I'm fine with this. The old model was great and unsustainable. They are switching with the explicit goal of not taking VC money, which is a good thing in any context.
this post was submitted on 19 Feb 2024
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This is where I'm conflicted. Software development is hard and it's expensive. I completely understand that the old model was unsustainable.
HOWEVER - I've seen this a dozen times before. They make a move that's not great but it is understandable with the community. It's the next move that I worry about, when all of a sudden there is a subscription, or those old "lifetime" plans suddenly aren't lifetime. I remember PlayOn TV suddenly saying "Well now it's PlayOn Home. That's a new product, so you did get the lifetime of the old PlayOn TV! So we didn't really reneg on our deal!" Immediately in the garbage.
So, I'll be staying on for now.... with a big "we'll fuckin' see" in the next few years.
Me over here with a lifetime plex pass: "...uhhh, did you just feel that?"
I'll keep using it until they no longer let me, I guess. Pretty sure OMV and TrueNAS have matured enough to fall to if unRAID decides to go full subscription, at least.
Hey, fellow PlayOn lifetime subscriber! I feel you and not everyone needs to feel the way I do about this. But, I’m fine with it. That may change, but it’s where I am now.
That move by them is what makes me so nervous about things like this. I will never not be angry, I left that company the second they announced our lifetime memberships were useless. "You get 3 whole months of the new subscription because we're nice like that." No way, I was out.
I hope unraid treats us better, but I'm nervous as hell.
For those (like me) who don’t know:
https://www.techhive.com/article/579775/playon-streaming-dvr-just-got-a-lot-pricier.html
My biggest problem is security updates.
The "x years of upgrades" model is okay when it's for an app, where you can just keep using it with the old feature set and no harm is done.
But Unraid isn't an app, it's a whole operating system.
With this new licensing model, over time we will see many people sticking with old versions because they dont want to pay to renew - and then what happens when critical security vulnerabilities are found?
The question was already asked on the Unraid forum thread, and the answer from them on whether they would provide security updates for non-latest versions was basically "we don't know" - due to how much effort they would need to spend to individually fix all those old versions, and the team size it would require.
It's going to be a nightmare.
Any user who cares about good security practice is effectively going to be forced to pay to renew, because the alternative will be to leave yourself potentially vulnerable.
At which point such an user might already be looking at TrueNAS/DIY setups TBH
There's all kinds of people being born every day, growing up and becoming self hosting unRAID users. Meanwhile current license holders are growing older and dying off.
How is continuing to charge for new people to get into unRAID unsustainable? If it's worked this long but isn't now then increase the prices, or watch your overhead.
I'm here until my pro license starts costing me again. If that happens, I'll likely jump just like I have done with other products I paid for that changed our original agreement.
But if you already have a license they aren't changing the agreement with you? I also don't think there was ever any agreement that everyone else would get the same agreement as you
I think they mean IF the license for old users changes, other companies have done that before. I'm on the same boat as him, if my UnRAID license suddenly means I need to start paying again I am switching.
Hope it stays that way.
Ah, yes, the Autodesk style "not a subscription."
Which lasts JUST long enough to get people to buy in on the lower levels before they pull the fucking rug.
Some of you guys are nahive.
The true and best open source stuff is not developed for profit. Once it is, its only a matter of time because, guess what, software development is never really profitable no matter how much you piss off your user base.
Don't get me wrong: nothing bad in seeking profit, I do it myself too, I don't live of thin air...
But true open source projects are not developed by seeking sustainability and profit out of it. I steer away from any such project because it's doomed sooner or later and history is full of those projects.
Naive/naïve?
I searched for "nahive" just in case it was a word I hadn't heard of but it doesn't seem to be.
Yes, naïve :)
Did you know the world naïve is written backwards on your water bottle?
Thats a good one! But I am not French.
Software development is never profitable?
For it to be, you need a solid paying user base. Which is not the case at hand.
Very often also at.enterprise level the big money is in training, support and courses rather than in the software licenses per se.
Well duh, most software these days doesn't have a direct license cost; you don't pay for the Netflix app on your TV, you pay for Netflix the service.
(Okay, Netflix might not be the best example for sustainable software-based profit but you get the idea.)
