[smacktoward]

> what, then, would make them willing to pay to be a part of a social network?

At minimum it has to be free to get started, with the payment happening later as an add-on or up-sell. App.net put the payment up front, you couldn't use it until you paid, with the (predictable) result that nobody used it.

The model to look at is probably the tawdry world of "free-to-play" gaming on mobile, sadly.

[sp332]

App.net added a free tier in February 2013, and hit 100,000 users just two months later. By the end of 2014 they said that renewals were so low the site would be put in maintenance mode. So people are willing to pay for something, just not what App.net turned out to be. Or, they are willing to pay a little but not enough to actually afford the developers.