1y ago

It was 15 euros earlier today, what happened?

245 comments

As much fun as Sync is (and while I appreciate creators want to get paid)...
We're talking like $15-30(!). That's steep for a phone app. All this money stuff is pushing me back to Connect and Jerboa.
I wish Sync well. But I think I'm done with it already.
- Voyager is fantastic IMO. wefwef.app , it is a web app, it will even put am icon for itself on your phone so it feels just like a regular app. Works really great, and is really fast.
  
  Voyager is also available at m.lemmy.world since I see you are using lemmy.world
  
  It's also available in the Android Play Store and will be on the iOS App Store soon.
- Connect and Jerboa
  Try Liftoff and Thunder, I find them vastly superior; they are FOSS and available for both Android and iOS.
  
  While liftoff was the only third party I liked, I still think it was pretty unimpressive. It ran ok and that's about it. Features were lacking, aesthetics are bad, some glitches. For me the $20 or whatever it is for sync is worth it. I've used reddit since 2012 and browsed exclusively on my phone, swapping between relay and sync. If you average that cost out, even considering the $5 or whatever it was to get rid of ads on Reddit, it's basically nothing. The usage tracking is pretty shitty though.
  EDIT: Ok I just saw the lifetime price for ultra, damn wtf lol. Again, averaging that cost over the ten years I've used the app means it's still a good deal but fuck upfront that's a lot lmao
  
  They are okay and did the job until Sync came out. But are no way near as polished as Sync, which has years of updates and development.
- Ditto. I used to be a big Sync fan and used it for years as my primary mobile client for Reddit until 8-10 months or so ago when the dev did a 'fuck off and be unable to be contacted while something in the app breaks' break, which led to a bunch of ads appearing despite paying for no ads (and according to people on the subreddit at the time it was not a one time occurrence lol). I switched that day to Boost and didn't go back, but I was looking forward to trying out Sync for Lemmy when it released.
  All the privacy and pricing concerns the last 24 hours have brought forth does not make me wanna even touch the app lol. I'm not paying that much money to fucking browse a glorified forum on my phone (specially when there's many other options).
- Yes.
  There are a lot of other apps for Lemmy. Some are not as polished as Sync -- but some are. And none (that I know of, on Android) are ad supported. Most are open source and 100% free.
  This is a money grab. People were so excited for Sync that they don't want to call it a money grab. But that's what it is.
  
  🙄 it's a small dev, who got shut out of the previous customer base they'd built up, and now has to rebuild with fewer customers (and fewer potential customers at least short term).
  If your job lost 70% of its customers, I bet you'd be begging your boss to raise prices to avoid a 70% pay cut.
  It's not a money grab. It drives me crazy how much stuff people say is a "money grab", "theft", "a scam", "predatory", etc. Asking for money isn't malicious, neither is asking for more money than you personally think is reasonable/makes sense for your finances, and neither is offering a freemium ad supported app (which is better than nothing if you're not willing to pay with money).
  Edit: and sorry if that sounds overly aggressive, but you definitely struck a nerve/peeve as of late. It just seems like everyone wants to be as dramatic as possible lately.
- Given how much time I spent on Sync with Reddit, I imagine the ultra one-time price ($99) will end up being a dollar per hour in a few months and just go down from there.
  A dollar per hour for entertainment is generally a good deal to me.
- I agree. While $20 could still be seen as reasonable - even though making it one of the more expensive apps, thigh I'm willing to go for it if Sync continues development -, the asking price of $100 for the lifetime ultra is insane. I'm not aware of any other app that is this expensive. Of course, you could argue there's subscription apps out there that don't even have a lifetime model - e.g. Adobe, Microsoft Office -, But these provide considerably more value as well and are huge corporations.
  My feeling is - and I don't have facts to prove it - that the developers of the large reddit apps (esp. Apollo) simply became used to the money making machine and want to squeeze as much as possible out of it.
  While in the end it is entirely up to them, as there's open source and free alternatives out there, I'm not too fond of this behavior.
- I think that asking to be paid for your work is totally fine (albeit I myself made my lemmy app completely free and opensource, simply because its just my hobby project), but its a rather different story when you provide app for open source, nonprofit venture-free platform and start to inject ads and trackers into it. Its goes against the entire idea of free decentralised platform and makes it closer to profit-focused app like reddit/threads/etc imo

I would pay extra to not have to hear people complain about a choice no one is forcing them to make
Do what works for you, and let other people do the same
- Block this subreddit for a while I guess, check in after a month.
  
  this subreddit
  TRIGGERED
- It would be a lot better if it was a true donation, since Lemmy itself doesn't have ads. The developer also has very minimal fees to cover, so it makes no sense to add ads ontop of a free service and have a steep price to remove it (yes, 20+ dollars for an app toconly remove ads is steep, look around at other app prices). This was not the case for Sync on Reddit, it was a lot cheaper.
  It just seems unnecessarily greedy by the developer
  
  Hey, man's gotta eat. And there's many roads to Rome if you really don't want to pay the developer to remove the ads.
  
