Who's trying to lock you in?
I maintain a spreadsheet with my subscriptions. That includes online services, insurance, and other recurrent payments. The list is ever-growing, and I review it every couple of months to see what I can cancel or downgrade.
These are some of the services that are doing a great job of locking me in.
Apple wants to sync my photos, videos, and backups to iCloud.
Dropbox wants my file library.
Amazon Blink and Eufy want to store my recordings remotely.
Spotify wants to rent my music library.1
Zapier wants me to continue automating workflows with their zaps.
Descript and Riverside want me to continue recording and editing videos and podcasts.
Grammarly wants to fix my grammar.
Adobe wants me to edit media.
In Kevin Kelly's words, we pay for access, not ownership. Lifetime subscriptions are rare—catch them if you can.
So, as long as I do these things and find no free or cheaper alternative, I'll have to continue subscribing.
I always find it interesting to think of the many songs or albums you could own if you bought music instead of renting it. ↩
