Sync Ultra is a very reasonable $17 a YEAR. YouTube Premium is reaching that per MONTH. I have sync downloaded and it was the first thing I did. Thanks lj for the beautiful app.
[EDIT: That was a poor comparison, as pointed out in the comments. Leaving it for discussion sake.
There are many counterpoints and actually good discussion happening down below. Even if you don’t agree, thanks for showing me a different perspective!
If you want to support Sync, make sure to support the Lemmy Devs and your instance holders as well!
*This post was made early in the day before the update added the OTP option.]
First thing I did after opening the app was to look for the Pro (ultra) in-app purchase. But monhtly payments, no thank you.
Yea, I would gladly pay to remove ads. Like I already did for the Sync for Reddit. Twice. But no one likes subscriptions.
Same here. I hate subscriptions but would happily buy a Pro version like I did with Sync for Reddit.
What would you be willing to pay? I paid £4 for Sync in 2018. I can’t imagine a Pro (non-ultra) version would be that cheap this time.
At the minimum I’d think it’d match 1 year of Ultra (£17). Not sure if I’d pay that for Lemmy since I still use Sync for Reddit more.
Realistically, it would need to be higher than 1 year of Ultra, unless it only included some of the perks of Ultra. If it was priced the same for 1 year vs Lifetime, very few users would pay for the yearly sub.
Personally, I’m happy to keep paying the monthly sub to support LJ, if the development stalls or even stops completely, I’ll be stopping my subscription. I’m happy to provide continuous support for apps that I use daily if it means that the development continues.
New update Beta 25 dropped. Ad removal IAP is $12.99 USD.
Edit: increased to $19.99 USD
Edit 2: Ultra lifetime IAP added in Beta 26 for $99.99 USD
I’m seeing 19.99…???
I suspect he may be A/B testing pricing. I could have sworn I saw $12.99 for the Ad Removal IAP earlier, but it’s showing $19.99 now.
Even $12.99 felt high just to remove ads. Especially when compared to previous Sync Pro pricing.
I also suspect there may be some testing of the appetite for higher pricing for early adopters… with the potential to lower pricing later for mass audience appeal.
I think we’re seeing a lot of long-time Sync users (who came from Sync for Reddit), so that audience is probably a bit more amenable to higher pricing to support the developer, but this pricing doesn’t seem competitive with the broader Lemmy community.
I’m really confused why people feel this way. Can’t you just cancel it if you feel like it’s not worth it anymore?
Unless the app offers you cloud functions like email, cloud storage, multi-player gaming, or social media sites(lemmy, kbin, mastodon), etc. I see subscriptions as a no-go.
That’s a very good point. Software as a product should have a different pricing model than software as a service.
Sync does have some cloud features (and I suspect push notifications will be one of them soon), but yeah, I understand paying for them isn’t for everyone.
I usually hate subscriptions that try to squeeze you for money.
In the case of sync, I see it as a recurring donation for LJ. 15 bucks is what I make in like 20 minutes as an engineer myself, so ‘paying’ 20 minutes of my salary to a developer of such an awesome app is no problem for me.
I think Christian with Apollo went with a much better approach where he didn’t put in any ads, but limited the app to only being able to use one account and putting a limit to the filter list. But, you could buy the pro version to remove those limits and he put in subscription options too. If subscription is to be pushed his approach felt like the most tasteful way to go.
I just don’t do subscriptions. One of the aspects I hated about my foray into the Apple app store where everything seemed to be subscription or ads. Quickly missed Android and places like f-droid where I knew I could find ad free and subscription free open source alternatives.
I was happy to pay for apps like Procreate and Lumafusion though, so it’s not that I’m against paying for ads. I just don’t do subscriptions.
I generally do not do subscriptions either, but I do make some exceptions for specific apps/services. At least for me, Sync is one of those for now.
When I think about it I think it’s mainly been web hosting type services where data is being streamed or stored on the cloud that I’ve been fine with subscriptions for. And then not so much for pure software preferring more pay once and then pay for a new version update down the line type of approach like Office 2021 for example over Office 365. Although, I’ve moved mostly to libreoffice.
Same for games. I’d rather pay Diablo 4 $70 over paying for PS+ or game pass. Chose to forgo online multiplayer than pay for PS+ on my PS4 last Gen. Generally preferred a large one time lump sum than small monthly payments for things, since I suppose I just a distaste for adding more monthly expenses to the already growing list of monthly expenses.
Completely fair point.
I gladly pay subscriptions for services. I see that the Ultra has cloud backup of settings, but how much storage could that possibly use? Certainly not $2/mo worth. For that price I’ll want the equivalent of 100Gb of storage in the cloud.
edit: I’d send $2/mo. to the admins of my instance. They’re running the servers that host all this content.
Good point, I didn’t think about it when I wrote my comment, but I agree that there’s a difference between paying for a software product and paying for a software service.