  Then don't use sync
  
  It's more expensive than the upgrade was for Reddit, but it's a smaller market and you pay more for a niche product. I don't have a problem with him getting paid for a good product.
  
  I would like to point out that @ljdawson@lemmy.world has been very forward to the LW team and he has our full support. And while Lemmy itself doesn't have ads and Lemmy World is running on donations and volunteers that doesn't mean that every developer should be forced to do charity-work. This is his full-time job and he provided plenty of choices for those who don't want to pay or who don't want to pay the full price for Ultra. If that's not enough, nobody is forcing you to do anything.
  
  people seem to forget that the dev wants to work FULL TIME on the app, you are paying for having great updates quick bug fixes etc.
- No kidding. Bunch of crybabies
- It doesn't feels like a choice in the modern world. It is either awful experience with shit ads or normal experience with paying. Is it that hard to understand people?

This post lead to me to send 20 USD to the Jerboa/Lemmy devs.
- Happy to hear that, these devs need to eat too right
  
  They need to earn more than the dev of sync who don't split the revenue with the Lemmy dev and the instances. The split of the revenues is fair for everyone. Lemmy devs, instances and Sync dev receive something for their work.
  He is literally making money on the back of the people donating. Without these donator his business doesn't make any sense and wouldn't exist.
- Based
- I hope the dev donates a fair share...
  "Adding" ads to a FOSS service is pretty sinister especially if it only cost $3.99/year to remove them from the Sync for Reddit app.
  Lemmy could use some white hat bug hunters to find security vulnerabilities before malicious actors do, like Mozilla helping patch Mastodon’s TootRoot.
  
  No one is adding ads to Lemmy. Sync only puts ads in itself. It's pedantic but it's important to get it right.
  
  Reddit had considerably more users when Sync was created- so smaller amount per person over larger user base would pay for the bill.
  With Lemmy, user base isn’t there yet to create that same economies of scale - so to pay for the dev’s time - each person would need to pay a larger amount.

Greed.
I signed up for a year of Ultra yesterday, more as a show of support. I'm already regretting it after seeing how many tiers of pricing are now being shoved out.
I get the dev has to eat, but this is completely going against everything Lemmy is supposed to be about, while costing significantly more than its Reddit counterpart.
While not necessary, it would have been nice if there was a small discount for Ultra subscribers of Sync for Reddit. I got just over 1 year of usage out of my 'lifetime' purchase. A gesture, even a small one, would have been nice.
I've just been soured over this whole thing, tbh.
- I added the new price tiers based on user feedback on here after launching.
  
  I appreciate that, but your pricing is still still disproportionately high, especially when compared to the number of fantastic free alternatives out there.
  I love your app, and I've supported you as a Pro and Ultra member on Sync for Reddit as well, but I really think you should reconsider the current subscription pricing and lifetime purchases for Ultra options. As far as I'm aware, Sync is also one of the only major Lemmy apps that has introduced ads/pay to remove ads option. You've brought subscriptions and money into a platform that is now home to an exodus of users that hated how those things were slowly destroying Reddit. It just doesn't sit right with me.
  I've signed up for a year out of a show as support for you. The best thing you could do is show your long-term support for this platform by encouraging growth and fair options for users rather than creating multi-tiered pay walls with questionably high prices.
  
  I put in for a yearly ultra subscription and I'd do it again. Not everybody here is a FOSS crusader or hanging around on /c/piracy. Some of us are just Reddit refugees that want our Sync back because it was awesome.
  Hell, just add a built in pirate mode for these people that removes ads for free. I bet most of us would gladly pay anyway, and it will hopefully put an end to all the sobbing
  
  Maybe you should consider further regional prices. Here in Argentina it is U$S 20. I really want to support the app, but it is quite steep given our conversion rate and average income...
  
  I paid for ad removal, considering lifetime ultra but this price is very steep. I have no idea if Lemmy is even around a few years from now. Could you confirm or deny that this price for ultra is here to stay?
  Also, would it be possible to get a discount on ultra lifetime later if you already bought ad removal?
  
