Depends on what you mean by "rent seeking."

Liberal economists use this term the most, they usually mean large companies trying to get goodies from the state. Lefty ones tend to mean something like "profiteering."

X-as-a-service businesses models aren't exactly new in intellectual property. The patent/copyright systems explicitly assume licensing and royalties. But, I agree that subscriptions are pretty new in consumer-land.

But we need a different term rent seeking already has competing usages.