I’m fairly new and don’t 100% understand it yet, but instances are run on servers that require money. Are we heading towards seeing ads or subscriptions to raise funds instead of relying on donations to cover overhead?
Especially with the influx of new users. Hardware upgrades are needed.
Oh, I guess I’ve never noticed lol. Does Gmail have ads?
Yup! But they put them in the promotions tab so they kinda blend in with promotional emails and they’re presented very natively. The only way you can tell the difference is a little ad symbol.
They can’t over exploit their users because users have choice. Back when Gmail first came out there was a rush between companies to provide the most storage and features and that’s because email being an open standard inherently encourages competition!
The Android app does, at least in some sections (“Social”, f.e.)