• Izzy@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    11
    arrow-down
    7
    ·
    1 year ago

    I think you are missing the problem here. Paying for a good product or extra features is one thing. Paying to remove the ads that you added in the first place is another. Lemmy is funded entirely by donations and doesn’t have any ads.

    It’s a pretty bad look that is fundamentally against the goals of Lemmy as ad free an open platform with a free API. Otherwise we are going to go down the same rabbit hole again and again like what happened with Reddit.

    • zik@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      12
      arrow-down
      3
      ·
      1 year ago

      The ads/subscription support the developer, who works on this as his full time job. This means we get a better app.

      • Izzy@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        5
        arrow-down
        10
        ·
        1 year ago

        So you are ok with ads and paid subscriptions to remove them, but you aren’t ok with Reddit charging for access to its API? How do you reconcile the contradiction here? Reddit developers have to eat too. They are just a business trying to make money. What if Lemmy instances started charging for its API and priced out third party apps then added ads/subscription to their own app? All just part of the cycle?

        • ahal@lemmy.ca
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          4
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          1 year ago

          There’s no contradiction. It’s just a free market. Reddit charged an absurd amount for their API and offered an inferior product as the only alternative. So people left.

          If a Lemmy instance wants to charge for access or serve ads, that’s fine too. But they better have some competitive advantage or people will leave for an instance that doesn’t do that.

          Another difference between Reddit and Sync is the scale. I support my local coffee shop over Starbucks for the same reason.

          Funny how no one expects a coffee shop to run on donations.

        • zik@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          3
          ·
          edit-2
          1 year ago

          I’m fine with paying for a service I like and I did subscribe to reddit for many years. But even though I was a subscriber they cut off access to my apps. So screw them.

          I understand that nothing’s free so I plan to donate to lemmy.world to help them with their costs.

    • ahal@lemmy.ca
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      8
      arrow-down
      2
      ·
      1 year ago

      I’m getting tired of people telling me what Lemmy is supposed to be about.

      Every individual instance has their own goals that are completely independent from the core Lemmy project. If the creators of Lemmy don’t like that they shouldn’t have made it open source.