All these examples are missing the nefarious bait-and-switchy property to them like the printer example does. When you start using a managed SQL DB from GCP for instance there is no expectation whatsoever that you can use that offline. But you can still spin up a PostgreSQL and use that offline, no problem. No one can turn that off. Sure there are things like licensing but those have existed forever.

> You used to be able to actually buy stand-alone software, which you installed, and managed on hardware you'd bought, and which upgraded only when you decided to buy again.

That's not what Saas is usually considered though, at least in my experience. A note taking app needing a subscription to work isn't what I imagine this thread means when we talk about SaaS.