[flashman]

Website owners are free to attempt this business model. I am free to choose what code runs on my machine.

Every business model has trade-offs, and no model guarantees income.

[chii]

There's one model that guarantees income: the subscription model.

[timv]

Only if you can guarantee that someone subscribes.

[pdkl95]

You simply need to provide a product that has value. If nobody is subscribing, that might be a message that your product isn't actually worth anything.

[TeMPOraL]

That's exactly why ads are so popular on-line. With them, it's trivial to waste a bit of time of other people with shitty non-product, and earn some money in the process. The same thing wouldn't fly with subscriptions; you'd actually have to create something valuable.

[LaGrange]

Or people who would subscribe it are unable to afford the monetary cost. That doesn't mean it doesn't have value.

Wouldn't justify wasting energy and compromising user privacy, as the current model does, but that's why capitalism has to go.