I want to install a component on all computers so that whenever someone writes "just saying" it opens a hatch and punches them in the privates.
And if they also say anything equivalent to "you're not allowed to complain because it's free" or "the adverts are the price you pay" or similar then it also slaps them round the face.
I don't entirely subscribe to that notion, and free things can certainly be shit but the adverts are the price you pay and honestly, if you dislike it so much just stop using it.
I don't particularly enjoy the Facebook experience, but it's free and mostly works.
Yeah paying a sub isn't a good model either. They're both kinda old-media models shoehorned into the web where they don't really fit.
Donation models are cool, so long as you've got a userbase who (enough of whom at least) will pay. And so long as you let people who don't donate see everything (otherwise it's just subs under a different name).
The crop of free-to-play games of late are kinda interesting (the ones that are genuinely free-to-play, that is, rather than pay-to-win). Making your service free but selling vanity/convenience items. Although applying that to a website takes us into Delphi territory.
Someone with more clevers than me once said, "go ahead and use this service for free, it doesn't really cost me much if you do, and I'm happy to help people when I can."
It was me. Multiple times.
And no doubt plenty of other people too.
Not everyone on earth is a money-hungry selfish twat.
Firstly there's something which may provide a valuable service but isn't easy to put a financial value on.
Secondly you could run it as an old-fashioned 'business'. i.e. you make enough to live on and reinvest the rest into the service. Operating more like a tradesman than a businessman. Simply providing a service and getting recompensed for doing so. Not looking to make profit.
Also I think we have to realise that the little sites help the big sites. The greater the diversity and usefulness of the web, the more potential 'paying' customers the big sites have. So while something may not have a direct financial payoff for the people who run the site (or whatever), it all contributes to a healthier and more prosperous internet overall.
Operating more like a tradesman than a businessman.
There's someone who hasn't paid a plumber recently ;)
Seriously though, I don't disagree with you but I think in your eyes I'm probably a dirty capitalist so we're unlikely to reconcile our views. As far as I'm concerned I get a fairly solid stable service completely free, knowing that the whole thing costs staggering amounts of money to keep going.
They have to break even if they're running it as a traditional business, yeah. But that's not the only way. Cannonical (the company behind) Ubuntu is a good example. Founded by a millionaire as a loss-making venture to create and distribute a usable desktop linux distro (partly) so that people in developing countries are on a more level playing field with the rest of the world. Something was put before money.
Wikipedia is another example. Someone just wanted to create a free, crowd sourced, encyclopaedia and... did it. Making enough money to keep it running was a secondary concern and it exists on donations. But the important/interesting thing is that you have tens of millions of articles created by people donating their labour for free.
You are indeed a dirty capitalist. If I was king of the world I'd just make profit illegal. You can pay yourself what you want, you can reinvest what you want, but any liquid assets you or your business have in the bank at the end of each year get taken into my treasury to spend as I see fit :Y
But should these things really be run at a loss? When looking at Cannonical I like that it is free and there's no visible ads or any sort of knowing outlay of any sort, but surely most FOSS stuff is purely from the good of peoples hearts.
Life unfortunately runs on money and not good intentions.