This true. They have all discovered that the SaaS model is the best model for software sales —which is why the big players are all pushing everything into the SaaS model, which while convenient (financially and administratively), have drawback such as availability and of course the recurring nature of billing where you can’t choose to stay on an old version either because it’s good’nuff or because of compatibility reasons.

Yet, when google mail for business came out everyone hailed the idea; sigh... no more CALs, etc. which is true but now you have to pay recurringly (and msy have to keep former accounts live for compliance reasons)