Unfortunately users don't pay the bills - customers do.
For VC funded startups, the VC is the customer. Thus the company optimizes for customer satisfaction, not user satisfaction.
The cognitive dissonance necessary for users to believe they are customers, while at the same time believing the product should be free (or free adjacent) is impressive.
Clearly once customers no longer fund the company, the company closes. And the free users will complain.
Paying for a product does not guarantee it will survive. But not paying pretty much guarantees that the good times can't last forever. (Rejoice if you see ads, then at least you're being monetized.)
Damn that hit hard
https://threatpost.com/spear-phishing-exploits-glitch-steal-...
https://www.netskope.com/blog/glitch-hosted-phishing-uses-te...
Apparently the free ephemeral apps were (1) free, (2) easy to make and easy to make many of, and (3) hosted on infrastructure that targets tended to trust.