Lifetime access plans are (mostly) a hoax

I have never trusted the "lifetime access" plans offered by SaaS websites with subscriptions, as I know hosting services costs money and human resources to manage. An email from Pluralsight confirmed this today.

I used to have a set of courses I bought from ACloudGuru back in 2017. I loved ACloudGuru back then as it was a solid source to learn AWS for me.

I didn't follow up with ACloudGuru anymore and I didn't access my courses for 6 years, but it looks like it's owned by Pluralsight who decided to pull the plug on perpetually bought courses.

Do I need these courses? Could be, I may need to refurbish my knowledge if I move to another job, or renew my certificates. Now, I will lose my "lifetime access" courses by end of January 2025.

Lessons learned: - There is no "lifetime" access for online material. The lifespan of these materials are how long the host doesn't decide not to pull the plug. - Anything that is online and you don't have a copy of on your own drive means you don't really own. You just rent it. - NEVER trust lifetime access plans offers you to pay 3-5 times of their annual plan for the hope they will stay longer than the average startup lifespan of 5 years.