  It's more like blackmail tbh. "Pay or i'll track the shit out of you and sell the data to advertisers". I can see why people are put off, and I am also. And what's the guarantee if we pay that the data isn't collected and sold anyway?
- Why are you getting mad? The economy of scale is simply not there yet because there is only a handful of us lemmy users right now. With 100,000 active monthly users, even if 1% of them bought a subscription at $17/year, it'll still going to net the dev ~$12,000 per year (after 30% google play fee) which is actually below US minimum wage. As lemmy got more and more users, I'm sure the dev would revise the pricing. If he were greedy he would just quit and work at some big corp instead of working full time on a lemmy client for peanuts.

Between the ads, pricing and tracking I'm just going to stick to Liftoff, it works really well.
- Liftoff is good but I'm trying Infinity right now and it's even better imo.
  
  me too, infinity is free, open source, very good looking, customizable, fits android and is fast, very fast(infinity for lemmy has some bugs but it just released)

The price is very reasonable if you realize the economy of scale is not there yet. There is only about 100,000 monthly active Lemmy users right now. Even if 1% of those users bought the app at $20, the dev only net ~$14,000 for working on his app full time. The calculus will surely different if Lemmy have 10x more active users which will allow the dev to lower the app pricing while still sustaining himself.
- So you're basically saying wait until the lemmy user base grows and see if the dev drops the price. That would lead to a lot of the OG buyers getting angry.
  
  They shouldn't get mad if what they say about gladly supporting the sync developer is true. I meant, isn't it weird to get mad when something you bought actually got lower price a few years in the future? Like buying a game for $60 at launch and then some patient gamers bought them for $10 a few years later. Why angry at that?

Use Liftoff
- ...or Thunder, which is very similar to Liftoff. I use them pretty much interchangeably. Both are built with Flutter, have similar UX and performance and they work on both Android and iOS.
  
  I've tried thunder, and the UI looks really good, but for some reason when I try to scroll up on a feed the whole list starts shaking, almost as if the posts on the top of the list are changing size.
- I tried both Liftoff and Thunder but I prefer Infinity.
  
  Wait-. There is an infinity for lemmy ???
- bit late but, liftoff doesn't feel the same like sync, sync looks and feels like a native android app
- So. Much. Better. I just don't get the Sync mania.
  
  Liftoff is buggy as hell and has terrible performance and UX, as does basically every other Lemmy client
  
  And I don't understand how people say the other apps are better, especially Voyager. I've used them all and they're all a fraction of the quality of Sync.

AUD $33.99. No thanks.

Inflation

There's no ads in Lemmy.
- There's no ads, yet.
  
  I feel like ads in lemmy would be a hard to implement thing, it would need to be done on the instance level... and people would just jump ship to another instance that didn't have ads. it's possible that it could post ads as posts that get federated but it sounds like an amazing way to potentially get your instance defederated in concern that it's going to devolve to constant spam.

I got it for 15. Is it expensive for ad removal? Yes. Is it too expensive? No, for me personally no. I wanted to support the dev and I did it. Also It's the only app I am going to use until Lemmy is no more.
- You paid $15 for ad removal, when the dev himself is the one putting in the ads 💩 lemmy doesn't have ads, sync does.
  You played yourself.
  
  I know Lemmy does not put ads duh.
  
  That's how ad removal for literally every app in existence works. The ads aren't some kind of natural disaster that I'm paying the developer to "fight" lmao

Simple solution. Get DNS66 from the F-droid site (not the Play Store version that wants a subscription). That takes care of the ads in all my apps. It inserts itself like a VPN, filtering all Internet traffic, blocking the ad servers.
- AdGuard does the same. All I see is "sponsored content" and keep scrolling.
  
  Yup. Maybe the author still makes money from them even if they are blocked by our dns servers. Hope so, would be a win win.
- or NextDNS or Adguard
- Personally I'm more for using a custom DNS server to block ads.
  I was using Blokada 5, but found that it used a bit too much of my battery.
  Now I just set my DNS to dns.adblock.com, and it gives me the same result.
- Used DNS adguar before , now I use proton VPN which has it built in with netshield
- Mullvad VPN also includes the ability to block all ads at the DNS level, so if you don't already have a VPN (or if you're not happy with your current one), I highly recommend it. Great VPN, great speed, great company.
  
