So I pay one time for the software or is it an anuual subscription?
Your purchase of Winstep Xtreme entitles you to 1 full year of free updates and any new product additions to the Winstep Xtreme suite released durint that period (as it happened recently with the brand new Winstep Start Menu Organizer Pro).
Any updates you download during that year are yours to keep FOREVER. Once that year elapses, when you see a new version that you like enough, you can purchase it for only $19.95, which is a fraction of the original $39.90 purchase price. This purchase in turn will entitle you to another year of free updates and so on...
Note that this is not exactly a subscription as there is NO PENALTY whatsoever for letting your 1 year of free updates elapse. You can spend 5 years without upgrading, and, when you finally decide to, you still pay only $19.95 for the new version and another year of FREE upgrades.