
| > But what about the washing machine we have to buy again after
| X years? The iPhone we have to buy again after X years or any
| other product we use? Basically all subscriptions in disguise.
|
| The big difference here for me is that you own those, so you
| have equity in them. You bought a washing machine? You can sell
| it 3 years later, or purchase one used to begin with.
| brailsafe wrote:
| You don't have to buy a washing machine every few years, and
| you shouldn't have to buy an iPhone every few years either.
| That's just consoomer nonsense. Washing machines of all kinds
| are repairable. Subscription software is different. It's closed
| source, and often times there's no way to fix it.
|
| My Omnifocus 2 outright purchase for what is effectively a todo
| app bugged out in one of the MacOS upgrades in a way where it
| was still completely functional, except now there's a permanent
| grey box in front of the interface. I could buy a new version,
| but they haven't added or changed anything of value, and it
| costs more, so guess what, not buying it. I'd buy an upgrade
| for $5, maybe $10 if I really used it. That's digital
| capitalism. Subscription services, where you don't get access
| to anything if you stop paying, are even more disgusting.
| stirfish wrote:
| Musical instruments are a good example. Nobody _needs_ to
| replace their guitar/piano/violin/pipe organ/harmonica after x
| years, but they might build a collection based on the quality.
| ChildOfChaos wrote:
| I get it, but when it comes to Photoshop, you buy it and then
| can use that one version of the software for 10 years if you
| don't care about all of the upgrades, which aren't necessary,
| or you can pay ten years worth of monthly subscription fees.
|
| The subscription is massively more expensive.
|
| Buying a product and then buying a replacement at some point in
| the future is massively preferred to me over paying every month
| for that product. It allows me to budget and update when I want
| to depending on what features are released that I need or want
| or to replace the item when it wears out a subscription
| generally costs more and robs me of any flexibility.
|
| Production quality and innovation is also better without
| subscriptions. Businesses have to win me over with there new
| product or version and convince me it's worth paying to
| upgrade, if i'm already on a subscription, they don't really
| care as long as there are competitive to alternatives.
| [deleted]
| switchbak wrote:
| Interesting you chose Photoshop: I've stayed on my older
| version of Lightroom because Adobe moved to a subscription
| based model and I just don't use it enough to justify that.
| They're clearly addicted to that revenue stream over their
| former model.
| MH15 wrote:
| This isn't how Photoshop works anymore sadly. Now it's all
| under "Creative Cloud" subscription so you pay
| monthly/yearly, and if you stop paying you lose access. For a
| while it was common for users to keep the last "purchased"
| version (called CS6) but it's been so long I see this less
| and less.
|
| I fully agree tho when you stop subscribing you should be
| able to keep the previous version. It's a tool, not
| entertainment like Netflix/Spotify.
| tgsovlerkhgsel wrote:
| The washing machine in particular is not a subscription in
| disguise. You'll only pay (a well defined price) when the
| machine actually breaks (in a way that is not economical to
| repair), and you are free to choose any provider, with no
| pressure or default to just buy the same brand again.
| Especially if the machine asked for a "renewal" too early for
| your taste, you're probably not going with them again. They
| have to sell to you again.
|
| With a subscription, by doing nothing you just keep paying to
| the same company in perpetuity. You even keep paying if you
| stop using the product unless you actively cancel. The company
| sells to you by default, not by convincing you to make an
| active decision for them.
|
| A washing machine is also a big purchase that you'll probably
| spend some time to think through to some extent, much more than
| you will with your Netflix subscription - despite being quite
| small compared to typical subscriptions! A $600 washing machine
| that lasts 8 years is $6.25 per month. The subscription models
| are generally abused to charge way more for a product by making
| the payment seem small to people who are bad with money. A
| subscription washing machine would likely be "only" $3.99 per
| week...
|
| For example, at rent-a-center a washing machine that costs $520
| at Best Buy costs $1223.28 if you pay it off as planned (and I
| believe their business model also revolves around preying on
| people who miss payments).
|
| Phones are also commonly sold as part of mobile plans, where
| you pay approximately the purchase price of the phone _each
| year_.
|
| That's why most people who do the math hate subscriptions: They
| realize that they're now asked to pay 2-3x (and often even
| more) of what they were paying previously (or would typically
| be paying without a subscription model).
| lapcat wrote:
| > Name one company that was successful in just selling their
| product one time to a customer.
|
| Every funeral home.
|
| Anyway, I find the term "subscription" misleading. A lot of
| software nowadays is more accurately termed "rental". If you
| have a traditional newspapers/magazine/comic book subscription,
| you get to keep the issues forever if you want. I still have
| some old comic books.
|
| Whereas a lot of so-called "subscription" software stops
| working entirely when you stop subscribing. This is more like
| rental. You lose everything when you stop renting. In fairness,
| there is some software that has a subscription model for
| software updates, where you get updates for a year if you pay a
| subscription, but the last downloaded version works
| indefinitely. But that's a minority of "subscription" software.
|
| The key difference between rental and ownership is that with
| ownership, the buyer gets to decide if and when to buy the
| product again, whereas with rental, the seller decides.
| 63 wrote:
| Is it typical to spend so much on software subscriptions? I pay
| for Spotify and a cheap VPS if that counts but that's it. I
| figured the average person probably has one or two media
| subscriptions (Netflix, Disney, Spotify, etc) and nothing else.
| IshKebab wrote:
| Definitely not normal.
|
| > but I didn't think my list was particularly egregious
|
| Grammarly is $150/year!! How is that not egregious?
|
| My only significant subscriptions are:
|
| 1. Netflix 2. Amazon Prime 3. Youtube Premium
|
| All shared with other people.
|
| This guy was paying $40/year for a weather app and was
| surprised he was spending a ton on subscriptions. How?
| smsm42 wrote:
| 150/yr doesn't sound to egregious for an app you actually
| use. Of course, it depends on your income, for some people it
| could be insane, but there are many people earning high 6
| figures in tech (no, not me, not yet at least :) or even 7
| figures - for them $150/year is like rounding error in their
| paystub, why would it be egregious? Of course, provided it is
| really useful for you, otherwise there's no point even for
| $15/year or 1.5$.
| ghaff wrote:
| >Grammarly is $150/year!! How is that not egregious?
|
| I don't personally find Grammarly useful. But I know people
| who swear by it and, if it's an application that helps you
| write maybe every day, $150/year is nothing.
|
| I pay more than that for Lightroom which I also use a lot.
|
| More than that for The New York Times which I read daily.
|
| Etc.
|
| There's definitely a subscription version of "Does it bring
| you joy?" But there seems to be almost a moralistic pushback
| on paying for software/services things that you find useful.
| elashri wrote:
| I paid three month for grammaly when I was writing my MS
| thesis. It was useful for the extensive usage. But I
| canceled afterwards because it is not worth keeping.
| kaashif wrote:
| Yeah, I have an Amazon Prime subscription and a VPS for a
| personal blog, but that's it. I figure most people have like
| Prime and Netflix, or Disney+ and Spotify. Not all of the
| above, plus weather app subscriptions, and dozens of other
| things.
|
| But looking at some of these comments, we appear to be the odd
| ones out.
| poglet wrote:
| Off the top of my head I pay for Amazon Prime, Spotify, Apple
| iCloud, Office 365, VPS, VPN.
| smsm42 wrote:
| Depends. I used to have close to zero software subscriptions,
| but now I earn a little more and I can afford to pay for some
| software even if I technically could do without paid version -
| e.g. Duolingo, Evernote, Feedly, etc. I do it as a conscious
| effort to support apps I use - in part so that people that
| can't afford it still could use the free versions, and so that
| they continue to exist in general. From pure financial
| optimization angle, I am likely wasting my money. But I think
| it makes more likely the apps that I use survive and stay
| alive, which IMHO is worth a small investment even if I do not
| use too much of the paid features.
| brudgers wrote:
| Probably well above median and well below average.
|
| Median skewed by the fact that even people with little
| disposable income have phones with access to the App Store but
| aren't dropping $408/year for premium Apple experience.
|
| But the mean is skewed by money is no object users who don't
| miss a thousand dollars a month.
| site-packages1 wrote:
| I don't think so, I feel like mine are pretty aligned with what
| my friends have. I pay the AppleCare monthly, a couple smaller
| things like Peloton and Apple Music. Doesn't add up to that
| much overall. I do donate $20/mo to Signal, which is my largest
| software-only app thing, and I see the OP seems to donate to
| Twitter in a couple ways, so I guess to each their own.
| tgsovlerkhgsel wrote:
| Especially among people who don't really pay attention to their
| budget, I'd expect this to be common. Maybe not as extreme as
| some of the apps are more aimed at professionals, but having
| seen the amount of money people who really can't afford it drop
| on useless subscriptions (e.g. antivirus for iOS) _despite
| being told it 's useless_...
| ghaff wrote:
| I would say that's definitely on the high side. What you're
| describing is probably on the low side. Of course, many people
| spend about $100/month on a cable TV bill. It looks like he has
| a couple of sports subscriptions but doesn't actually seem to
| be paying for live TV in general.
