[TheRealDunkirk]

It's a function of the straw that broke the camel's back. What non-life-critical apps or services am I paying for every month? Quite a lot already. Cell service and cable TV & internet are already $350/mo for me. Then you have Netflix, Amazon Prime, Hulu, Sam's Club (Premium!), Google Play, some stupid app my daughter needs for $8/mo, Wolfram Alpha to help her with homework, LastPass, Apple iCloud storage, SpiderOak backup, Google apps for business... and I'm probably forgetting several others.

I understand everyone wants a subscriber, not a customer, but my budget is dying a death from a thousand cuts here. I just can't keep paying for all these things, even when they're only a "few" dollars, every month. It all adds up. This is why people are saying they only pay for a subscription if it REALLY matters to them. The slots are full. If your model requires a monthly payment for something, it must literally change my life, at this point.

Thirty years ago, I had a $20/mo land line, and a TV antenna, and that was it! Think about that! I'm not at all clear that my quality of life is $500/mo better than it was back then.

[fhood]

For a late high-school, early college student, wolfram is not non-critical.

[tortasaur]

What? Of course it's not critical, especially not the paid subscription. You can get by just fine without it with a good textbook.

[sitkack]

Have you seen text book prices?

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0495559725

Across the board they are like this.

[jsilence]

Your university does not have a library?

[LordKano]

Sometimes it feels like I'm the only one who has this perspective.

I'm a couple of TV shows away from going to an "online streaming only" mode of TV watching.

I'm becoming increasingly annoyed by the "only" in the sales pitches.

[georgespencer]

I wonder if in the future there will be a subscription service which consolidates subscription services and pays our fractions of the subscription fee to each provider a la music streaming.

[newscracker]

That'll take a few years to come by. Right now (and in the last few years), many content providers/producers have actually been focusing on having their own streaming services to get more control on their assets and earn a bigger piece of the pie. The users end up paying a lot more separately to each one, and so this cannot be sustained for long.

I see some sort of reverse consolidation happening in the next few years. Netflix, Amazon, Google, Apple and probably Facebook would lead this aggregation, as they have been doing (or trying/planning to do, as the case may be).

[mendelk]

https://setapp.com

At least one of the apps on OPs list (2do) is included.

[georgespencer]

Thanks! Interesting.