It's not paying by the hour that was the problem, it was the huge capex and million dollar service contracts that made people want freedom. In that sense, cloud is the opposite of mainframe: instead of, "Here, spend a million dollars and get locked into a service contract," it's, "Here, spend $0 up front and just pay for usage, then leave whenever you want."
>Those who continue to do significant work offline will become the exception; meaning they will be an electoral minority. With so much effort being put into web apps, they may even be seen as eccentrics; meaning there may not be much sympathy for their needs in the halls of power<p>Already happened, unfortunately. Google's ecosystem, is tuned to constantly nudge you towards the cloud. My pet peeve is their "discontinuing" of Picasa (offline photo manager/editor/viewer) and removing the download links from their websites, and peddling Google Photos (cloud service) as a "replacement". It also takes mental effort to prevent photos from going to the cloud when you get a new phone.
> This is why “free” and open source software (FOSS) will not help us. A software license touches on the software, not on the human relationships which the software mediates. It is those relationships that lock us into positions where Zuckerberg's foot is on our necks.<p>I have never heard such a succinct reason why Stallman's crusade against proprietary software will not work. I will remember this.