First off, thank you for speaking to me as a person and not in tirade-mode. I think, though, this also partially encapsulates the issue and arguments past.

Whether the stores themselves are complicit in this or not ignores a basic consideration - you can have free apps and there’s no charge to the developer (outside of possibly the developer license). I personally think the Subscription problem is more about the greed of some devs than micro transactions.

There’s a time and place for subscription. That’s the one point missed in this argument, which tends to be absolutist against any kind of renumeration outside of the initial spend by the consumer.

Not every app deserves a subscription, and 90% of the apps in any app store probably have no reason to exist – so many copies of apps, rehashes, one-tweak-wonders, etc. A smart consumer shouldn’t give these the time of day, but that they exist in the volumes they do suggests there are plenty of unwise consumers out there.

There are, though, likely thousands of apps or games that deserve to exist, and often expand on their utility in each release and offer features not normally on the base OS.

For instance, something like Infuse - it’s a godsend for anyone who doesn’t want a media server but does have a hard disk they can plug into their home base station. They also let you use formats that aren’t otherwise available on any of the OSs, license Dolby to the platform, adds spacial audio, helps with organization and grouping and is a knock-out player.

I personally love its constant development and don’t mind updating my license yearly. I could stop and still have the use of the version I paid up to, but man alive - do some people complain about paying for it. But that’s their choice, right? Use the simple version for free, or use another app like Plex or VLC - what’ the problem? Still - you can barely have a conversation about it without a big thread battle about “subscriptions”…

My ultimate point is we, the consumer, have to be better at our part of the process.

There are good apps where a subscription makes sense. There are others where you should turn your back immediately, to the app and likely the developer - there are some stupidly greedy apps out there. But also there are other apps where they are free or a fixed price…they probably live in obscurity.

Instead of arguing about whether there should ever be a subscription basis to an app, why not just try something else, or recommend a better, cheaper app? I’m tired and salty from the binary nature of this argument - there are so many other options, and yet so much time and energy wasted on a pointless battle.