| reaperducer wrote:
| _Of course, many people spend about $100 /month on a cable TV
| bill._
|
| I think $100 may be low these days.
|
| At a neighborhood party around 2017 I asked people what they
| were paying for their cable service, because I was thinking
| about switching from satellite. Not one was under $125, and
| most were in the $175 area. $250 with internet. The big
| sports fans were well over $300/month.
|
| One guy who considers himself a "professional sports gambler"
| (when he's not repairing air conditioners 9 to 5) said he was
| paying over $600/month to feed the wall of six 60-inch TVs in
| his man cave.
|
| "Hunnert bucks a screen!" he crowed proudly. I ended up
| keeping my existing service, which I think was in the
| $35/month range.
| ssl232 wrote:
| I know this has come up before, but since the gulf in cost
| is so stark I thought I'd mention it again. In the UK I
| just signed up to a PS20/month VDSL2 broadband service
| (approx 65 Mbps, FTTC, unmetered), rolling monthly
| contract, and PS65 up front. The contract guarantees at
| least around 50 Mbps or they automatically pay
| compensation. $100/month seems pretty crazy to me. I know
| the lack of competition and widespread collusion is bad in
| the US amongst cable companies, but you saying people
| typically pay 5x more for what seems like similar service
| to what I'm getting is really eye-opening. Apart from
| Virgin Media most companies share the OpenReach network
| that's sort of publicly funded (ish). Yet, the UK isn't
| exactly known for investing well in public services so I'm
| still surprised at the gulf in cost.
| comfypotato wrote:
| There's a lot of variation in the US. I'm in a 600k city
| and an area with some kind of COVID program that pays my
| $20.00 bill. I'm not paying anything for a very reliable
| 35 mbps.
| ghaff wrote:
| We're talking about cable TV content. Satellite (DirecTV)
| costs about the same. But, yes, now that I only have
| Internet from my cable provider, I also pay about
| $100/month for that.
| wdb wrote:
| Internet sucks in London, UK, yet to get 6.5mb/s or so
| called 'Fibre' internet. It's 2022 and you can't get a
| 200-500mbit plan in Zone 1 of London without going for a
| business fibre plan and pay a lots of money for digging
| if you don't live in some apartment building. Even
| g.network and Hyperoptic have been digging around my
| house but my Mews house won't get connected even while
| everyone in the Mews indicated interest
| msbarnett wrote:
| Looking at the exchange rate, I'm paying ~PS65/month for
| 1Gbps unlimited fiber in Canada, which is not exactly
| known for its cheap internet.
|
| PS20 a month for only 65Mbps seems not great to be
| honest.
| Dayshine wrote:
| Is PS500/y really worth a difference you'll rarely
| notice? Streaming needs 20Mbps max, so it's only large
| downloads like games which will take an hour or two.
|
| The savings pay for a high end phone every year, or a
| complete desktop upgrade every other year.
| msbarnett wrote:
| I do a heck of a lot more with my internet connection
| than just streaming - there was a night-and-day
| improvement when stepping up from my previous 150 Mbps
| coax connection. It's not just "large game downloads",
| but moving many gigs of data to remote servers daily as
| part of my job while both my wife and I are in video
| calls, while also etc etc. Fast symmetrical fiber is a
| godsend.
|
| But whether or not these speeds would be meaningfully
| useful to you personally, the real observation here is
| just that GP is paying ~4.7x as much on a Megabit per
| second per month basis - your 20Mbps "I just stream"
| connection should cost hardly anything, a bad deal
| however you slice it.
|
| (As an aside: yearly phone replacement?? I buy hardware
| to last on a much longer timeframe, so it more than
| balances out)
|
| edit: back of the envelope network stat math - the 7.5TB
| I moved last month (up+down) would have completely
| saturated a 20Mbps connection for more than the month (34
| consecutive days), assuming it was symmetrical (which a
| connection like that probably isn't).
| crtasm wrote:
| Most of that PS20 goes to cover the telephone line
| rental, it's not directly comparable to prices for fiber.
| msbarnett wrote:
| The details of _why_ the bad deal is bad are good color,
| but don't really change that it's not a great deal.
| oarsinsync wrote:
| > would have completely saturated a 20Mbps connection
|
| The GP was talking about a 50Mbps connection.
|
| Also, I pay the same for a 150Mbps symmetric FTTP (well
| its fibre to the building and copper Ethernet to the
| demarc in my flat), with the option to upgrade to 1Gbps
| symmetric for PS43pm. I dont use my home as a backup or
| major content creation store so for me its not worth the
| extra.
|
| Either way, it sounds like Canada doesn't suffer from the
| same problems as the USA as far as broadband goes.
| cassianoleal wrote:
| I'm paying PS43/month for 1Gbps symmetrical with
| Hyperoptic. My current bottleneck is the otherwise very
| capable Turris Omnia that I use as a router.
| linker3000 wrote:
| Similar speeds, about PS24/mo for the FTTC, with bundled
| phone (pay as you go) and one static IP. SIM only Mobile
| phone with same provider with unlimited calls and 7GB
| data for just under PS10/mo.
| antihero wrote:
| London it's about PS60/mo for 1000/50Mbps DOCSIS from
| Virgin Media but I think the smaller FTTH companies that
| require an enabled property are cheaper.
| 121789 wrote:
| US is a big place. I'm paying $75 for unlimited 1G fiber
| where I live, and it is not a cheap place in general. I
| have family living in cheaper places paying <$30 for
| 50-100Mbps cable broadband. I have other family in the
| suburbs paying like $300 for decent internet and cable
| TV, getting ripped off, but essentially not caring
| because they don't want to deal with changing anything.
| somedudetbh wrote:
| The person you're responding to isn't talking about
| internet service, they're talking about premium sports
| video packages like NFL Sunday Ticket.
|
| > I know this has come up before, but since the gulf in
| cost is so stark I thought I'd mention it again.
|
| I think you might be remembering conversations about
| mobile service or something. I live in the US and my
| gigabit fiber (to my house) is fifty bucks a month. The
| US is a big place.
| reaperducer wrote:
| _In the UK I just signed up to a PS20 /month VDSL2
| broadband service_
|
| Good for you. But I wrote about cable television service,
| not about internet service. Two different things.
| [deleted]
| phkahler wrote:
| I only have cable for internet. But then a couple things
| like disney plus. Amazon Prime is there as a side effect
| :-) Since I need to update my mobile phone I'm thinking
| about using it as a hotspot at home as skipping cable
| entirely. Not sure how viable that is.
| water-your-self wrote:
| This information comes as a shock to me. My monthly
| subscriptions are for home internet and spotify alone
| TaylorAlexander wrote:
| Wow I haven't used cable in over ten years! I have a $30
| per month Comcast internet subscription and I get all my
| stuff through there. I don't pay for any streaming service
| except nebula.
| NikolaNovak wrote:
| I'm a random dude with family and kids.
|
| Spotify, Netflix, Disney, prime, Adobe, jetide, reface
| (occasionally) toon faces (occasionally), peak,Duolingo. These
| are the ones I'm consciously aware of.
|
| Various educational services from Monthly to coursera to music
| ones such as pianote and ultimate guitar and songsterr.
| Previously stuff like code academy or oreilly etc. YouTube
| subscription. Half a dozen patron accounts I support (I am
| well-off enough, and as ex-programmer and ex-photographer
| sufficiently of content-producing/livelihood mentality , to
| have the luxury and intent to support the content I consume).
|
| Then there are the ones I only notice when I really think about
| it or look at yearly transactions - Microsoft office, Google
| drive, apple Icloud, backup (originally sync.com then back laze
| and now I Backup or something). 1password. Sometimes nzbmatrix
| and whatnot. Apple arcade. Geforce now. And it keeps going.
|
| This empathically does not include traditional subscriptions.
| My father in law lives with us and I am embarrassed at size of
| our cable bill as that's what he watches all day long.
| azinman2 wrote:
| I guess the question is do these things provide value to you?
| And what percent of your income is it? I'm guessing the
| answer is yes and small.
| NikolaNovak wrote:
| Correct.
|
| Mostly I wanted to indicate you don't have to have
| extraordinary needs to accumulate subs.
|
| We've gone from cable model to Netflix monopoly (how I miss
| it) back to myriad subs to get content for broad family.
|
| similarly for software, if you like to fool around with
| utilities computers, it's not hard to rack up the subs. A
| file comparison utility wants me to pay yearly fee. Image
| browsing program wants to be a subscription. Everything
| wants me to keep paying.
| biztos wrote:
| I feel like I'm not a big subscriber to stuff, but I have, off
| the top of my head:
|
| - YouTube $10/mo and super worth it
|
| - Netflix $15/mo and lately meh
|
| - AppleTV $10/mo and meaning to cancel again
|
| - AMC $10/mo ditto
|
| - Apple Music $10/mo and want to cancel but need to figure out
| migration
|
| - Adobe $10/mo for PS+LR and pretty happy with it
|
| - DropBox $10/mo and I guess, whatever
|
| - 1Password I forget how much...
|
| - Old-School web hosting about $10/mo
|
| - GitHub $5/mo, tribal membership fee
|
| - Digital newspapers and magazines, probably around $50/mo or
| maybe double that?
