I don't own anything anymore.

Want a cup of coffee.
Want to try a different V60 recipe.
Opens App Store and searches "pour over".
Downloads an app that shows a ratio calculator, a timer, and a form to enter recipes.
Can't change the ratio. Hmm.
Premium page shows up. SUBSCRIPTION.

Disclaimer: this is my daily therapy. Writing about something I hate.

This is a true story. A simple ratio coffee calculator with a timer and a few public recipes on it, is a subscription.

I don't know when everything changed. One subscription at a time. None of them felt like a big deal. That's how I can explain this whole subscription thing. Every app is a subscription now. Apps that do everything locally, with no servers, no live content, nothing that could possibly justify a recurring charge. Just because.

I want to be clear. I'm not against paying for software. I love supporting developers. I love paying for a well-built app. The problem is there is no common sense anymore.

A calculator should not be $2.99 a month. A flashlight should not have a Pro tier. A document scanner should not need my credit card to save a JPG as a PDF.

So last Sunday I made a spreadsheet. Of course I made a spreadsheet. I went through my bank statements for the past year and listed every recurring charge. 9 entries. nine. Some of them I didn't even remember signing up for. There's one for an app I downloaded last year to convert HEIC photos. I used it once. Still charging me $1.99 a month. That's $48 to convert one photo to a JPG.

But the worst part isn't the money. It's that I don't own any of it. If I stop paying, the app with my data, my workflows, turns into a brick. The thing on my phone is just a license that expires every 30 days. I'm renting access to a tool I never really bought.

I get why developers do it. The App Store rewards recurring revenue. A one-time $9.99 purchase doesn't pay rent. The indies who'd rather just sell you the app are slowly pushed into the model whether they like it or not. I don't blame them. I just hate what it's done to the whole thing.

I used to look at my home screen and see a collection of tools. Things I had bought. Things that were mine. Now I see a stack of leases. Each one a small monthly drip, in exchange for permission to keep using something I never really had.

Anyway. I cancelled 8 of them. I made the V60 with a 1:16 ratio I remembered from a YouTube video. It was fine. The pour-over app is still on my phone. Maybe one day they'll come to their senses and ship a one-time purchase.

Not optimistic. Common sense Pro, $2.99/month.