by David Redmond

If something you purchased and relied on suddenly became a subscription service, what would you do?

Many readers of Tech On Tap will have heard of, or may even have purchased the Voice Dream Reader app. Voice Dream has been a popular tool for those with sight loss for years, but now it’s under new ownership. Applause Group, who now own the app originally developed by Winston Chen clearly want to up revenue after their purchase, but the way in which they planned to do it spectacularly backfired.

The Voice Dream Reader app has been in the news in the past few days following a now-reversed decision from the app’s new owners to turn the app into a subscription service.

Many users had already paid for the app, but those users were going to be forced to purchase a new subscription for the app if they wanted to keep using it.

In a message to existing customers shared last week, the new owners of Voice Dream said “This subscription includes the Mac app, all the voices, and much more. You will always have access to existing documents, but the subscription will be required to upload new ones.”

This resulted in major backlash from the app’s users, which resulted in a reversal of the decision on Saturday. The company said:
“We will continue to provide access to the app’s existing features at no additional cost.
As we continue developing Voice Dream, some new features may be offered as part of a subscription, but the current capabilities will remain free to those who have already purchased Voice Dream.
For those who have already moved to a subscription, it’s no longer necessary to continue using the app. You may cancel your subscription, but we welcome you to keep it active to support ongoing development.”

It’s good to see that the new owners listened to the feedback, and hopefully, they won’t try introducing a subscription in this way again any time soon.

It does, however, raise lots of interesting questions, not least those which I shared at the beginning of this article. What do you do if a tool you rely on and potentially already paid for goes down the subscription route? It’s Voice Dream on this occasion, but who is next?

Aira was on our Talking Technology podcast this week discussing their totally free access AI feature. The catch though is they are relying on technology from Open AI and Google, so Aira’s Access AI remaining free is dependent on other companies not raising their API prices.

Voice Dream might have made the right call this time, but I’m confident we’ll see this story again.

Companies need to respect consumers, and taking away something a user already purchased is definitely a bit rich, but right now there’s a lot of technology like Be My AI available for free, and I’d be nervous that the bubble will burst.

Conclusion
I was one of the customers who purchased Voice Dream from its original owner. I’ve even still got the long-discontinued Voice Dream Mail. I might have dodged a subscription this time, but I definitely expect to hear this tale again soon. Let’s just hope companies who provide assistive tech show their customers some respect, as that honestly does make a big difference.