|
| ...plus a few obscure software subs that are sort of "pro" and
| Amazon Prime which is for fast delivery to rural America a few
| times a year, plus a bunch of domains, plus Patreon including
| at least one software person. Plus whatever I'm forgetting.
|
| My goal for media is to have one streaming movie/TV service at
| any one time, and go back to paying for music one album at a
| time. But who knows if I'll get there. My monthly software cost
| will definitely increase soon.
|
| And despite all this, I think I'm pretty conservative and don't
| have too many subs. Someone with a good income who subscribes
| on a whim, probably spends at least double this much.
| bluescrn wrote:
| If you use 'serious software' (Adobe, Autodesk, Unity, etc) the
| bill can add up fairly quickly. But that's for professionals
| and serious hobbyists, and that's powerful software that offers
| a lot of value to serious users.
|
| And any tech hobbyist can quickly end up with a number of
| smaller subscriptions (e.g. hosting, backups, AV, password
| management)
|
| But I've not yet found any mobile-only 'apps' that can justify
| the usually-overpriced subscriptions.
|
| The upside is that I don't spend too many hours on mobile
| devices, as so many games/apps have such obnoxious monetisation
| (see Diablo Immortal, or any 'hypercasual' game with more real-
| money-gambling ads than actual gameplay), and the 'mobile web'
| isn't as good as it should be (endless app nags, poor ad-
| blocking compared to a real computer)
| [deleted]
| de_nied wrote:
| Have you tried Brave browser for Android? Its ad-blocking
| works extremely well for me.
| smoldesu wrote:
| Or you could download a system-level adblocker and swerve
| the whole cryptocurrency/BAT thing altogether. There's a
| lot better solutions for fighting ads than downloading
| $SOME_GUY's Chromium fork/pet ponzi scheme.
| doodlesdev wrote:
| > $SOME_GUY's Chromium fork/pet ponzi scheme.
|
| You mean the creator of JavaScript and Mozilla co-
| founder?
| system2 wrote:
| No, the author has no self control. This is a financial issue
| rather than subscription addiction.
| iLoveOncall wrote:
| I'm sorry, are you saying that paying for a weather app and 4
| different note taking apps is not a good financial decision?
| xanaxagoras wrote:
| I pay for my VPN, one health app and one productivity app. I've
| left a ton of software behind. I moved to self hosting, piracy,
| and free software alternatives that are good enough.
| m_a_g wrote:
| Which apps are those?
| avgcorrection wrote:
| Things like buying coffee (a hot cup of coffee while out and
| about) is not something I started doing before I had a full-time
| job. It would have been mad of me to do that as a student.
| austinl wrote:
| I've become more open to paying for subscriptions over the years
| --especially for apps that continue to release updates or provide
| new content.
|
| Just to add another data point, I'm currently at $858.21/year:
|
| _Music, TV_ Apple One (Family): $19.95 /month Amazon Prime:
| $139/year Formula 1 TV: $79.99/year
|
| _Fitness_ OpenSnow: $29.99 /year AllTrails: $29.99/year Strava:
| $59.99/year Strong: $29.99/year
|
| _Learning_ Lingvist: $9.99 /month Waking Up: $99.99/year
|
| _Misc_ VSCO: $29.99 /year
| galleywest200 wrote:
| I think banks should implement a feature where you can navigate
| to a tab on their website that shows you all repeating charges
| you have been paying for, maybe even giving estimates of total
| future cost. This would be very easy for them to implement. I
| have written to my credit union suggesting this.
|
| This is one advantage of having an app-store manage my
| subscriptions - I am the person who forgets what all I am
| subscribed to.
| neilalexander wrote:
| HSBC in the UK does something like this. It detects the regular
| monthly outgoings from your account, like bills paid by Direct
| Debit or other regular payments, groups them by whether they've
| been paid yet this month or not (based on the date that you
| entered as your payday) and estimates what your remaining bank
| balance will be after the bills are all paid.
| ricardobeat wrote:
| ABN Amro does this. Their app automatically groups expenses
| into categories and is able to identify recurring costs.
|
| Video is in Dutch but you can get a rough idea:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_1MJrhED4Lc
| criley2 wrote:
| A number of credit cards have apps/websites with recurring
| charge trackers. As much as I love credit unions, they don't do
| 2-5% cashback, so it can be wise to stack recurring payments
| onto credit cards for benefits.
| bergenty wrote:
| This list is particularly egregious.
|
| I have a Netflix and Amazon prime subscription and that's about
| it.
| rr808 wrote:
| Why do you need Amazon? You can easily live without that.
| collaborative wrote:
| Funny, it's my only subscription. Wife is gonna buy loads
| from them anyway, and this way I also get some digital
| content (which happens to be more than I can watch)
| whymauri wrote:
| I actually stream more, rather than shop, via Prime these
| days.
| diebeforei485 wrote:
| I went into the Subscriptions page and found a few subscriptions
| to cancel.
|
| Thank you Apple for making this easy to do, but they're the ones
| who pushed everyone into a subscription model to begin with - by
| staying stubbornly at 30% for purchases, but 15% for
| subscriptions.
| balderdash wrote:
| This is a simple hack, but I just put everything that is
| recurring on a single credit card (auto insurance, cell phone,
| app subscriptions, etc)... it really strikes home to see how much
| your monthly nut is. It also helps to not have these charges
| buried in amongst Ubers, lattes, lunches, etc.
| noirbot wrote:
| I always find these discussions interesting. The risks that the
| article outlines around losing track of how much you're spending
| are certainly real, but there's two things that strike me around
| all of this:
|
| 1. I somewhat object to them including things like Disney+ or MLB
| in this calculation. Sure, it's an app subscription, but you're
| primarily not paying for an app with its features and
| development, you're buying access to content that you happen to
| be receiving and paying for via an app. You wouldn't include
| subscriptions to products on Amazon as an "app subscription" even
| if you bought it through the Amazon app.
|
| 2. I'm curious to balance the rise of the subscription model with
| what I see as a generally increased quality and upkeep of many of
| the apps that are on it. There's obviously exceptions, but apps
| like Carrot Weather, Craft, and Flighty I find to be a generally
| superior experience to the $3 single-purchase apps that they
| generally replaced. Many of them are on the cutting edge of using
| new OS features well, for instance Carrot's widget support is
| amazing. I've totally forgotten the dread of an OS update where
| half of your programs just stop working for weeks or months, or
| even forever.
| Nextgrid wrote:
| > apps like Carrot Weather, Craft, and Flighty I find to be a
| generally superior experience to the $3 single-purchase apps
| that they generally replaced
|
| Not sure about the last 2 but a weather app is a simple problem
| that needs to be solved once and then never messed with again -
| I would personally prefer my weather app _not_ to be constantly
| updated. The last thing I want is the UI on my _weather_ app to
| change all the time.
|
| I don't go buy a new screwdriver or hammer despite newer and
| slightly better models being available unless the existing one
| breaks or stops being compatible (let's say a new kind of
| screw/nail became mainstream). I want the same from my utility
| apps.
|
| The _collection_ of weather data itself is a different task but
| that 's something that's already often done by governments and
| given away for free (as we pay for it indirectly via taxes).
| layer8 wrote:
| What you pay for isn't generally updates to the app, but the
| service of sourcing, processing and consolidating the weather
| data for the way it is presented by the app. I use three
| different weather apps (only one of them with a subscription,
| $1 per year) because each has unique aspects of its data and
| presentation that are useful depending on the use case. One
| of them has diagrams combining forecasts from 20 different
| data sources for the next week (which gives a nice overview
| of the spread of forecasts for each day), sources which I
| don't think are all free.
| noirbot wrote:
| But they're not changing the UI regularly for the most part,
| they're offering new and more convenient optional UI elements
| that are useful. Or providing good Day-1 support for new OS
| notification features or new options on Apple Watch.
|
| It also helps pay for their use of those weather data and
| forecasting APIs, some of the more effective of which are
| private and paid APIs.
|
| And that's totally ignoring that almost nothing, especially
| in mobile apps can just be "written once and never updated".
| APIs change, new sizes of device come out...
| ghaff wrote:
| Yeah, while he did categorize the subscriptions, I do think it
| would be useful to break things down as content, applications,
| and infrastructure. There's some overlap as with Apple One
| (which includes both storage and News+ for example), but it
| probably makes sense to separate out a Disney+ from a
| Grammarly.
| noirbot wrote:
| I even see Grammarly as being in an odd category since it's
| also presumably something they use on a computer and not just
| an app.
|
| I'd split it up as Content, Services, and Applications.
| Something like Apple News, The New York Times, or MLB you're
| buying access via an app to content you could potentially
| get/consume via non-app means, though likely still paid.
| Services like a Grammerly or a VPN are an ongoing cost for
| usage. Applications like a Bear or Carrot Weather are purely
| optional. You could use Notes and Apple Weather if you
| wanted, but you're paying an extra X per month to fund the
| development and upkeep of a tool you find use out of.
