[Idontreddit]

Licensing is old news. The hip new thing in business is the social media model.

Businesses are now trying to give you things for free in exchange for rights to your data. That's the entire social media business model. It is so lucrative at the moment that even microsoft is now employing the social model for their consumer OS ( starting with windows 10 ). You get a "free" OS, but that OS is going to track what you do and sell your data.

Of course this model is much easier for software than hardware because of the low cost of distributing software and an easier way to achieve scale. If hardware decides to try this model, it will be interesting and funny to see what the implications would be. Tesla could offer to lease you a "free" car but they get to monitor you, collect your data and sell your data. Hell, what happens when housing developers try the "social media" model. You get to lease a "free" house but the developer gets to record/monitor everything you and sell your data.