  Mozilla VPN uses Mullvad's servers so it offers pretty much the same QoS but some of it goes to a non-profit that develops and supports Firefox, funds white hats finding and patching bugs in the Fediverse. and fights for an open web.
  (It also features DNS-level ad blocking.)
- Or RethinkDNS

Honestly I think we all need to relax. Lemmy is a niche app that's rising, and it's one guy. I paid for ultra since it was cheaper than the pay for no ads option.
$29AUD or whatever it was per year for ultra is literally paying a dev once a year for their work, and to keep it updated and build features.
The outrage is really ridiculous considering how quickly the app was built, how decent the experience is and the realities of the real world right now.
Pay the cash, you're not going to remember it by the time you're paid next. For the job you did, producing something. Like this guy did.

Imho 15 eur is actually a fair price. In my country you can get a McDonald's meal for that price that satisfies me once whereas Sync satisfies me everyday 😄. And 25 still seems okay to me for a nice app like this. I can imagine a lot of effort is put in this app. But everyone is entitled to their own opinion.
- I used to use sync pro for Reddit. I now have connect and sync for Lemmy installed. Connect seems better in every way? What features is it missing?
  
  One thing I've not seen any other Reddit* or Lemmy app do that Sync does, is preserve the "position" of comments. If you enter a thread, scroll down half way, then go back, enter a different thread, leave that one, and come back to the previous thread - you'll still be at the same spot.
  This is nice for me when I accidentally swipe the wrong way and end up on the previous page, or something happens to catch my mind just as I'm going back a page.
  Specifically, I like a lot of things about Connect but I've found that there's no decent separation between different comments/posts. Aside from Sync though, I really like Summit.
  *Apollo somewhat did this, IIRC you had to use the swipe forward gesture in order to return to the previous position. But if you loaded another thread (or even just did a regular click of the same thread), that didn't work. I also haven't been on iOS for a while now so I could be out of date on that.
  
  I was using connect before I moved to sync (I had used it forever on Reddit) and connect is so much more janky while scrolling or viewing/dismissing images. Sync is smooth and feels way more polished.
  
  Customization and polish, for one.
  
  Just try sync for some time and you'll notice a huge difference.

It's been $33.99 AUD since it was released.
- $37.99 NZD here
- Typical for Australia though tbh, getting the shit end of the deal
  
  Strictly speaking, everyone is getting the shit end of the deal. Reddit Sync was 4 quid, one off payment.

WTF is this in CAD!?
- According to Google that's about 30.75CAD
  
  The amounts are CAD. $134!?
- So I just took a look because I paid 19cad for the remove ads option which was distinct from "sync ultra".
  I think part of what's confusing is there was never previously a sync ultra lifetime price it was always just monthly or yearly. And sync pro was the lifetime price which was also out before ultra was a thing.
  If you open the menu, above sync ultra is there a "remove ads" button with a more reasonable (lifetime/onetime) price?

Just to check, when it was 15, was that possibly the annual cost for Ultra? Whereas this is the lifetime cost for removing ads only.
- no, it was the remove ads, there is a different menu for the ultra I think
  
  Ah fair enough - yeah, bit odd that. Not sure why it would change so soon.

It's 21,99€ for me 🧐
- He's working on region pricing

I can confirm the price with a bit of variation 21.99€ for me.
- €18.99 here in Belgium. I would think it is adjusted now with local VAT percentages.

I'm soso happy to pay $2/mo for Ultra, very cheap for what it gives me. Miles better than any other app, keep it up!
- It baffles me the amount of pushback the $2 a month is getting. I guess it says alot about the demographic browsing Lemmy...I'm happy to support the dev. For the amount of time I've used on sync it's 100% worth every penny.
  
  You must be new if you're surprised lemmy is mostly privacy and security conscious folk who prefer foss.
  
  I can't post or search on the app yet... It's objectively the worst Lemmy app currently. I loved Sync for Reddit, but charging more for a product missing basic features is questionable.
- It's not miles better than either infinity or voyager.

Punishing us for asking for regional pricing.

The price seems to vary quite a bit depending on the location. Probably something on google play's end?

Where do you see that? I have not found this option at all.
- It should be in the profile menu on the top left. Perhaps LJ is rolling it out selectively.
  I bought it last night and it was half the price in OP's screenshot. Either it has gone up, or again perhaps there is some A/B testing going on at different price points.
  
  i don't think it is selective just update the app regularly
  
  Thanks! Worked for me, was 21.99 Euro here.

Inflation, duh.

Does the premium version remove trackers or just stops ads appearing?
- The trackers were specifically there for Google’s ad service, so I assume this’ll get rid of those too.
  