|
| The split I think helps you identify what you may want to
| stop paying for because each of those are slightly different
| calculations. You could maybe replace Netflix with a local
| library card, or just buying theater tickets and DVDs. You
| could go back to using Notes or some other app instead of
| using Bear. There's no real alternative to paying for a VPN,
| so that becomes harder to decide you no longer need once
| you've decided you need it.
| ghaff wrote:
| With content in particular, there's far more of it out
| there both streaming and otherwise than anyone has time to
| watch. Indeed, it probably makes sense, if one were to
| budget, to have something entertainment as a category of
| which streaming is just a subcategory. It's certainly an
| area where you can end up subscribing for some show and
| then you really don't get your money's worth. I don't watch
| a huge amount of video and I'm always leaning in that
| direction.
| BiteCode_dev wrote:
| It reminded me of a youtube video were a chief was explaining how
| to cut vegetable quickly. One of the comment said: "I can cook
| diner with what this guy throws away".
|
| Well years ago, I used to live an entire month on what this guy
| spend yearly on subscriptions.
|
| I could now afford all this, but it still seems odd to me to
| spend so much on this.
|
| I guess old habits die hard.
| [deleted]
| Animats wrote:
| I tend to avoid subscription services. But it means I watch more
| Asian drama than US TV. "Log in with your television provider?"
| What television provider?
| UkrainianJew wrote:
| >At $3/coffee (black, nothing fancy) purchased on average four
| times per week across 4.5 years of school, the total came to
| roughly $1,700
|
| $3 x 2 people x 365 days = ~$2K
|
| A decent fully automatic Espresso machine is ~$1K. You load the
| beans once per week, water every day, and run the descaling cycle
| once every few months. And these things are modular as hell: if
| you are not intimidated by reading a service manual and know how
| to get around with a multimeter, you can get replacement parts
| from specialty shops and maintain them yourself at reasonable
| cost.
|
| And the best thing is, you don't need to go anywhere. You wake
| up, crawl to the kitchen, press the button and enjoy the coffee.
| ProllyInfamous wrote:
| I am a retired, mid-30s, former IBEW electrician.
|
| That there are even so many subscription models, and that a
| single person/family could spend THOUSANDS of dollars, annually,
| on "apps" ... just blows my mind.
|
| Definitely, I'm "an old fogie" : I still use a pager for incoming
| contact; I still mainly use Mac OS 10.6/10.8; I have an iPod,
| which is outdated but task-specific (and I enjoy its simplicity);
| my kid-sister installed Pandora on the iPod, which I ENJOY (and
| pay for)... BUT Apple no longer offers updates for the iPod, and
| Pandora does not allow updating without installing an unsupported
| iOS.
|
| The "licensing model" most major platforms are pursuing is
| alarming; when my Mac Pro 5,1 goes out, I'm not sure what I'll do
| without my long-ago pirated edition of CreativeSuite4.
|
| ----
|
| Reading about all the menstruation cycle tracking apps, and the
| criminal/civil vulnerabilities some women may/will face in some
| jurisdictions... is just alarming. Already, the data mined from
| these apps can be pretty "choice" for advertisers (e.g. hormonal
| cravings &c).
| mgaunard wrote:
| I don't understand, 1,700 per year is nothing.
|
| You'd need to spend twice that amount just to acquire decent
| coffee equipment. Then waste a huge amount of time teaching
| yourself how to source good beans, make good coffee, not
| mentioning the time needed to execute and clean up even when you
| have achieved mastery.
|
| No, buying from a coffee shop with trained baristas making coffee
| all day is a much better deal, unless you're in need of a new
| hobby.
| nicce wrote:
| Where do I need to spend that much for coffee equipment?
| mgaunard wrote:
| The hint was in the "decent".
|
| The decent espresso machine is more than $3,000. You'll also
| need to acquire a grinder, usually around $1,000.
| nicce wrote:
| I did not think that espresso is standard for high quality
| coffee. It is just a type of the coffee. You can make
| "decent" coffee with regular pressure boiler and $200
| grinder.
| newaccount74 wrote:
| You don't even need a grinder unless you make espresso
| IMO. Filter coffee from pre-ground coffee is pretty good
| (as long as you drink enough coffee so it doesn't go
| stale).
| nicce wrote:
| I agree that if you are able to consume filter coffee
| quick enough, grinder is optional. Of course, unless you
| want to be picky with the roast of the coffee.
| newaccount74 wrote:
| If you want high end grinder and a dual boiler espresso
| machine with good temperature stability.
|
| Unless you want to take part in barista competitions you
| really don't need to spend that much money.
| temp_praneshp wrote:
| >No, buying from a coffee shop with trained baristas making
| coffee all day is a much better deal
|
| Not the OP, but my bar for "good coffee" is pretty low. I think
| I'm not alone, and for a lot of us the investment is way
| smaller. In 2017, I spent about $500 for a grinder, kettle,
| scale, dripper and glass containers. I haven't spent a cent
| since then on infra, just ongoing expenses for beans (again,
| not terribly expensive given the bar).
|
| I like an amazing coffee now and then, but the number of places
| where the $8 coffee is really amazing is vanishingly small,
| IMO.
| mixmastamyk wrote:
| How to get it 99% cheaper:
|
| - https://www.traderjoes.com/home/products/pdp/coconut-cold-
| br...
|
| - https://www.traderjoes.com/home/products/pdp/050759
|
| Can even upgrade to the French roast.
| ghaff wrote:
| In the summer, I sometimes like ice coffee. I actually bought
| a cold brew coffee maker. I still use it for iced tea
| sometimes but otherwise I just pick up the cold brewed coffee
| in the supermarket.
|
| In addition, although I'm definitely not a Keurig fan I
| rather like Nespresso and have been having that rather than
| dealing with the filling and cleaning of my espresso maker.
| newaccount74 wrote:
| An Aeropress costs 30EUR and makes better coffee than most
| coffeeshops. You can learn using an aeropress in 10 min.
|
| Good coffee is typically 30EUR per kilo and easily available
| everywhere in speciality stores. Heck, most supermarkets here
| even sell acceptable coffee.
|
| You really don't need to spend thousands a year for good
| coffee.
| omega3 wrote:
| You can get very good equipment for a lot less, Gaggia Classic
| + Baratza Encore will set you back around USD 700 new and will
| last for many years. If you want all in one Barista Express is
| about 500.
| lozenge wrote:
| He was buying coffee every day on campus, not driving to the
| best coffee shop in town. The priority was convenience and the
| priority would still be convenience - one button coffee, rather
| than becoming an expert coffee taster.
| prmoustache wrote:
| singron wrote:
| I cannot tell if this is a joke.
| lelandfe wrote:
| This comment gives me "how much could a banana cost" vibes.
|
| You can out-brew Starbucks with about $50 of "equipment": $20
| Mr. Coffee machine, a pack of 100 paper filters for $5, and a
| $20 electric grinder. Skip teaching yourself how to source good
| beans and just buy some fresh, local whole beans at your
| grocery store. Probably a medium roast.
|
| Pike Place really is not a high bar. (I doubt I'm even two
| degrees away from anyone who has a $3,400 coffee setup.)
| mgaunard wrote:
| Ignorance is bliss, I guess.
|
| A good grinder alone is 675 dollars.
| system2 wrote:
| How good do you need to grind to justify $675 to crush your
| beans?
| throwaway743 wrote:
| You gotta be trolling. This is definitely a caricature of
| some of the worst commenters on hn.
| lelandfe wrote:
| A Baratza Encore burr grinder retails new for $170, but you
| can get one in great shape on eBay for $50-70:
| https://www.ebay.com/itm/325267513385
|
| I can't even fathom what you'd get for $675. What does it
| do?
| newaccount74 wrote:
| If you want to make espresso the type of grinder is
| important for the quality of the coffee. More important
| than the espresso machine. You want a disc grinder, and
| they are more expensive than cone grinders.
|
| For filter / french press / aeropress it doesn't matter
| as much and you can use any cheap grinder.
| lelandfe wrote:
| Your prices are starting to make more sense. Wild stab
| here, but I don't think most people read "decent coffee
| equipment" and thought, "espresso machine at a _minimum_
| "
| kaashif wrote:
| I'm skeptical you need all of that to get a cup of coffee
| you'll like the same amount.
|
| Is there quantitative data out there on the kinds of coffee
| people like the best? I recall a TED talk [1] which claims (not
| as its main claim) most people like weak milky coffee despite
| claiming to like a dark roast - claimed preferences are
| different from revealed preferences. I don't know if that's
| true or not, but it'd be interesting to see the data.
|
| Personally, I think my bar for "good coffee" is so low that
| I'll be satisfied with the shittiest mug of instant coffee with
| a small amount of any milk.
|
| [1]:
| https://www.ted.com/talks/malcolm_gladwell_choice_happiness_...
| gumby wrote:
| > Personally, I think my bar for "good coffee" is so low that
| I'll be satisfied with the shittiest mug of instant coffee
| with a small amount of any milk.
|
| When I wake up and the household hasn't finished yesterday's
| pot I just pour it in a mug, zap it, and I'm fine. Let
| someone else go to the effort :-)
|
| Coffee has a lot of rituals that have replaced smoking.
