Oh, I'm not defending their approach per se - I don't want another subscription at that price point either - I'm just saying that it's not as simple as it appears on the surface because the alternate approach has a direct impact on the behavior of a good chunk of the user base, in a way that's not really good for the business or the users.
I'd argue that in many cases - including this one - the issue with subscriptions is simply that they are overpriced from the customer's perspective. Reasons for this could be greed, a desire to get to a self-sufficient revenue point too early, worrying about the handful of users that will abuse any sort of unlimited plan. From the customer's perspective, if the cost-vs-benefits don't feel right, then they'll complain about a subscription, but it's not /really/ the main problem in most cases.
The most "fair" plan for e.g. Netflix would be if I paid for each thing I watch, but that is effectively a "tax" on usage and negatively affects my usage patterns (from both my perspective and theirs). For example, I'd be super hesitant to browse and try out stuff I might not like. On the flip side, Netflix has now passed 15USD/mo and while it's not a huge chunk of change, I don't feel like I get 15 dollars of value out of it, so I'm thinking of cancelling. If the subscription was an absurdly low 1USD/mo, I wouldn't care about the subscription at all.
Kagi's situation is unfortunate for them because they are trying to get people to pay for something that we normally think of as free, so they probably need to lower the price point, at least for now.
> Amazon doesn’t make me subscribe and I can buy 100 hours and use them over 10 years for all they care
Well, sure, getting a customer's money up front for something intangible that they may never use and whose cost to you trends towards zero anyway is something they're happy to sell you. :)
