> You joined the site back when there was a one-time signup fee.
I wouldn't if it wasn't the case.
I am much more willing to pay a one-time fee for a lifetime unlimited plan than a subscription. No matter how expensive is the former or how cheap is the latter.
I just feel extra constant anxiety for every thing I don't own which sucks money from my account regularly, also ready to fail me as soon as I stop paying or move to another country or something. I feel insecurity and anger every time I'm offered a subscription.
Having bought something on a single-pay basis, on the contrary, floods my brain with the senses of achievement and security. Paying some bucks manually every month may do too (provided I find the service extremely useful), but not annually and not automatic (by the way I was extremely delighted to find an easy option to disable automatic payments in Pocket - the only service I've found to offer this).
This feeling runs contrary to the practical reality. Paying once for a service someone else is running doesn’t actually mean you “own” it; Pinboard could disappear at any time.
By contrast, if you’re paying a recurring fee, you’re incentivizing the company to continue operating the service.
I understand, but I want to feel the problem solved once and forever and I am not going to have to pay any more ever. This is not really rational, I just feel this way. I am not going to be mad if the author actually discontinues the service (provided he lets me export the data).
This probably is because I'm a gig survivalist and have never had a long-term stable source of income. What I buy during a prosperity time is what is going to keep me warm during a broke time and help me out of it.
Regular payment obligations are a danger, a paid-forever thing is an asset.
Pinboard offers one-time-ish payments for very long time periods. Cleverly, my money for using this service in 2024 is already earning the founder interest instead of me:
“Pinboard charges $22 per year for a regular account, or $39 per year for archiving and full-text search. You get discounts for multiple years...”
Meanwhile, looking under the hood of most “lifetime” offers means for the expected life of that version of the product. My experience is even the 90th percentile expected value is below 5 years. This service has stood out in contrast to that.
I appreciate your extra constant anxiety, yet manage to also be anxious whether I’ll miss noticing when the pre-paid months finally come due in Feb 2025. Hopefully by then pinboard will still let me pre-fund the founder’s money market account.
To add, with subscriptions there can be an increase in price (or decrease in features) without customers having a say in the matter, so it isn’t even a predictable cost.
That's a false sense of security though. It will only last as long as it's profitable. No one is going to keep a business going into perpetuity if it's a continual money loser. I tend to always check if a service has autopay through paypal, that way it's easy to stop it.
I wouldn't if it wasn't the case.
I am much more willing to pay a one-time fee for a lifetime unlimited plan than a subscription. No matter how expensive is the former or how cheap is the latter.
I just feel extra constant anxiety for every thing I don't own which sucks money from my account regularly, also ready to fail me as soon as I stop paying or move to another country or something. I feel insecurity and anger every time I'm offered a subscription.
Having bought something on a single-pay basis, on the contrary, floods my brain with the senses of achievement and security. Paying some bucks manually every month may do too (provided I find the service extremely useful), but not annually and not automatic (by the way I was extremely delighted to find an easy option to disable automatic payments in Pocket - the only service I've found to offer this).