Technology

I wouldn't mind paying for most worthwhile services, actually I already pay for VPN, email, etc, but the fact is that the old adage "if it's free, you're the product" is no longer true. Even services you pay for collect and sell an impressive amount of data. I wouldn't mind paying for social media, but then I would also expect a zero collection policy on any metrics that pertains to my account or interactions with it.

The biggest, obvious one to me is news. Say what you will about mainstream media but some great investigative journalism still happens, and these companies are in an awkward position where no one wants to pay and everyone uses adblockers.

When I'm not living paycheck to paycheck I want to support Standard Ebooks (they're doing a great job of showing how to make ebooks that don't suck, check out their style guide) and maybe Neocities.

The more I think about how Medium works, the more I think it makes sense? While they could have done the typical thing where the people hosting content there pay for their share of the servers, by doing it in reverse the individual monthly cost can be lower (casting a wider net) and the people writing for them can actually get paid a bit for doing so.

I'm thinking about throwing some money at Obsidian, too, since I practically live in that app.

I pay for ProtonMail

I am yet to write an essay where I'd argue how it ad-funded internet is responsible for so many problems in our society, including the increased polarization and radicalization, the destruction of civil debate and the complete dehumanization of society.

Business models that depend only on monetizing eyeballs do not care about the individuals. They care only about the masses, the tribes, the identity groups and demographics. On the other hand, businesses that makes a living out of receiving a monthly payment from their customers need to care enough about their customers to the point where they can not lose them to a competitor.

I believe so much so in this, this is exactly why I've started Communick. Like you, I've always wondered why people are okay with paying $10 for some extra power up on Mario Kart, but would balk at the idea of paying $10/year for a social media service that is based on open protocols and does not put in a walled garden.

I actually started giving my home Mastodon instance 8 bucks a month as a little "thank you" for hosting and maintaining it, because I think they're doing a solid job at keeping the place wholesome and curbstomping less wholesome instances, and keeping it up and running.

Also, I pay the subscription for Home Assistant/Nabu Casa, because I think it's worth for having a locally-hosted home automation platform that is completely independant from any cloud provider, but can make use of cloud features if need be. Yes, I could set up my own SSL certificate for the instance, and set up the connection to Google Home manually, and run a completely local TTS (which I actually have as a backup in case the connection drops), but there, I pay for the convenience on top of supporting the developers a little bit.

And before I switched to Jellyfin, I was happily using Plex and paid for the Plex Pass.

I pay for:

• eMail, Cloud storage, VPN (Proton)
• Search (Kagi)
• Anything that takes away advertisements if I do. I loathe ads.

no. I will steal everything

I recently purchased an expensive samsung tv. There is no way to disable advertisements or data tracking... They're selling you an pricey piece of hardware and want to sell your data - double dipping at its finest.

(My solution has been not to agree to their tos, which means i can't use any of the apps on it. I just plug in a roku and use the tv as a monitor. Also looking at adblock/pihole once i get a proper firewall back up)

before the whole "everything is free on the internet" you had to run your own server, know someone or pay a huge bill for special network services.

it was VC money being thrown at people for 20+ years trying to make them think the place was just "supposed" to be free and funded entirely by spam. It does not work, this is not PBS this is communication, and each user has to make a certain amount of input to keep it operational.

What you are seeing is the internet returned to its intended designs and interactions. We aren't supposed to be tied to providers, only protocols.

I don't like subscriptions at all because I'm very conscious that one day I may not be able to afford to subscribe and I'll lose access / data etc. So I will simply not use apps that require an ongoing subscription where my data is difficult to move. If they allow me to buy a lifetime license, I'm in.

I am happy to donate or make a monthly payment, knowing that if I stop I can still access it. So Obsidian works for me - I donate but the data is local and mine so if anything happens it's still there. Archive.org I donate too - if I don't pay I can still use it.

The other consideration I have is where is my data and what are they doing with it. For example, I host my email with Fastmail. It's a yearly subscription but the data is mine and I can move it where I want and I trust the company credentials on not mining my data.

I wouldn't pay Reddit or Facebook. Whatever you pay they're still horrendous corporations that you are the product for.

I will easily pay $2 or $3 a month for something I use. The more I use it and it makes my life easier, the more I'll pay. $2 is a no brainer to pay. More takes consideration.

I absolutely agree. Hell, I would pay some companies to not show up to me anymore.

I think it depends on the company.

If you think about paying big ones to have an ads-free experience, you have to keep in mind they still track you and sell metrics for ad targeting, that is they sell "your data" even if they don't show you ads, why should I pay them if they don't pay me for my data?

Different matter IMO if we talk about smaller companies (or small developers) that are still focused on providing a good service or app, I pay for protonmail for example, in some cases, paying a little bit might make a big difference to those developing.

Even more different if we talk about supporting opensource projects, that can't be even considered "paying", it's donations to make it so those projects can go on since they're not "monetized" in any way.

Yet I often tend to think way too long on even smaller digital expenses, like an app for €2, but I will happily pay €10 for a coffee and a croissant at a train station like it is nothing.

I think about this a lot too. I spend $10 on a drink that's gone in a half hour, and I'll never remember having months from now, but spend lots of time questioning whether it's worth it to pay for apps I use daily.

I regularly pay for a VPN, cloud storage, and music/video streaming. I find myself most willing to pay extra for no ads on streaming services I use a lot, even if I only pay for a month here or there (YouTube, Peacock, Hulu). I used to pay for Proton (VPN, Email, Cloud Storage, and Calendar) before iCloud implemented E2EE. Sometimes I'll pay for news.

I find a lot of the apps I use I wouldn't benefit from paying for extra features for, and if I would benefit from them, I wouldn't have enough free time to use it to justify paying for it. A lot of my needs are covered by the free and/or stock apps.

I would pay a reasonable amount to use Reddit if their true issue is not being profitable enough. If they lowered the API access fees to a reasonable figure, I would pay for a third party app. I would also pay for Reddit itself if it continued to allow third party access to the API like they have been. Maybe I'm in the minority, but if the argument is "if it's free, then you're the product" then I would, as dystopian as it sounds, pay for Reddit.

I pay for Proton Unlimited (Email+vpn; ongoing), a couple of Android apps (once) and that's it. The thing you said about spending 2$ on an app vs 10$ at the coffee stand is very relatable.

I think the important thing is that our services should not REQUIRE you to pay monthly. Some people can afford to maintain these things but many cannot. A paywalled service is less useful for everyone, including those who can afford it.