| People rave about Philz coffee in the Bay Area, but if you
| walk in you can't just walk straight out with a cup of
| coffee. No, you _must_ make a bunch of choices (there's no
| default nor minimal option) and then wait for them to make
| it. The entertainment is the point. I like that in a
| restaurant but can't be bothered for just a cup of coffee.
| I'd rather spend my time on talking with the person I'm with,
| not paying to be entertained.
| ghaff wrote:
| Probably because I hate lines, it always shocks me to see
| the cars lined up around the block at takeout for my local
| Starbucks. In person lines are almost as bad. I've skipped
| coffee in the morning when traveling because I didn't want
| to stand in a 15 minute line.
| lelandfe wrote:
| > Coffee has a lot of rituals
|
| You might appreciate this article:
| https://www.seriouseats.com/the-case-for-bad-coffee
|
| > _Standing at my kitchen counter, I measure out two
| teaspoons of Maxwell House instant coffee into my favorite
| mug, pour in 12 ounces of hot water from a tea kettle, and
| stir for a moment. I look toward the automatic drip maker
| to my left and feel a pang of sympathy for its cold carafe
| that once gurgled and steamed each morning with the best
| coffee money could buy. On top of the refrigerator, my old
| friend the French press has gathered dust. When I notice a
| dead housefly decomposing inside it, I wonder what the hell
| has happened to me._
| gumby wrote:
| I really liked that, thanks!
| throwaway743 wrote:
| Used to do the same and still would if I had a coffee
| maker. Now I just use a plastic drip cup, filter, and cafe
| bustelo (nothing against coffee makers, it's just less
| space/easier imo). Tastes good, affordable, lifts spirits,
| gives some pep, gets the job done, and helps trigger the
| morning number 2/three Ss.
|
| Though, one does wonder if the connoisseurs have better
| experiences with their morning laxatives
| jjice wrote:
| There are diminishing returns there, and I'm assuming this was
| standard drop coffee, not a pour over. Is a Mr Coffee and some
| generic ground coffee going to be as good? Likely not (but if
| it's a generic coffee shop, it really is a toss up in my
| opinion). If you get a $1,500 grinder and then use something
| like a V60, that's more expensive in equipment than most people
| care to buy or can taste enough of a difference to make it
| worth while.
|
| Also, most people don't care about their coffee enough to
| consider $1,700 "nothing".
| throwaway743 wrote:
| > I don't understand, 1,700 per year is nothing.
|
| Welp, good for you for getting the money to roll on in and not
| be able to understand that most people aren't in that position.
| Median income, at least in the US, is ~$30k.
|
| $1700 is significant for the majority of folks, not just in the
| US, but the World. $1700 spent purely on coffee each year is
| also laughable and/or outrageous to most, when that could cover
| rent for 1-4 months.
|
| ...the hubris on HN lately, regarding high personal income, is
| too much...
| egypturnash wrote:
| hnthrowaway0315 wrote:
| I don't have any subscription aside from utility (including
| network).
|
| I don't watch Netflix/Disney+ (anymore) as I realized there are
| too many good free contents out there on YouTube and such, and
| modern shows are pretty much garbage comparing to X-Files and
| "Yes (Prime) Minister". Those two and a few similar old-timers
| can keep me entertained till death (I'll just loop through them
| every year).
|
| I don't have music subscription. Actually music subscription is a
| very alien idea. I buy cheap CD given the chance and they stay
| with me for a very long time, while subscription service could
| screw people if they want.
|
| The only subscription I really have a motivation to purchase are
| high quality magazines. I don't have any yet because I'm a bit
| picky at the moment. I once purchased a year of "Archaeology" but
| then realized I don't really get much from it. It goes a lot more
| in-depth with books and academic papers. Actually, with the boom
| of Internet, very few magazines have reason to exist. I really
| enjoy the PoC GTFO magazine but it's free. Anyway I'll probably
| keep spending $0 on magazines and more on books.
| dfee wrote:
| I'm finishing up making my family a GAAP family (kinda joking,
| but mostly serious). I'm doing this to understand where my money
| comes from and where it goes. Think YNAB, but including
| paychecks, etc. against a family of four. Built with some hand
| crafted software on top of hledger, too.
|
| Anyway, we're at about $80/mo, largely dominated by Apple One and
| Google Cloud subscriptions (though I'd love to move off the
| latter, but lock-in). What really gets me is the cell phone bill,
| though.
| gumby wrote:
| > What really gets me is the cell phone bill, though.
|
| What I don't understand is that we have been on the same fixed,
| unlimited plan with five identical lines yet somehow the bill
| varies each month.
| pixelrevision wrote:
| What I usually do these days is subscribe to a streaming service
| when I want to watch something then immediately cancel my sub. If
| I need to extend that it's a couple button presses away. I
| generally find I do not. The only service that sucks with this is
| Netflix, as they often delete inactive accounts.
| wirthjason wrote:
| Say you are building an app or service, does anyone have rules of
| thumb to setting subscription amounts or tier levels?
|
| As a consumer I like subscriptions because I can easily
| calculate, "how much time and effort do I spend doing X, is it
| worth $_____ a month for that?"
|
| My career has been enterprise software for internal apps so I've
| never sold software before. Setting costs feels like a WAG (at
| least initially).
| ketzo wrote:
| One very basic one that I see is "how much employee time am I
| saving you?"
|
| If a company pays its engineers $75/hour, saving 10 hours of
| engineer time is worth $750/month!
|
| That's a high number -- plus, it's on you to prove you really
| can save that much time with your service -- but I think it's a
| reasonable starting point.
| [deleted]
| DantesKite wrote:
| I'm surprised there isn't a straightforward financial app that
| could tell you all this information with an intuitive graph.
|
| I'd pay $9.99 a month for that.
| [deleted]
| paradite wrote:
| It's free.
|
| I use one dedicated free debit card to pay for all my
| subscriptions. You can see the bank statements in details every
| month. Also graphs.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| In the US, you can even earn at least 2% cash back with a
| free credit card and get the same breakdown and analysis from
| almost any bank website.
| Tepix wrote:
| I wouldn't.
| skydhash wrote:
| I use bobby [0] for that
|
| [0]: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/bobby-track-
| subscriptions/id10...
| sakopov wrote:
| I use virtual cards via privacy.com to pay for subscriptions. I
| generate a virtual card with a monthly or annual limit on it
| for each individual subscription service. Each card is backed
| by my real credit card. When a virtual card is charged, my
| credit card is charged. If it's charged over card limit, the
| transaction doesn't go through. The nice thing about this is i
| can login to my privacy.com account and look at all of my
| subscription spend. If I ever needed to cancel any subscription
| I can also burn the virtual card so I don't get over charged.
| pards wrote:
| The major Canadian banks offer this as a standard feature.
| jsnell wrote:
| > didn't think my list was particularly egregious. There's Apple
| One, a markdown app, a weather app, a few streaming services, a
| VPN, a password manager, and a few more
|
| At this point I thought I was reading satire, but reading to the
| end it is clearly earnest. How is an annual subscription to a
| _weather app_ not egregious?
|
| Commercial VPNs are mostly scams preying on people's irrational
| privacy fears. I personally wouldn't pay an ongoing fee for a
| password manager. And paying $400 / year for cloud storage seems
| pretty steep, but we can't know whether the author really needs
| 2TB.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| Yeah I have two subscriptions: Netflix, and YouTube Premium. I
| have purchased a handful of other apps on my phone but all were
| one-time payments.
| ghaff wrote:
| Apple One is a bundle. If you use the majority of the services
| at a given tier, it can make sense to just buy the bundle
| rather than a la carte.
|
| Some of those definitely seem high for what they are. Certainly
| he has more than I do although I do subscribe to The Economist
| and The New York Times which are relatively high ticket and
| also have an Adobe subscription--in addition to various
| streaming content.
| perardi wrote:
| I didn't realize Apple One Premier was that expensive.
|
| I...guess it could make financial sense? If you do use Apple
| Music for streaming, and you do watch shows on Apple TV, and if
| you have a family that could plausibly use 2TB of backup
| storage. But yikes that seems costly--I have the 200GB iCloud
| Storage plan, and I still have over 100GB available.
| iasay wrote:
| I have it. I use it with 6 people and we all use Apple Music,
| watch stuff on Apple TV and use about 1.2TB of storage for
| backing up 5 macs and 12 iOS devices. Two of us use Apple
| Fitness. Oh plus hosting 3 email domains. Works out fairly
| cheap if you use it all.
| gumby wrote:
| Same for us, with a "family" account. The teens didn't care
| about switching from Spotify to apple and this way I know
| all their stuff is backed up. iCloud...can't say it's as
| good as Dropbox but in the bundle it's cheaper than paying
| for Dropbox. Etc.
|
| An unexpected feature is their News app. I pay for some
| subs to read news in my RSS app, but sometimes i come
| across a paywalled article that is free with the bundled
| apple news sub, so I read it there. I wouldn't pay for that
| benefit but when the marginal cost is $0 I'm glad it's
| there.
|
| It's a good deal for this use case. I'd actually think
| there are a lot of people in that category.
| iasay wrote:
| News app is fairly good actually. I use it for BBC Good
| Food magazine mostly.
