[tonyedgecombe]

Well people seem to expect support and updates in perpetuity.

In reality most software offered a pseudo subscription through updates. Every couple of years they would offer a new release with heavily promoted features to entice you to open your wallet. Bug fixes were often an afterthought.

[FpUser]

The minute you stopped paying for service is the minute you loose it. With software updates you can still use the old software just fine. So, no I would not consider it a form of subscription.

Lemme give you very particular example. I own old copy of DxO labs software for processing photos. It suits me just fine and works like a charm despite it being 4 years old. they keep sending me offers to upgrade to new version with new features at very attractive price. If one day the old one stops working for me for whatever reason I will upgrade then. But I have already saved tons of money on just this software alone never mind whole bunch of other titles that I bought.