[Sigia-l] Buy or rent?

[Listera]

Manu Sharma:

> More on pay-per-download vs. subscription model of music download.
> News.com reports:

So now we know that Jobs can be naughty. He really should have sued Napster
for its "Do the math" campaign for its utter deception instead. :-)

I wish this episode could open up a substantive discussion on issues
concerning the 'rent' model, and not just for music. What happens if you
lose access to your financial or medical records, for example, when you
change banks or doctors? How about ASP data for your company? Different
'ownership' legalities on different data types? How do you design systems
that favor customer 'stickiness' (how's that for a comeback?) over all other
considerations? Quicken, I'm told, rescinded a bank service facility in its
software if you didn't upgrade from the 2003 version. How cool is that? If
you are only 'renting' software, does the vendor have the right to
force-upgrade you? We have a lot of issues inherent here.

Ziya
Nullius in Verba