Former sublime text user here. Eating popcorn and chuckling at "lifetime license"
I was about to fly off my handle when I heard this, and was about to send them an email to give them a good piece of my kind. But I chose to read first (don't do this very often) and I found that this applies to new customers only. I think this is pretty fair. I've been using Unraid for 5 years now, and have absolutely no regrets. Anyone thinking on getting an unraid license, now is the time.
Yeah, there have been posts saying "They're going subscription!!" and that's why I made this one. They're not going subscription. It makes me hella nervous that they might go subscription, but for now they're not. I'm alarmed and watching, but my pitchfork is still in the shed. ...for now.
Haha me too! I only use 6 drives but bought a pro key just to support. However, if I had to then pay more I would have felt wronged and would have joined the ESXi boys jumpimg on the proxmox train. Might ride that train someday just to learn it.
Proxmox is great but if you are happy on unraid then it does make a lot of things simple that may or may not (depending on what we’re talking about) be as easy on PVE. For example, PVE is not a storage solution first; sure you can do lots of storage stuff but you should not host shares directly off it for example (set up a container or VM to host the shares passed through from the storage pool on the host box).
You get more control and customization (which is where I was very happy; I have a cluster and my network shares are a service I manage within that) but if you are looking for a NAS-first solution for a single server, give something like TrueNAS Scale a good look before you take the plunge.
They've gotta make money somehow.
Having a bunch of intentionally out of date systems seems like a bad idea though.
I'm hoping security updates are always included, but new features could be gated by lifetime/subscription. But no word on that yet.
Yeah they don't mention it at all which is a bit concerning.
At least they are being honest and keeping their word on the lifetime promise to those who bought those. How many other companies keep their word like that?
The water is not that hot!
🐸
I read the whole thread just waiting to see something that would make me go, "Oh, see, there it is - that's how it's a trick. That's why it's a double-speak betrayal."
And...I didn't see it. It honestly looks like they are doing a thing to help develop the product in a way that as a user, I want; and they are not throwing current users under the bus or bait-and-switching what we were promised when we committed to the platform.
New users may not have it quite as good, but it still seems reasonable, and honestly - getting involved early is something that should be rewarded in special ways. We accept it in all sorts of other contexts (just with more up-front information, but not in materially different outcomes).
Proxmox, OpenMediaVault VM, Docker, Portainer, SnapRaid.
I have similar setup but without PROXMOX. I tried it but never saw the benefit. Using ZFS for bitrot protection.
While it's a valid business decision, and while I can see that they're trying to open more storage options for lower tiers, it does feel like a bait-and-switch to me. I've had so many people pushing this to me and I've been interested, but unable to justify the money for a license, because I'm poor and have severe health problems in the USA, which means unfortunately my money is better spent elsewhere.
So when I'm finally getting close to feeling like I might maybe have a spare $90 I could put towards a Plus license, it just feels lame that if I don't come up with the money soon, I'll be left paying for updates each year.
On the current Buy Now page it reads "Buy Once, Use for Life. No subscription. No hidden fees."
This just feels like the first step of enshittification to me. While its great the low-level plans now have access to more storage devices, now it is a subscription if you want to keep security updates? So no subscription until they change their minds, essentially. I don't know, it definitely makes me feel less inclined to invest my money in it. I never saw myself needing more than 12 storage devices, and a lifetime of updates seemed like a great deal. This seems like an average deal. I don't even have close to 12 drives, so having "unlimited" storage devices seems... pointless to a casual user trying to set up a cheap NAS at home.
I don't use unraid as it is proprietary software
Good now I don’t have to plan a huge data migration for a good long while
Not gonna lie, I thought it already worked like this.
As long as the lifetime licenses continue to be a thing, it's great.
Acronyms, initialisms, abbreviations, contractions, and other phrases which expand to something larger, that I've seen in this thread:
| Fewer Letters | More Letters |
|---|---|
| ESXi | VMWare virtual machine hypervisor |
| NAS | Network-Attached Storage |
| Plex | Brand of media server package |
| ZFS | Solaris/Linux filesystem focusing on data integrity |
4 acronyms in this thread; the most compressed thread commented on today has 4 acronyms.
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