That's how we do it with our products (purchases include a subscription). A subscription consists of:

- A year of support on our forums (real company-provided support, not just peer-provided).

- All minor releases and bug-fix builds within the year.

- After the subscription has expired, you still keep everything that you purchased forever, including being able to download anything you own at any time (we keep track of all of that for you).

We do have some "catches" to prevent free-riders at the expense of customers that maintain subscriptions, notably that you can only renew a subscription at the normal price within 2 years of your last renewal. After that, we start to ratchet up the renewal costs until, at the 5-year mark, you'll need to (effectively) purchase a new license.

Also, we offer inexpensive direct phone/email support through a separate "support session" method that is not tied to your subscription. So, even after a subscription expires, you still have direct support options.

The key is that any arrangement be fair and beneficial to both parties. In our case, we get a steady, predictable stream of revenue, and the customers get support, enhancements, and bug fixes quicker and at less cost.

Fair and beneficial to both parties! Almost like the olden days where people only did business if this was so?

One I know is Bitwig who recently changed their licensing model so you get 12 months updates with your perpetual license and can pay to continue receiving updates after 12 months[1].

[1] https://www.bitwig.com/en/17/new-license-model.html

Reaper gives you years of updates for your $60.

That seems like a good hybrid model

It's the old JetBrains model.