WhoRoger

I don't know if it has a subscription per se, but holy crap/crab

cross-posted from: https://feddit.de/post/3190681

You've seen Louis's rant about how difficult it is to cancel gym memberships. But I think he's mad at the wrong thing here, or at least not at the main wrong thing.

The worse issues, as I see them, are:

The main issues are:

1. Why does a gym require membership/subscription in the first place? Ok sure, fixed expenses and stuff, but that's the case of every business ever, and my grocery store doesn't require me to sign up for membership to buy bread.

Where I live (Europe), gyms, swimming pools and other such establishments are walk-in. You come, pay an entry fee and leave whenever. Memberships and tickets for multiple entries are offered, but it's just to save money if you want it and are a regular anyway. So there's a steep discount coming with those. Businesses need go actually earn your membership money.

I kept seeing people joking about gym memberships in US TV shows and comedies, and just had to shake my head.

Not that people aren't trying to bring this subscription/membership rot here. One large local gym/wellness chain now requires membership and a phone app to enter. The membership itself is free (presumably you pay with your data in some way) and there are still just single entrance fees, but fuck that.

2. I'd say it's good manners to accept cancellation of a contract by the same method as the sign-up. But in absence of good manners by businesses, laws should exist to enforce exactly this.

As far as I know, Europe-wide laws require cancellation of contracts to be easily available, at least using the same way as you can sign up.

So if the laws don't demand this, and businesses don't respect this simplest, basic logic, then there's something fundamentally more wrong than just "making it difficult to cancel".

And overall, it also just shows how far can things get when subscriptions are just accepted as normal thing. It always gets worse and worse, unless the law intervenes (if it does). That's why it's pretty much best to avoid subscription services and memberships whenever there's an alternative available. Sure, exceptions apply, but always think what the situation with your service will be in 10 years.

cross-posted from: https://kbin.social/m/tech/t/433816

BMW has made a U-turn on a controversial subscription service that saw drivers pay a fee to activate the heated seats fitted to their car.

//

How nice of them. But I'll bet my tyres that even worse subscriptions will come from all sides, and we won't need to wait long. These tiny wins against corporate nickle and diming only make sense, when we keep fighting them. More often than not, people get tired of complaining about the same thing over and over, until it just gets fully normalised.

In other words, don't buy cars with subscription seats, don't buy shitty subscriptions and try to not support companies that push that kind of shit.

Sorry for being a downer and not celebrating, but that's the point.

cross-posted from: https://kbin.social/m/gaming/t/408797

USD "per year" prices:
The Essential plan is increasing from $60 to $80.
Extra increasing from $100 to $135.
Premium increasing from $120 to $160.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/2944272

Smaller subscription deals and the underperformance of certain titles have had a severe impact on Devolver and TinyBuild, says stockbroking firm Goodbody.

Both companies floated at the peak of the games business in 2021 and have seen their share prices plummet over the past two years. Devolver has seen its share price drop 92% since its peak in January 2022, while TinyBuild's has fallen 95%

"We have seen from Devolver and TinyBuild that subscription is under pressure at the moment," says Patrick O'Donnell, technology and video gaming analyst at Goodbody.

"The cheques coming from Sony and Microsoft are just not as big as they were. And that creates problems if you're concentrated on that side of the market.

"TinyBuild, of all of them, was most exposed. Devolver was exposed, but not quite as much."

We haven't heard anything in a while...

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/3882090

Reader would work for like 90% of people, but no, everyone needs Standard or Pro because reasons.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/3405817

Have to use Windows for work (I've asked), the ads have been getting worse and worse on my work laptop. Today got a game ad notification... That's clearly too far, right? Like I have to clear notifications, so I have to see it

And here's the other side, a view against subscriptions or rather any monetisation of features, specifically in cars but can easily be applied to lots of other industries.

This article can be quite agitative and speculative (tho I can't really disagree with much), so be warned - but like with that other post, there you go - some points "against".

It's a bit of a cucumber season, so I thought I'll post something from both sides of the argument.

This video discusses some positives of subscriptions, though specifically in comparison to free services. I think they're forgetting a few things - such as that just because a service is paid, doesn't mean it's inherently better or more private - but there you go. Some points "for".