  Dev has confirmed multiple times that trackers are not even initialized if you pay to remove the ads.
- Yes. That is specifically for Google's ad service. It's gone with the ad-free version.

Greed, probably.

I think the developer should have just made the app ad-free, and charged for features people will want.
It's not a feature to remove ads. It's just normal. At least for many of us Linux users, we never see ads since we have so many ways to combat them.
But yes, if Lemmy starts to become very popular, it will pull in everyone who uses windows and has ads and shit in their face all day. They are used to it. Maybe they will pay.
- So you would rather have micro transaction/dlc for various features... Instead of having a free path and a paid path...
  Honestly all these hardcore, zealot Linux users all bent out of shape because god forbid they pay for someone's work while acting like they're on the high road, really makes Linux users look bad. I've come across way too many posts about yet another person triggered because OMG, it wasn't just free and the dev can't survive off good vibes and a 'donate' button no one would click.
  For all the people mad sync isn't free, how many of the Foss projects have you donated too. A fiver one time a decade ago to one project means nothing. Going to guess I'll get more downvotes than people showing proof the donate, regularly.
  I bought sync. Bought it here and bought it on Reddit many years ago. With the amount of time I used it, probably came out to less than a penny per hour of use.
  
  It seems you are grouping me in with previous people you have talked to. And I hate micro transactions or dlc.
  I would simply lower the prices. That's it. I think people should pay for quality software, including search engines and email providers that are high quality. I do that of course myself. It's the only way to get away from the ad/tracking model we have today.
  But the price of Sync is just too high.

It's getting ridiculous everyday
- Huh? It's only been out for a day.
- What is ridiculous about this in your opinion?
  
  It's very steep since tons of reddit apps were more like $2 for the pro version.
  I can see how that's too low to be sustainable, but $25 is a lot more.

ITT: People don't know that FOSS donations are a thing and also very common. Defends app that injects ads with trackers onto a FOSS platform.

Hilarious watching people complain about an app that gives you a CHOICE to buy it if you want to. I really hope the dev is laughing at you guys with me because this is some really low IQ shit.

For the amount of hours a week I spent in Sync for Reddit and the price I paid then for removing ads, I feel that 20 euros is cheap to remove ads in Sync for Lemmy and would have paid more.
However I understand the price might feel steep up front for new users. An initial trial without ads for a short while might be a solution, where users only start to see ads after using it for a bit so they can test run the app without being disturbed by ads.
- it really depends on what you value
  
  Of course, it's all relative and personal.
- Yeah, if Relay showed up with an app for KBin and wanted $30, I'd give it in a heartbeat, but being a long time user, I'd also feel like it's partially back pay for using it for years after only paying like $4
  As it is, I'm really looking forward to Artemis launching and will probably do an equal donation of at least that much to its dev and to Ernest (/KBin social admin and /KBin dev).
  The /KBin PWA isn't bad for what it is, but god damn do I miss using a proper app. At least y'all on Lemmy have options!

I've seen 4 posts in the last two days that have solidified the fact I will never even TRY Sync. Dev seems like a real scumbag. I'm pretty happy with Liftoff so far.
- Regardless of what you think of the pricing, the dev is not a "scumbag".
  I used Sync for Reddit for many years, and he is without a doubt the most responsive and accommodating app dev I've ever encountered. Always updating the community, always looking into improvements, and always friendly and helpful. Not to mention extremely skilled at what he does, as you would discover if you tried Sync (even in its free form).
  Your accusation is absolutely over the top and completely contrary to reality. Of course you're free to use whatever app you like, and to disagree with the Sync pricing policy. But there's no need or justification for talking about him like that.
- Ok, I don't agree with the price and all the people that are answering with excuses about pricing more because Lemmy has less users, so people have to pay more for a platform that is still on their early years? That honestly makes no sense to me.
  Said that, Laurence (Sync dev) is a really awesome person.
  The amount of work and feedback he replies to, makes Sync, while closes source, feels like a collaborative software.
  So... No he's definitely not a scumbag.
- Check out Infinity if you haven't already. It's an early port though.
  https://codeberg.org/Bazsalanszky/Infinity-For-Lemmy/releases
  
  What the heck?! This is actually a great app with an actual working tablet landscape mode and looks great! Thank you!
  
  I was trying different apps since Infinity was my go to for Reddit but I caved and downloaded it this morning. Honestly it's just a great app that works even as an early port. I'm sold again.

245 comments