Because of all the free, open source software, I don't see it as a big deal. I don't mean to say that you can just get the free version of everything in OSS. Ra

Because of all the free, open source software, I don't see it as a big deal. I don't mean to say that you can just get the free version of everything in OSS. Rather, that the entire software landscape has shifted, in a meaningful way. On the one hand, you get A TON more software for free, and on the other, for something that has a real moat - yeah, you pay. I think it's fair, software moats are hard, and therefore expensive. I too prefer to buy, not rent, wherever possible. But the way I think of subscriptions is, first of all, as one-off annual expenses, which I can decide if I still want or don't. Something like the office suite, I think you get the basic for free. And you can have a workable email client like thunderbird for free. But outlook is a million times better. So when I did this one piece of work, in my mind I said: okay, this one pays for Office till I retire. Mentally, I allocated the money, and stopped thinking about it.