Nobody's slamming you personally, it's just sign of frustration as it's one of the most commonly asked questions and most of us love MC so much we gladly pay the upgrade fees which are minimal, (usually around 10 bucks from the previous version). And if 10 or 20 bucks is too much to part with, then, with all due respect, MC isn't for you.
If you upgrade to a beta version(free), as far as I can remember, you don't have to pay anything to keep what you have when that version is "officially" released. And then there's all the free updates as MC is continuously being tweeked. And the support here is second to none.
As has been said MC is a commercial product not freeware. MC is like a piece of high end audio/video equipment - you can't walk in the store with last year's receiver and expect to get the latest one for free, it ain't gonna happen.
And lastly, nobody's forcing anybody to upgrade everytime a new version is released, I and many others are still happily using 9.0, 9.1 and even MJ 8. I, personally will finally upgrade when version 11 is released as it will be substancially different from anything before it.
Buy it. Relax. Enjoy the music.
PS: JRiver: BTW is MC 11 fianally going to be released with that long-promised beer dispensing button?