Are you going to tell me the dead people are at fault for not taking advantage of services provided?
The point here is the relationship between (business) provider and consumer. It should be fair and balanced. No one is asking a business to provide services for nothing. But when the services aren't being used, the non-consumer shouldn't be charged either.
The only question remaining is - what is a fair way to go about this?
A reasonable time period of non-use before suspension of service seems ok. The business got money for nothing - but can't try to make that into a business plan.
Clearly businesses would rather have more "money for nothing" - so would everyone - but it isn't reasonable.
I also think there are systemic reasons to stop it. If you're running, say, a good streaming service, imagine a competitor coming along that makes a lot of use of dark patterns to get people to sign up and keep paying even though the value is much lower than your service. Now you have a choice: try to compete against a better-funded competitor or go for the same dirty money yourself?
As a society, we want companies to devote their capital and brainpower to making things better for customers that can freely choose the best products. And that's what most company founders want too, so that markets are competitive in fair ways and they can focus on the products that got them excited enough to start a company. So I think it's in the interests of everybody except the parasitically inclined to just rule out exploitative business models.
On some level yes. But recently banks here in Australia were busted for charging dead people.
https://www.afr.com/companies/financial-services/apra-punish...
Are you going to tell me the dead people are at fault for not taking advantage of services provided?
The point here is the relationship between (business) provider and consumer. It should be fair and balanced. No one is asking a business to provide services for nothing. But when the services aren't being used, the non-consumer shouldn't be charged either.
The only question remaining is - what is a fair way to go about this?
A reasonable time period of non-use before suspension of service seems ok. The business got money for nothing - but can't try to make that into a business plan.
Clearly businesses would rather have more "money for nothing" - so would everyone - but it isn't reasonable.