This is absolutely spot on. You've articulated with great clarity what was, for me, a sense of muddled frustration. I've virtually stopped buying things these days, it just makes life much simpler.
I feel this in my bones. That’s why my husband and I are huge of physical media and this idea of analog is coming back. We are tired of not owning anything anymore while the rest of society tells us to just get with the program and move on! No use in fighting it!
This bugs me to no end. I'm always trying to get around it; for example, I went on eBay and bought Microsoft 2010 so I could install it on my computer without paying for a yearly subscription.
What I find so fascinating is while corporations are leaning into the dependency model, it's spurred consumers to band together and create alternatives.
Open Source software that is completely free and will never cost you anything often outperforms commercial solutions. I transitioned from Windows 11 to Fedora Plasma recently. The change has been night and day. My system now uses half the RAM and a tenth of the hard drive space to run the OS. Games run like a knife through butter, and best of all my system doesn't BSOD every three days.
There is a learning curve, there is a lot to understand and you will accidentally break a few things while installing, but the OS is free and more importantly by making the switch the computer becomes fully your in ways it just isn't with Microsoft.
And heaven help you if you want to cancel a subscription. Fake email addresses, fake phone numbers. It’s so dishonest! We’re dealing with crooks and con men on every transaction.
“There is no longer money to be made in being trustworthy, now the money is made in how close you can get to scamming without ever actually scamming anyone.”
This is so true and there is real damage done by many of these products and subscriptions. This is why I deleted my instagram app and have refused to redownload it for the past 10 months. I found valuable things on my instagram but the ads finally did me in.
The algorithm figured out I have infertility and every ad for the past 3 years was trying to sell me a cure.
And some of the ads were hard to ignore.
It was cruel. I’m so glad I’m free of social media at this moment.
I feel strongly about this concerning the music industry. This youngest generation does not, as a whole, understand what it means to actually purchase and own your own music collection. I am THRILLED that my almost-19-year-old daughter has caught onto this on her own, and is now investing in CDs that she keeps in her car to listen to. Just the other day, we were discussing how, via Spotify and the other streaming platforms, you literally own nothing. And if the company disappears one day, so does the entire collection of your music. CDs for the win. :)
I had the same experience with an HP printer. I've always had HP printers because they were just ubiquitous. But when I ran into the subscription problem you described a couple years ago, I just gave that printer away and will never buy another.
Yes! I bought a record player and started buying records. I am buying DVDs and cancelled Amazon Prime. I am buying or checking out real books from the library. We have to push back.
Buying a car now practically requires a subscription just to drive your car. That's where it's going. Automobile manufacturers are trying to remove classic cars from existence. We need to email our Congress person and ask them to put a stop to this racket!
Man that printer thing is infuriating! I definitely share the same sentiments about all these subscriptions. Nowadays I try and buy real cds when I can afford them (even though I do use Spotify), and anything that I can support local for. Anyway, great article!
Spot on Truth. I bought a basic, inexpensive refrigerator in 1999. It finally gave out in 2024. I know for certain that the one I bought to replace it, won't last a decade. Just the way things are these days.
It used to be understood that a person could run a business that made a profit AND help people along the way who came to them for their business. Sadly these days, it's all about squeezing every last dime out of the customer.
But a big part of this is our fault. We used to buy things from businesses that were owned by people we knew. We then changed to buying things from huge corporations because the item we bought was 50 cents cheaper. The chickens have indeed come home to roost.
I 1000% agree with you. Unfortunately this is all planned and part of the UN’s Agenda 2030 where they themselves said that “you’ll own nothing and be happy”.
I too miss when products and brand names meant something. My friend is an engineer and she says all the time that one of the first things they learned in engineering school was to first determine how long you want the product to last, then build from there. They are all designed to fail so that you have to spend more money.
This is absolutely spot on. You've articulated with great clarity what was, for me, a sense of muddled frustration. I've virtually stopped buying things these days, it just makes life much simpler.
I feel this in my bones. That’s why my husband and I are huge of physical media and this idea of analog is coming back. We are tired of not owning anything anymore while the rest of society tells us to just get with the program and move on! No use in fighting it!
