I just wanted to say I'm sorry for the backslash you're getting for charging money.

I'm also sorry people expect it to be $1 because the Reddit app was $1 back in 1825. I genuinely believe it's children complaining, because no functioning adult would complain about a price increase when rent has tripled or quadrupled since the $1 Reddit app. It's also annoying to see that people think that saying they bought the Reddit app for $1 and enjoyed it for 10 years is an argument. It goes to show it was severely underpriced.

It must be frustrating to have that type of response. Lemmy users seem to be really entitled when it comes to software, and the response you're getting scares me for the future. I really hope the Boost developer doesn't cancel his app after seeing how entitled Lemmy users are being right now.

What frustrates me more is the people complaining are continuing to use the free open source apps. Like great, you already have an alternative you prefer. Shut up. Stop bringing others down.

I wish you the best. Thank you for choosing to develop for Lemmy. I have my eyes on Boost, but I'm gladly using your free tier for the time being.

Thanks again!

LJ,

I too am a reddit refugee. I like what you've done with this place.

:)

But we have to talk about pricing and privacy.

Pricing: tbh I see not much wrong with the 20 bucks. But I do think that you should take 2 bucks from that and donate one to the lemmy org (this is not reddit, nobody is getting paid, the lemmy devs also need an incentive) and the other one to lemmy.world because that's the instance you're dumping us all on. Hosting is not free, lemmy.world costs money and probably a lot of time to run. Being a reddit admin is a payed job, being Ruud at lemmy.world most certainly is not.

In this way "we" are giving back to the Foss community and it should silence a lot of critics. In that way you don't look like the evil capitalist earning a quick buck over the back of free labour of the foss community. I think that's 2 bucks well spent.

Edit: same goes for ultra subscriptions of course, a similar percentage should be fed back to the lemmy org and lemmy.world.

Privacy: since you're using admob and I forgot the other one, privacy is out the window. That's a big issue for the Foss community we're all relying on. Maybe it's wise to point out that once you pay for sync all that tracking that admob and the other one (not you I hope) does is out the window.

Edit edit: maybe you could also add a yearly reminder to donate to the users favourite lemmy instance.

Yeah man...I am a dev myself but $20 to remove ads is just too much, especially without regional pricing.

Whether the pricing is appropriate is purely subjective. I paid the 20 bucks, thank you for your work. Looking forward to see this app thrive, it already works super smooth!

Hope you do not take the inevitably rude comments to heart.

I'll repeat what I said in some other thread:

I loved the old app, I still love the new app, it’s a pleasure to use compared to the alternatives I’ve tried, and I find the ultra subscription rate both reasonable and worthwhile to support a product I truly enjoy.

Sync is good for me. There’s plenty of other options if it’s not good for you.

Please keep up the good work!

I just want to say thank you for getting Sync up and running on Lemmy. Please don't let the toxic comments sour your day. I for one is really grateful for what you do.

Going to have a stab at regionalising ad free now.

Reply to this with your country and I'll regionalise the pricing there.

I'm seriously impressed with how functional this app is from the start. Like lots of others have said, it felt like coming home given how long I'd used Sync for. Didn't hesitate to pay for the ad free version once that option was added.

I'm all on board with FOSS, but I used sync for reddit for years, ljdawson has my support on Lemmy too. I don't mind supporting a good dev. Do I prefer things be FOSS? Yeah, but I have no issues using a closed source product if it works. And sync has always been top notch. Responsive dev, all around good product.

Check out number 10.

My wishlist:

• Downvote counts
• Mod tools

I was floored when I opened the beta and found that almost all existing features survived the transition. In a single month! You're a monster that makes the rest of us developers look bad 😉

I know that there's an active ongoing discussion about monetization models and I'm certain that there's room for improvement... but at the end of the day you can't make everyone happy. I just wanted you to know that, as a long-time fan, I sincerely appreciate what's been accomplished here. Cheers! Don't forget to take some well-deserved you time once things quiet down a little.

A part from the comments on the images, I think there is a bug with alignment because the first comment has 3 lines instead of one as you can see from this image

The backlash has surprised me a bit. I agree the price is a bit steep but considering the userbase is only a fraction of what Reddit has, it's understandable that the price would be higher.

I just didn't expect such negative reactions to either the ad component or the price. A lot have mentioned that it could become a form of gatekeeping for newcomers. I just hope it won't turn out that way.

Not to wake sleeping dogs or anything, but uh I don't see any ads. Where are those ads supposed to be?

Took me a while to figure out how to sign in with my lemdro.id account.

Maybe it's embarrassing to admit but I must have scanned through that long list of servers five times before realizing I could just type in my own server. Could be helpful to add a line inviting users to type in their own server.

Please don't let the controversy get to you, I love this app mainly because I feel back at home. It makes sense that if someone has never used sync, feels put off by the pricing but I think it makes sense purely because of the smaller userbase and the amount of work that goes into an app like this.

I've used some other open source alternatives and they feel rough compared to sync

Hopping on to the "I feel at home" train! One thing that really bugged me about the alternatives was that they weren't as smooth and fluid. Like I scroll down and it jumps, I scroll up, it jitters etc.

Sync is the UI and the UX I've missed!

I don't have 20 dollars to spend on removing ads for a mobile app. I also previously bought Sync for Reddit Pro. Why is the price so much higher for a client to a service that definitionally doesn't have API charges?

Cool, bumpy start but I support your work, you will be instrumental in growing Lemmy. GDPR issues needs to be fixed pronto as it otherwise won't legally comply in the EU.

I've got a bug fix thread here

Keep it up!

I'll say it again: you are a legend.

$30.30 for ad free in Canada. That's wild. It's not even the exchange rate... that's a markup from the US price.

A really hard buy for me. Not sure I'm going to spend that much.

A nice feature for us new people would be a way to subscribe to a community from the everything feed as opposed to having to click through to the community page.

It's the best app but the pricing is insane. I mean, maybe you have experience from your other apps and you know this is the optimal price, but otherwise, consider changing it. People are surprised by the high price right now.

If it was me, I would price it like this:

• Remove ads - $10 lifetime.

• Ultra - $3 per month, $20 per year, $50 lifetime.

Those sums are realistic and people are likely to find them acceptable. You would get more users instead of less users paying more.

But this is just me and I speak only as someone who never had an app in a appstore. Maybe you know better. But that's what I would do.

A few things I want to say:

1. Congrats for the successful launch! I hope this project continues to improve.
2. The ads aren't very intrusive, they're just banners in-between some posts and I'm fine with that.
3. This app makes using Lemmy more attractive than using Reddit, which means that the goal of moving me far away from Reddit has been accomplished!

Amazing job so far. Here's to the future of decentralized social media!