The problem is all of those products are targeted towards western markets, including Write.as. I think going forward price localization should be considered as part of the federated business model. Because let me tell you what it feels like to pay for each of those services as an university student from a developing country:
- Write.as Pro subscription normally costs 60$ per year(Less with student discount), which equals to about 400 units in my local currency,
- Commento also costs 60$ per year at minmum, which again equals to about 400 units
- [Put some other service with similar pricing here]
Now let me ask you, would you pay 800$ for just two of those services each year? Because unit-wise our income amounts are similar. But due to inflation and other economic circumstances the expense ratio is enormous. (Yes, I could also setup WriteFreely on a cheap AWS but that defeats the whole purpose and also doesn’t really solve the issue. What about those who are not power-users?)
So what does a poor fella like me do? He naturally goes and uses services like Disqus which steals and sells the users’ data without their consent. And their monoculture keeps getting stronger because they are able to attract many customers like me.
GOG.com has a lovely DRM-free business model. But guess what? Everytime I wanted to buy a game from them I have used an IP proxy from Russia to deceive their system and get saner prices in return. Steam doesn’t have that issue, Steam localizes majority of their product prices. But Steam also has DRM and the final say on the matter if you really own a game or not. And that’s why it keeps winning.
I know that there ain’t no such thing as a free lunch. But there could be one such as fair lunch. If privacy-friendly, decentralized services to be gained momentum, they are going to need global support. Privacy shouldn’t be a luxury or only a thing that western people could afford.
So please @matt, @cjeller1592 when you keep working on your next project such as the Remark.as, please keep the users like me in mind. I really love your work, I really want to support it but I also ask for a fair chance.
Going forward, maybe this should be one of the main topics. Money is not everything but it is also important. So we should ask ourselves how can we find the middle ground where it doesn’t put the strain on the service provider or the user in particular.
The current providing a basic service while allowing to pay for extra services model is unfortunately not fair either. Because while one can use the basic service because they wish to do so, the other has to use it because they can’t afford any better.