That said, I feel like a similar feature that requires an opt-in from the user might actually be worthwhile. I'd suspect that a number of developers (myself included) wouldn't mind deliberately opting in to an occasional non-intrusive terminal ad, especially one displayed during a download progress screen, because we'd know it's financially supporting the project.
However, for that to work:
Again, it would HAVE to be opt-in only. You should be able to change your mind whenever, and just toggle a flag in the settings to opt-in or opt-out.
No tracking. Ads are the same for everyone; possibly match categorically to what's being installed.
No cluttering logs.
Clean and non-instrusive; text-only. Clearly marked as an advertisement.
No additional actions to dismiss the ad.
Ads should be screened to weed out scams and creepy stuff.
Keep ads relevant to development and productivity.
The way they appear to have done it, it was an idea with some potential, done badly.
As thoughtfully implemented as this, I may even have happily opted in. The issue has never been about whether these projects need financial support, of course, but these details matter.
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I'm glad they ended the experiment.
That said, I feel like a similar feature that requires an opt-in from the user might actually be worthwhile. I'd suspect that a number of developers (myself included) wouldn't mind deliberately opting in to an occasional non-intrusive terminal ad, especially one displayed during a download progress screen, because we'd know it's financially supporting the project.
However, for that to work:
The way they appear to have done it, it was an idea with some potential, done badly.
As thoughtfully implemented as this, I may even have happily opted in. The issue has never been about whether these projects need financial support, of course, but these details matter.