| aniforprez wrote:
| While commercial VPNs are scams from a security perspective
| with misleading marketing, they're pretty useful for location
| spoofing and accessing blocked content (if the content service
| hasn't blocked a VPN already). Especially if you travel a fair
| amount and want to access things from the perspective of your
| home country, they do the job
|
| I'd also say my password manager (1Password) is by far my most
| used and most bang for the buck subscription I currently have.
| I literally use it almost every hour of every day and paying a
| few dollars a year is not a big deal
| massysett wrote:
| I thought 1Password was too expensive, and the interface
| doesn't always work perfectly. So I canceled the subscription
| and went to a home-rolled solution of spreadsheets and
| Apple's built-in manager.
|
| My home-rolled solution worked OK on desktops but using it on
| tablets and phones was no fun at all. After several months I
| went back to 1Password and am now happy to pay for it.
| benhurmarcel wrote:
| If you want to replace 1password by a free (or cheaper)
| alternative, look at Bitwarden rather. The UX isn't as
| polished but otherwise it provides the same main features.
| abirch wrote:
| How does it compare to Google's password management? I
| constantly use it from chrome or mt Android phone.
| staindk wrote:
| I think Chrome's pw manager is pretty fine if you don't
| feel like you're missing anything.
|
| I'm on the free tier of Bitwarden and it's been perfect for
| me. I'm a cheapskate with subscriptions though.
| nsm wrote:
| Browser password managers are probably fine for most users,
| but 1password is really good for specific use cases
| 1password works across multiple OSes, works in other
| browsers, allows saving much more than just passwords (ssh
| key management, API credentials). The ability to securely
| share passwords with time limited links is a big draw for
| me to use the subscription model. 1p cli is also seriously
| useful.
|
| Also for those who are not aware, if your company uses 1p
| business, you get one FREE personal family account for
| every business user.
| z3c0 wrote:
| Or shielding content from intrusive ISPs. Comcast and AT&T
| will both shake down people over torrenting media, especially
| if that media is copyrighted by one particular mouse-related
| company.
|
| It's also a good way to obstruct mass data gathering by
| governments, provided your chosen VPN lives outside the
| 5/9/14 eyes.
| worldofmatthew wrote:
| I have a 2TB Storage VPS that costs $48/year............. With
| a host that has been operating since at least 2016.
| kristianp wrote:
| What do you use for backups? That's another cost on top.
| KronisLV wrote:
| Huh, that seems like a pretty rare offer!
|
| Some of the more affordable providers that I know of:
| Hetzner 1 TB storage VPS: EUR3.45/month Time4VPS 1 TB
| storage VPS: EUR6.65/month (with yearly billing)
| Contabo 1.4 TB storage VPS: EUR12.99/month
|
| So Hetzner can be EUR41/year (though taxes vary) for a single
| TB, but all other providers that I know of cost at least
| twice the amount of money or so.
| naniwaduni wrote:
| Hetzner storage is not VPS, for what it's worth; it's a
| restricted ssh environment that won't do much beyond
| storage. About the same category of offering as rsync.net,
| I'd say?
| worldofmatthew wrote:
| ServaRICA "Polar Bear Storage Offer".
| nicce wrote:
| > I personally wouldn't pay an ongoing fee for a password
| manager.
|
| I would say that proper password manager is the best investment
| you can do from any app. You use it daily on many platforms. If
| you don't, either you repeat your passwords or are using some
| other bad practices. Proper password manager saves your time
| and probably keeps all of your services more secure.
| kaashif wrote:
| > I would say that proper password manager is the best
| investment you can do from any app.
|
| I agree but I think the point being made is that there are
| free password managers that do the job just as well. I use
| keepassxc on the desktop, it has autofill, it's backed up in
| my Google Drive, I have an Android app that works pretty well
| too.
|
| I've never really felt a need to pay for a password manager,
| my current solution works well enough.
| jjice wrote:
| I agree. You need to pay for the hosting and continued
| security support, and they're usually not priced
| unreasonably.
| priyanmuthu wrote:
| I would strongly recommend BitWarden
| jsnell wrote:
| I agree that everyone should use a password manager. But that
| doesn't mean you need to subscribe to one, rather than buy
| one outright or use the (rather capable ones) that platforms
| already ship with. 1Password could have run a good stable
| company. Instead they took $1B in venture capital, and now
| need to desperately grow an monetize their user base to
| justify their $7B valuation.
|
| It's easy to see why some things need to be subscription-
| based; e.g. the value is actually in some kind of constantly
| updated content; or providing ongoing service actually has a
| significant cost to the supplier, e.g. in bandwidth, compute
| resources, operations. Neither of those is the case for
| password managers. (Or at least, should not be the case.)
| nicce wrote:
| > 1Password could have run a good stable company. Instead
| they took $1B in venture capital, and now need to
| desperately grow an monetize their user base to justify
| their $7B valuation.
|
| That is their greedy business decision, and it should not
| reflect to every one of the password managers. If it costs
| too much, change service.
|
| However, there is a reason why you would pay for the
| password manager. They have the highest security
| requirement from the every app. Their auto-fill properties
| should not fill to scam websites. They should support every
| possible machine, like BitWarden for example does, even CLI
| is there. They should be accessible at any time. Their data
| can't be leaked with bad memory managment. Their UX should
| be designed in a way that everyone graps the idea of good
| password, and can keep using them. Too often people stop
| using them, because they are too difficult or clumsy to
| use.
| cowtools wrote:
| If they have the highest security requirement of any
| program, why are you using a closed-source
| implementation?
| nicce wrote:
| My example (BitWarden) is fully open source.
|
| Anyway, open source does not mean that much unless you
| are able to verify identical releases with reproducible
| builds.
| cowtools wrote:
| There is no need for reproducible builds if you just
| compile it on the user's end.
| jakear wrote:
| Except Apple already provides one for free
| nicce wrote:
| It is quite limited and not very usable on cross-platform
| use.
| snug wrote:
| I also don't understand paying for this when both Apple and
| Chrome have one, and you can even use the chrome one
| instead of apple for most things on the iPhone
| diab0lic wrote:
| I've had this thought a few times, but am pretty
| entrenched in 1Password with hundreds of logins. I'm
| curious if you know about a good migration tool to get
| these into the Apple password manager?
| ProblemFactory wrote:
| > I would say that proper password manager is the best
| investment you can do from any app.
|
| My bed is the best investment in the sense that I spend 1/3
| of my life there. That doesn't mean it would be a good idea
| to pay 1/3 of my income towards a bed and mattress
| subscription.
|
| Healthy competition from many suppliers means that I can buy
| a bed for a one-time, materials cost + profit margin price
| instead of purely value-based pricing, and spend the surplus
| elsewhere.
| nicce wrote:
| The bed is a great example. Saying that investment should
| go linear with a time spent is a bit of a harsh
| generalization.
|
| Instead, you certainly want to get a good enough bed.
| However, at some point, you get diminishing gains when
| investing more into it, and it does not matter anymore.
| Usually, good enough is the point to which healthy
| competition leads--an affordable price and with a not too
| high-profit margin.
|
| Similarly, with password managers, are free alternatives
| good enough? The initial comment implied that it is not
| worth paying at all, but I think the good enough is not met
| with current free alternatives, at least for non-tech
| people.
| noirbot wrote:
| Like the author, I pay for Carrot Weather. I do so because I
| find the features it provides to be helpful and of high-
| quality, and I find it a joy to use. I could probably just use
| the free version, or any other app that didn't charge, but I
| also find it feels good to give a clearly talented and
| passionate developer a job making an app they seem proud of. I
| don't find it any different than buying a nice piece of art, or
| eating out at a nice restaurant.
| Vespasian wrote:
| I need a whether app fairly often and luckily the federal
| whether agency of our country offers a pretty great one for a
| one time flat fee of 3EUR that has become an invaluable part
| of my (hobby Pilot) flight preparation routine.
|
| To get a different / global perspective I also pay for windy
| premium.
| xanaxagoras wrote:
| > people's irrational privacy fears.
|
| My ISP sees me connect to one server and one port only. I think
| it's great. It's irrational not to want my ISP to record my
| activity on the internet all day every day, and associate it
| with my real life identity?
| raverbashing wrote:
| Pretty much this
|
| 1/3 of this list is just BS. Another 1/3 are things that you
| can go for the cheaper option.
|
| Not to mention stuff like "CleanMyMac"
|
| (oh yeah I'm not paying for 1password)
| noirbot wrote:
| Sure, and I could eat rice and beans with water every day and
| save thousands of dollars per year. It's confusing to me how
| many people on here seem to think paying money for non-
| essential things that provide enjoyment or convenience is
| some sort of moral failing.
| raverbashing wrote:
| I'm all for spending money on convenience (that doesn't
| mean a "fundamental laziness") and enjoyment
|
| NordVPN and CleanMyMac or the oversubscribed options like
| Apple+ are not enjoyable nor convenient to me
|
| "fundamental lazyness" - things like relying only on your
| phone to unlock your car then running out of
| signal/battery/etc and getting stranded somewhere and
| looking like a dunce because you were more lazy than you
| should have been. Or getting takeaway coffee as first thing
| in the morning when a coffee machine would pay for itself
| in a month of usage.
