a subscription to a service X is O(n), where n is for how long you keep that service.

instead purchasing the content provided by X individually, is O(m), where m is how much content you buy.

if in one subscription term, you would spend more purchasing individual content than one subscription fee to X, it is financially more efficient to use X.

however, this assumes you will only consume a piece of content once, and dont care about having a physical/true copy of it.

a O(1) scenario would be like a lifetime subscription to X.

ps: i am fully on the side of owning media, and i have no idea if this comment is actually true, it just sounds smart :-)