Should the spiralling cost of SaaS be a concern?

SaaS was billed as a way to support our favourite services. So why are they getting so pricey?

I just paid over SG$300 for various online and cloud services last month.

• Office 365.
• AWS domain fees.
• Google Workspace.
• Fees for Apple iCloud.

I tally up every line on my credit card each month, and it wasn't a great feeling when I saw the final figure.

It wasn't like this previously. A decade ago, I paid less than a quarter of this amount. So what happened?

The services landscape

Of course, I did sign up for a few more new services in recent years too:

Services like:

• New AI writing tools.
• Descript for podcasts.
• Hosting for www.techstories.co.
• IFTTT for home automation.
• Sync for Obsidian text editor.

(Ok, so maybe more than a few)

That's not the end though, as fees for various services are set to rise further, such as Otter, a voice transcription software.

A matter of changing needs?

While many of the services delivered compelling value to me, others such as Otter fell short. Bugs reported years ago remained and the service was only recently upgraded with new AI features - that I didn't need.

After all, a decade ago, I would have made a one-time purchase such as Dragon NaturallySpeaking and called it a day. These days, I pay monthly, though I'll be lucky if I can get someone respond to me more than once a month.

So what's the cause? Could it be:

• Software development is getting more expensive.
• SaaS a has become a way to sell us software worth many hundreds of dollars, disguised using cheap monthly fees?
• It's not the services, but how we consume them have completely changed.

What do you think, and how much do you spend on your online services?