| Andrew_nenakhov wrote:
| As someone who is unlucky enough to live in Russia, VPN is now
| more or less a necessity to access information around Putin's
| internet censorship.
|
| However, while using it I've found some unlikely virtues of
| using VPN:
|
| - I'm never offered ads based on my location
|
| - Services like Google are not suspicious of your logins and
| don't bother you with additional 2fa measures. Previously it
| could be a real pain if you are abroad without your regular
| phone service and Google _really_ wants you to enter that code
| it sent you over SMS.
| kkielhofner wrote:
| Commercial VPNs prey on ignorance as well. They frequently talk
| about "keeping you safe from hackers". When is the last time
| sensitive data was intercepted due to lack of TLS? Twenty years
| ago? VPNs do nothing to protect from the most common and
| serious threats - data breaches, spear phishing, any/all of the
| other myriads of ways users are tracked online, etc. I'm also
| of the belief that security services take a closer look at VPN
| traffic (like some Tor exit nodes) that also happens to make
| their jobs easier by concentrating the data for them.
|
| Commercial VPN services certainly have some valid use cases but
| for the vast majority of the population they effectively do
| nothing or worse.
|
| If there's any benefit to their proliferation it's in the
| security service case. Now that all of your non-technical
| friends have signed up for ExpressVPN because they heard about
| it on a podcast there's just that much more data to sift
| through. Not that security services can't handle vast amounts
| of data... I'm just certain that from a classification
| standpoint intercepted data coming out of a VPN (and certainly
| Tor exit) is likely classified higher for analysis, potential
| manual review, etc. Much bigger haystack in the VPN/Tor case.
| gumby wrote:
| Two decent use cases are out-of-region TV and hiding your
| unencrypted traffic (URLs) from your ISP (as you say you
| don't hide it from your VPN provider, but they don't know
| your address). Also sites you visit don't get your location.
|
| Personally, given the kinds of friends I have, a VPN hides my
| traffic from them when I'm on their WiFi. But I don't need a
| commercial VPN for this.
| kkielhofner wrote:
| The out of region TV is a use case but I wonder how long
| before this turns into a cat/mouse game between VPN
| providers and streaming services/content providers. I am
| pleased to see (when I have to sit through these ads on
| podcasts) that providers have seemed to start emphasizing
| this use case instead of their dubious security related
| benefits.
|
| This is kind of my point - now if a law enforcement or
| security service wants to get access to a treasure trove of
| traffic and analytics that is likely significantly more
| interesting to them than general ISP traffic they send an
| NSL or equivalent to a VPN provider and have it all nice a
| collected for them. That said, DoH appears to finally be
| gaining some traction (default on Firefox, IIRC).
|
| Hah, I'm a little curious about what kinds of friends you
| have for this to be of concern :).
| gumby wrote:
| > The out of region TV is a use case but I wonder how
| long before this turns into a cat/mouse game between VPN
| providers and streaming services/content providers.
|
| This cat and mouse game has been going on for a while. I
| actually subscribed to Expressvpn for my kid, who likes
| to watch tv in the languages he grew up with: he says
| their customer support is really good for this use case.
| (This reminds me he's now old enough to pay for this
| himself).
| rchowe wrote:
| After Tom Scott made a video about VPNs[1], apparently a
| lot of VPN company executives got together to rethink how
| they market their product. He mentions that the reason
| there are so many VPN ads is probably because they are VC-
| funded, so perhaps the gravy train will run out for these
| companies some day.
|
| It's odd to me that they have pivoted to marketing VPNs for
| out-of-region TV, because that's against the terms of
| service of pretty much every streaming provider. I guess if
| the ads don't mention a name, they can say "oh we expected
| you to find a streaming service where that's not illegal,
| not use Netflix."
|
| [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WVDQEoe6ZWY
| throwaway675309 wrote:
| No one is going to admit it upfront but I imagine that there
| is a huge number of people who use a VPN as their defacto
| means to torrent.
|
| Additionally unfortunately at least in the United States a
| lot of ISPs snoop on your traffic, so you can avoid
| throttling and achieve some semblance of net neutrality by
| running everything through VPN (assuming of course that VPN
| doesn't do any throttling).
|
| Obviously your IP records may be available, depending on
| whether or not the VPN keeps logs, but in general most cease-
| and-desist requests for torrenting go after the low hanging
| fruit e.g. people who don't obfuscate their IP address at
| all.
| hdjjhhvvhga wrote:
| I just can't figure out one thing: why would one ever want to buy
| a Twitter subscription?
| sdze wrote:
| That's why I have a personal finance spreadsheet.
|
| Also I despise subscriptions
| izzydata wrote:
| I haven't even heard of 90% of these things. It seems hard to
| believe that people could have so many things in their life that
| need paid software solutions. I get the feeling that most of
| these are solutions trying to invent problems instead.
| system2 wrote:
| You are in the majority. I bet 99.9% of HN readers don't have
| these either.
| ww520 wrote:
| BMW sells heated seat subscriptions to car owners, starting with
| $18 a month.
| aluminussoma wrote:
| Hardware is also turning into a subscription-like model. You
| can't upgrade a component on your iPhone or Android without
| needing to purchase a new phone. With Macbooks, you can no longer
| update the hard drive, battery, and RAM. You must purchase a new
| Macbook. Remember the recent story about BMW charging for heated
| seats in South Korea, another hardware as a subscription idea.
|
| I read that Apple is considering a subscription model for iPhone
| devices. That will formalize what is already implicit.
| jcubic wrote:
| I don't know about other countries but in Poland we have
| subscription based phones for ages from mobile operators. You
| get the phone for 1PLN but you pay for it with the bill for 1-2
| years, when you get another phone with new agreement. I don't
| know about you but I call that subscription for device.
| n3t wrote:
| Right but you get to keep the phone after these 1-2 years.
| Once it's paid, it's paid and it's yours.
|
| It's more like a consumer loan than a subscription in my
| eyes.
| massysett wrote:
| This is nothing like a subscription. I have a MacBook Pro that
| is over 8 years old and I'm still using it. It still works just
| as well at doing what it does as it did when I bought it.
|
| I even have an old iPod touch that still does its thing just
| fine.
| MAGZine wrote:
| It already exists.
|
| https://www.apple.com/shop/iphone/iphone-upgrade-program
| aluminussoma wrote:
| This is not quite the subscription based model I envisioned,
| but it is a big step in that direction. For example, you
| still need to make payments on the existing phone for 12
| months before becoming eligible for a new device.
| cowtools wrote:
| That sucks for apple users I suppose, but I don't think that's
| the direction the rest of the industry is taking outside of
| luxury brands.
| gumby wrote:
| Due to the screwy way credit works in the US I just use one card
| but have several (free) ones. Cancelling the others would make my
| credit worse; if I don't use them for a while two companies have
| reduced the credit lines and I have heard others can be cancelled
| due to non use.
|
| So I distributed my subscriptions among them (in my case news,
| video, apps, clown subscriptions); every month I get a reminder
| to consider the spend. When I had everything on one card I had
| only one bill to pay but these subscriptions were buried in
| everything else.
| egypturnash wrote:
| I am trying to decide if I want to learn more about your "clown
| subscriptions".
|
| I'm betting it's _probably_ an autocorrect failure for "cloud"
| but I keep on trying to figure out what it would entail if you
| really meant to type "clown".
| fshbbdssbbgdd wrote:
| I similarly have several credit cards, but they're all on
| autopay. There's some older ones where I don't use the card
| anymore haven't even logged into the account in a long time
| (but I may still use them for new transactions on websites
| where I saved the credit card info). The autopay comes out of
| my checking account, but it just says things like "citi
| $271.15" (made-up example). So effectively I do not know where
| my money is going and it's possible I have subscriptions I
| forgot about.
|
| Just pointing out a potential pitfall of this situation.
| Someone's who better at keeping up with all the details would
| not have this problem.
| 1270018080 wrote:
| I would be embarrassed to post a list like that. This
| "consooming" just for the sake of it. Like part of their identity
| is paying for subscription services. I wish I had the writing
| skills to fully elaborate on why this irks me so much.
| noirbot wrote:
| That seems like a profoundly ungenerous take to have on someone
| making a fairly honest post about them realizing they'd let
| their finances get away from them. It's not as if they're
| bragging about how much they spend. Presumably these are all
| things they started paying for because they found enjoyment or
| value in them at the time - no different than why anyone else
| pays for anything.
| cowtools wrote:
| The best things in life are free.
| bowsamic wrote:
| I think you are projecting quite a lot here
| sashk wrote:
| Most of my subscriptions are for video services like Netflix,
| Hulu, Disney+ and HBO Max.. But some of the software
| subscriptions present there and my current monthly bill comes to
| little bit over $150/month. Well, at least it is what Bobby (iOS
| app - https://apps.apple.com/us/app/bobby-track-
| subscriptions/id10...) says. The only problem I need not to
| forget to add/update subscriptions. There are apps which will
| track these things for me, but will require to share access to
| credit card/bank accounts, which I don't feel like providing.
