> I have to admit that I didn't see a recurring subscription pricing model coming at all.
That was extremely obvious from the beginning. They allowed to use the beta for free and never made any promises on licensing model. So, it was obvious that they wanted to force you to pay subscriptions. Actually that was the primary reason for me to avoid getting use to the app.
Someone would pay, sure, but it's cheaper to get Fastmail than to pay that much for GMail client.
I'm not sure I agree that recurring subscription pricing was "extremely obvious from the beginning" from my experience with it over the past three years. To me that's not any more obvious than alternatives like: selling for a one-time purchase, or raising funding to keep it free for now.
It was a solo founder for a long time. I didn't realize he'd hired other people before today... but you gotta pay those engineering salaries somehow, I guess.
But I agree that the new pricing model announced today feels off.
That was extremely obvious from the beginning. They allowed to use the beta for free and never made any promises on licensing model. So, it was obvious that they wanted to force you to pay subscriptions. Actually that was the primary reason for me to avoid getting use to the app.
Someone would pay, sure, but it's cheaper to get Fastmail than to pay that much for GMail client.