I think people want either (a) a subscription that lets them keep the latest version perpetually, or (b) a perpetual license that provides some predictable amount of updates (this could be zero).

What people don't want is to pay for updates that they were led to believe they would get, but that they never got. Or to lose access to software that they paid a lot for, or that they got locked into (even free).

I don't think these are particularly difficult expectations to understand or meet.