SaaS to SaSSY

It went something like this: 

1. Make a thing of lasting value, sell it.

2. Make a thing of slowly, but surely diminishing value, sell it, make something new and improved, sell it for more, Rinse and repeat

3. Then, an idea came to switch to renting . You never really owned it, but now you'll lose access over time until you decide to reup. BUT fear not, in exchange for this you get the most up to date version AND while you may be paying more over the long run, you're also getting A TON more! You get service too.

And thus, Software as a Service (SaaS) was born. And it went ok for a while. Many companies hopped onboard trying to match the right subscription term with their offering. Month to month made sense for accounting so that's primarily what we got. But that lost its zeal relatively quick. 

Soon pushing customers from calling for support and service to 'self-service' became all the rage. "Consumers prefer to help themselves. It's faster!" we said, neglecting that the comparison point was repeatedly watered down service we offered and all the road blocks we put up to reduce access to service. 

This lead to the worst of both worlds, Software as Software, Serve Yourself (SaSSY). Now you pay recurring rent without cross-subsidized service. IF you still want actual support from the company selling the software, well you can get it. It just costs extra. Essentially with SaSSY, you're getting less for more!

This potential gap in value can easily be patched with branding service tiers things like, 'Good', 'Better', 'Best' instead of 'nothing', 'something', 'more'. We tell ourselves this is what customers want and if they want more then they can say so with their wallets and we'll happily oblige. 

But what comes next? As we careen towards consumption, we enter the world where every step you take, every click you make, every term and condition you break, we'll be charging you. Oh what fun.