cw8: I wonder why it seems to be successful with software, ...
There are tow sides to the transaction. I may show excessive skepticism or lack of confidence in my own species, but I'm seriously considering that consumers prefer to swim in a water that is slowly put to boil than to be plunged in boiling water. In other words, they get caught by the apparently lower price of subscriptions. that why you wtill find people renting their digital TV terminal and paying 6 € a month for it rather than buying one for about 120€...
Now, on the suppliers side, there are many benefits : streamlining cash flow for instance. . Increasing sales. Making customers less likely to leave ( if you have an old version, you may not buy the new one and just keep the previous one. In a subscription model, if you leave, you lose what you had ) Or being able to repackage the liabilities of their customers in financial products, in effect cashing in advance several years or subscriptions, thus generating more apparent cash, thus justifying juicy bonusses for Management
So, in the end, the question is, as ever : quid bono ?