I had not used Sync for Reddit as I was a Boost user but now that I've installed Sync for Lemmy I'm enjoying it. It's very polished, smooth and easy to use. I think it will great once it's feature complete.
In a way you have a headstart over the other new apps and it shows. I'm sure rewriting the back end is not fun but at least your already had the UI.
I think the pricing model is fair. Free with ads for those who want to try it, one time fee for those who don't like subs, and a low cost sub for power users.
Send like most people have an issue with €20. Perhaps they were expecting €10 but that's less than €1 per month in just the first year, nevermind all future updates. €20 seems fair for a lifetime unlock.
I think the pricing is fair too. I'm just doing some quick math.
24k users on day one
if they all paid 16$ for a year that would be $384k a year
if just 1% of that user base buys sync for a year that's 38k a year ($3200 before any taxes or other costs)
potential donations to lemmy (2 of the $16 dollars) cuts down to $2800 a month
cost for infrastructure to run the app is unknown but it comes out of that $2800 for the app subscribers.
In this 1% case, that is not a lot of money.
With an app of this calibur, if there are more subscribers we would see rapid growth as it's still in its early days an needs more subscribers. Apps stagnate when they hit their growth limit.
I think you'll get the most on your return on investment if you choose to pay. SYNC is a great app and I will gladly pay for continued development.
Note: I also do think that ads are imorral. If sync made enough off subscribers to provide an experience without ads to free users I think it should be considered.
I was lurking in the comments here to see if other Boost users are going to Sync since we don't have Boost for Lemmy yet. I'm going to wait and see what happens before I support one of them with my wallet, but so far Sync is clean and intuitive.