The "infinite free trial" model surely helps them indirectly. It expands the user base, which expands the plugin ecosystem, which sells licenses... because when

The "infinite free trial" model surely helps them indirectly. It expands the user base, which expands the plugin ecosystem, which sells licenses... because when you choose a text editor, you're choosing it for the ecosystem as much as for the editor itself. There are AFAIK only two full-time employees (Jon Skinner and Will Bond) so they don't need to sell a ton of licenses. If they sell 6,000 licenses a year that nets them nearly $500K/year in revenue. Please note that the "6,000" there was totally invented by me. I just estimated how many licenses they need to sell to reach half a mil. I don't know if they sell 1,000 a year or 100,000 a year... I'd be really curious to know how many they sell.