Many things like cellphone contracts have already gotten this right: You enter a contract guaranteeing service on their end and payment on yours, pay a reduced

Many things like cellphone contracts have already gotten this right: You enter a contract guaranteeing service on their end and payment on yours, pay a reduced upfront cost kinda as a deposit, and pay the rest monthly. Then either party can terminate after the contract is up (or you both continue). Cloud-serviced hardware is nothing new. Somehow this isn't an expectation with IoT, probably because they're shiny new toys in the experimental phases.