| tppiotrowski wrote:
| A CEO I worked with a while back just cancelled her CC every few
| months. Then she'd resubscribe to things she was still using. She
| said she didn't have time to cancel all those subscriptions
| individually. I thought it was poor form since a lot of services
| bill at the end of the month and would never get that last months
| due.
| lozenge wrote:
| That's definitely CEO behaviour, legally she is still on the
| hook for that expense and it can go on her credit rating. Don't
| try this at home!
| rs_rs_rs_rs_rs wrote:
| >The findings shook me. My current subscription tally came to
| $1,500 ($1,520 to be exact) per year
|
| I want to know how much you earn yearly.
|
| So let's assume this person makes $50k/y after taxes. How is 3%
| of your yearly income paid for stuff you use shocking? It's
| really not that much...
| franciscop wrote:
| Put it the other way. If you could have an extra $1500/year
| after-tax, would that motivate you to do some lifestyle
| changes? In EU you can travel to 3-5 countries (like a weekend
| trip) as a 20-something with that amount.
|
| Edit: $50k after-tax is probably even low for HN, but it's
| probably in the top 1% globally.
| antisthenes wrote:
| > If you could have an extra $1500/year after-tax, would that
| motivate you to do some lifestyle changes?
|
| When I was younger and poorer, maybe.
|
| Now, not really. $1500/year for things I actually use on a
| 50k post tax income is nothing for peace of mind and
| convenience and saved time. Compare it to things like health
| insurance that you pay $3000-4000 a year for and maybe end up
| not using at all if you're healthy.
|
| The problem for me, personally, is that I would be very hard
| pressed to find enough SAAS services I find useful to get to
| the $1500 number, if we exclude must-haves like utilities +
| internet subscription.
|
| I pay ~$60/yr for a VPS and ~$35/yr for an email provider,
| and that's about it.
| brushfoot wrote:
| Kudos to OP for spring cleaning, but the idea of many of these
| being subscription services to begin with is outrageous to me.
|
| Software as a service rarely makes sense on a scale of 1.
|
| - 1Password (Family): $59/year. Replace with a shared
| spreadsheet.
|
| - Bear: $20/year. A markdown editor for Apple devices.
|
| - CARROT Weather: $40/year. For the weather.
|
| - Day One: $32/year. A personal journal app that runs on
| "unlimited devices." Why, unless writing the journal with a team
| of ghostwriters?
|
| - Lost It!: $28/year. Supposed to be Lose It!--a weight-loss app?
| Replace with books: The Blue Zones, Spark, Self-Directed
| Behavior.
|
| - Habitica: $63/year. Habit tracking, gamification. Replace with
| books. These are tactics, not technologies. Learn the tactics
| once and use them for life.
|
| - Ulysses: $67/year. A writing app for Macs. What could justify a
| recurring fee?
|
| - Squash 3: $41/year. A batch photo editor for Mac for resizing
| photos. Like the free IrfanView or many others.
| karamanolev wrote:
| - 1Password (Family): $59/year. Replace with a shared
| spreadsheet.
|
| Saying (Family) doesn't mean they only use it for sharing. In
| our family we're using it for our individual password
| management, sharing is just an add-on. Having it as a family
| plan is just cheaper. Please don't replace your password
| managers with spreadsheets (unless you really really know what
| you're doing and few people do).
| Shank wrote:
| > Replace with a shared spreadsheet.
|
| I really do not suggest storing passwords and sharing them with
| family members in a spreadsheet. Of all of the services on this
| list, a system that provides end-to-end encryption, autofill,
| generation, and sync for passwords across a family, is a fairly
| good rationale for a subscription. They at least offer a server
| side component that has to be paid for somehow.
|
| A shared spreadsheet doesn't even come close to matching
| 1Password's features.
| brushfoot wrote:
| > I really do not suggest storing passwords and sharing them
| with family members in a spreadsheet.
|
| Why not? Password-encrypt the spreadsheet if you want. The
| browser can do the "last mile" of autofill.
|
| Realistically, a family's going to be just as safe with an
| encrypted spreadsheet on OneDrive or a home file share as
| they would entrusting their passwords to a centralized
| service that's highly visible to attackers.
|
| Alternatively, just write them in a notebook. A family isn't
| webscale.
| moolcool wrote:
| People work hard to develop and maintain all of those
| applications, and other people find more utility in them
| compared to the free alternatives. What's the problem?
| brushfoot wrote:
| People can develop what they want and people can pay for what
| they want. I'm with you there. But the developers' hard work
| doesn't necessarily create value. I may work hard on
| composing a song, but that doesn't mean it's any good.
|
| To me, there are better alternatives than paying monthly for
| these kinds of services.
| moolcool wrote:
| Hasn't value been created by the fact someone got a service
| in exchange for money? Like I don't see how 1Password
| doesn't create value just because free spreadsheet tools
| exist. Similarly, with your example, if you compose a lousy
| song, but people enjoy it enough to spend money on it over
| the other songs on the market, you've created value.
| brushfoot wrote:
| Sure, enjoyment is valuable. And if someone enjoys my
| terrible song, that's their prerogative. The same for
| these services. I'm not trying to tell anyone they _can
| 't_ use them if they like them -- I'm just expressing
| disgust with their subscription pricing models, which I
| think are outrageous for what limited value they add
| compared to perpetually licensed software.
| daneel_w wrote:
| I currently have two online service subscriptions: Posteo
| (e-mail) for EUR1.20/month, and a VPS for EUR5/month.
| joshe wrote:
| One practice that's helped me is to always cancel immediately,
| which translates to only paying for one month. Ie. for spotify,
| netflix pay for the subscription, immediately jump through the
| hoops to cancel.
|
| Forgetfulness turns into money savings, and as a bonus I get to
| review whether I am getting much out of it. Especially for tv
| like disney/netflix/apple tv, I often run though everything
| interesting and don't have much else to watch with them.
|
| Also psychologically there's resistance to a boring to do that
| involves loss. I will put off "go to netflix and figure out how
| to cancel." So do that work when you are excited to see the new
| show.
| sneak wrote:
| Another practice I've found that helps me keep my subscription
| spending in line is torrenting all software and media for free.
|
| It has the added benefit of not enriching these
| subscriptionware scumbags.
|
| PS: Resolve is better than Premiere anyway.
| noelsusman wrote:
| Yeah stealing stuff is a pretty good way to keep your
| spending down.
| sneak wrote:
| Copying data isn't stealing. But, then, you already knew
| that.
| Jerrrry wrote:
| depriving one of potential profits is certainly a form of
| theft.
| 300bps wrote:
| _Another practice I 've found that helps me keep my
| subscription spending in line is torrenting all software and
| media for free_
|
| There was a time that the only practical way to see media was
| to torrent/IRC/newsgroup it. But the ridiculously low cost of
| streaming services and their ease of use just makes it not
| worth it to me.
|
| I get Disney+ for free from my home Internet provider and I
| get Netflix for free from my cellular provider. I got Hulu
| during the Black Friday special for $1 per month for a year.
| olex wrote:
| This is how I use the ever-growing video streaming landscape.
| As soon as there are a few shows I want to watch on one
| particular platform, pay for a month of that, cancel
| immediately. Watch the shows during the month, maybe extend for
| another one if necessary. Then at some point later do the same
| with another service - Netflix, Disney+, Apple TV, all of 'em.
| risho wrote:
| Alternatively and potentially easier so that you don't need to
| jump through all of the hoops of finding where they hid the
| unsubscribe button and futzing around with the app:
|
| use one of those credit card privacy generating services and
| cancel the card or set limits on the cards use after you create
| it. it offers super granular control over who has access to how
| much of your money, how often and for how long.
| zovin wrote:
| Capital One credit cards have the virtual card feature built-
| in. You can use the Eno extension to use them. It even allows
| for scheduled lock outs of the specific virtual cards. I use
| it for every subscription service I use.
| jonwinstanley wrote:
| Agreed. I do this too. Instantly cancel every subscription
| religiously.
| bombcar wrote:
| This works really well, especially the year subscriptions -
| buy, cancel, get the year's worth. If you're using it, you'll
| notice when it dies and can resubscribe.
| [deleted]
| carvking wrote:
| A good reminder - thank you for sharing.
| Invictus0 wrote:
| Is it unusual that I have zero subscriptions to anything?
| McNutty wrote:
| Unusual in terms of total world population, probably not.
|
| Unusual in terms of HN readers, I'd think most people here have
| at least 1x video streaming service at home.
| system2 wrote:
| Maybe one video (Hulu or Netflix) is understandable. Maybe one
| Spotify if the person likes to listen to music without
| interruptions or non-youtube form on the go.
|
| Anything else in this article is hard to believe/understand for
| most of us.
| jjice wrote:
| Most people I know at least use a music streaming service, so
| I'd say you're in the minority of people that I know. Respect
| to you!
| grishka wrote:
| I pay for my server, but I don't consider that a subscription.
| So I also have zero subscriptions.
| hgazx wrote:
| cercatrova wrote:
| With this many subscriptions, no wonder piracy is up, not to
| mention free and open source alternatives to many of these apps,
| such as with weather, productivity or note-taking apps.
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