I think what happened is the term "rent seeking" entered the zeitgeist, and a lot of people didn't bother to look it up but rather just tried to infer the meaning through context, and arrived at "somebody who rents things out" which can easily morph into "the software company that makes you have a subscription rather than just purchase it" or something like that.
People come by it honestly as for most people that's how they learn the words, and certainly the vast majority of human history language and meaning has been transmitted that way.
I think what happened is the term "rent seeking" entered the zeitgeist, and a lot of people didn't bother to look it up but rather just tried to infer the meaning through context, and arrived at "somebody who rents things out" which can easily morph into "the software company that makes you have a subscription rather than just purchase it" or something like that.
People come by it honestly as for most people that's how they learn the words, and certainly the vast majority of human history language and meaning has been transmitted that way.