This bugs me to no end. I'm always trying to get around it; for example, I went on eBay and bought Microsoft 2010 so I could install it on my computer without paying for a yearly subscription.
What I find so fascinating is while corporations are leaning into the dependency model, it's spurred consumers to band together and create alternatives.
Open Source software that is completely free and will never cost you anything often outperforms commercial solutions. I transitioned from Windows 11 to Fedora Plasma recently. The change has been night and day. My system now uses half the RAM and a tenth of the hard drive space to run the OS. Games run like a knife through butter, and best of all my system doesn't BSOD every three days.
There is a learning curve, there is a lot to understand and you will accidentally break a few things while installing, but the OS is free and more importantly by making the switch the computer becomes fully your in ways it just isn't with Microsoft.
And heaven help you if you want to cancel a subscription. Fake email addresses, fake phone numbers. It’s so dishonest! We’re dealing with crooks and con men on every transaction.
“There is no longer money to be made in being trustworthy, now the money is made in how close you can get to scamming without ever actually scamming anyone.”
This is so true and there is real damage done by many of these products and subscriptions. This is why I deleted my instagram app and have refused to redownload it for the past 10 months. I found valuable things on my instagram but the ads finally did me in.
The algorithm figured out I have infertility and every ad for the past 3 years was trying to sell me a cure.
And some of the ads were hard to ignore.
It was cruel. I’m so glad I’m free of social media at this moment.
I feel strongly about this concerning the music industry. This youngest generation does not, as a whole, understand what it means to actually purchase and own your own music collection. I am THRILLED that my almost-19-year-old daughter has caught onto this on her own, and is now investing in CDs that she keeps in her car to listen to. Just the other day, we were discussing how, via Spotify and the other streaming platforms, you literally own nothing. And if the company disappears one day, so does the entire collection of your music. CDs for the win. :)
Same, my 12 and 13 year olds took money they got for Christmas and bought record players.
I had the same experience with an HP printer. I've always had HP printers because they were just ubiquitous. But when I ran into the subscription problem you described a couple years ago, I just gave that printer away and will never buy another.
Yes! I bought a record player and started buying records. I am buying DVDs and cancelled Amazon Prime. I am buying or checking out real books from the library. We have to push back.
Buying a car now practically requires a subscription just to drive your car. That's where it's going. Automobile manufacturers are trying to remove classic cars from existence. We need to email our Congress person and ask them to put a stop to this racket!
Man that printer thing is infuriating! I definitely share the same sentiments about all these subscriptions. Nowadays I try and buy real cds when I can afford them (even though I do use Spotify), and anything that I can support local for. Anyway, great article!
Spot on! Anticonsumers unite!
Spot on Truth. I bought a basic, inexpensive refrigerator in 1999. It finally gave out in 2024. I know for certain that the one I bought to replace it, won't last a decade. Just the way things are these days.
It used to be understood that a person could run a business that made a profit AND help people along the way who came to them for their business. Sadly these days, it's all about squeezing every last dime out of the customer.
But a big part of this is our fault. We used to buy things from businesses that were owned by people we knew. We then changed to buying things from huge corporations because the item we bought was 50 cents cheaper. The chickens have indeed come home to roost.
Thank you! I mean, I love researching, but it's so exhausting to have to research EVERYTHING.
Everyone has turn into a used car sales guy and I hate it here.
If they were used cars, there wouldn't be a subscription. The hardware would be yours.
All this subscription shit began when Microsoft went from a standalone product to a service. At first, they charged you 25 dollars a year.
I hate microsoft. They kept adding bloatware to the OS and are working like hell to get people to buy new computers just to keep getting MS.
I broke those chains and downloaded Linux.
No subscription, no constant downloads, just me, my computer and the browser.
Farmers got tired of John Deer trying to turn their tractors into a subscription service.
I 1000% agree with you. Unfortunately this is all planned and part of the UN’s Agenda 2030 where they themselves said that “you’ll own nothing and be happy”.
I too miss when products and brand names meant something. My friend is an engineer and she says all the time that one of the first things they learned in engineering school was to first determine how long you want the product to last, then build from there. They are all designed to fail so that you have to spend more money.