this post was submitted on 02 Aug 2023
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I installed Sync to try it out, and noticed the subscription model for no ads, and for basic features like push notifications and exporting a list of your subscribed communities. $2/month or $100 for a "lifetime" subscription. Immediately uninstalled it, yes it has a beautiful interface but I've never been fond of subscription-based apps, especially for FOSS services. A low one-time fee would be acceptable to me, like the $4 fee for Toot! for Mastodon.
The silly thing to me about the subscription is, they say it's to "cover the monthly running costs". What running costs do they incur if Lemmy is free and open? I'm genuinely curious, if anyone knows please tell me.
My best guess would be the development cost. I guess they created the app as a business, not for/by the community.
I don't blame them, but I also won't support them. I'll just keep supporting lemmy/jerboa instead. I don't have absolutely anything against sync, but I generally don't like supporting that business model and trust open source a little more.
I didn't know sync was that expensive though lol
FYI There's a 22€ (prolly 20$) lifetime purchase for "pro" which will cover most nice features as well.
$20 fee is specifically to remove ads, pro is a subscription or $100 fee
Sync for Reddit had a low one time cost. But it was worth more to me than the few coffees I spent on it. I think the developer knew this, and upped the price to something reasonable. I was happy to pay, even though I already use AdAway. I'm a FOSS developer too, but there is good reason for an app being closed source (sole proprietorship and jury) and paid.
Also, my time is expensive. There's no reason the dev of Sync shouldn't also be paid.
Same, i bought Sync Pro 10 years ago for something like $3 and used it daily for 10 years, thousands of hours. I was waiting for Sync for Lemmy and bought it too.
A few points to make and answer:
The app is technically free, but yes it is made by a single dev and it is/was his income, so it's ad-supported.
The development is still ongoing and so some things aren't finalized, but there is a one time payment option that will be available (something like $10) to just remove ads.
The Ultra tier which has the subscription cost (and much higher one time cost at $99) is what incurs monthly fees in this case, mostly for cloud storage for things like settings and I believe an OCR and translation API.
Ultimately, use whatever makes you happy and aligns with your principles, but there are at least a few good reasons why it is how it is.
I'm of the same state of mind: it's a superb interface, but I won't give money to an app developer to remove ads from a service that does not display ads inherently.
I have no problem with folks using Sync, web app, Liftoff, whatever. This should not be divisive.
The dev asked their most ravenous fans about what they would consider acceptable to pay, and to much surprise they said sky’s the limit (while also paying for monthly subs and the dev’s patreon). And here we are.
Bold of them to assume they'll even still be maintaining this app in 4.16 years
It's been great for the past 10 years.