First, this.
So a lot of people have been talking about the track DA has been taking, how it's become more like FB and less like DA. Well ... I've said it a few times, money's the issue. It does cost money to have servers running and pay staff and such.
Have you ever seen a free site offering memberships, say: "Hey, sign up for a paid membership so we can run servers and pay people"? Well, if not enough people sign up for paid memberships out of the goodness of their hearts, then that site starts looking for investors. Angel investors are far and few between, so most sites just go to ad services.
When I first signed up for DA, it came