That's poor evidence, considering some of the first movers to this new model were people who ensured their services were going to be used irrespective of what their pricing model was, and then everyone else following without providing an alternative. Where's a consumer to go?

Well that's no evidence. That's just the market adjusting to aim for the higher margin model.

Doesn't mean this is what users prefer – it just means this is what the companies behind the apps (and thus making the $) prefer.

If companies just increased their prices that would mean higher margins as well.

Companies move to subscriptions because it’s more lucrative to them, not because customers prefer it.

What else could prefer mean in this case other than that people are willing to pay more money when it’s a subscription?

Of course people rather pay $10 x 1 than $10 x some number greater than 1. They rather pay $10x1 than $100x1 as well. All else being equal people prefer to pay less for things.

When more are willing to pay $10x20 than $100x1 I don’t know what you’d call that other than expressing a preference.