This is actually an idea I took from my current employer. We did this from the beginning so we don't really have numbers on how it effected our signups. The rea

This is actually an idea I took from my current employer. We did this from the beginning so we don't really have numbers on how it effected our signups. The real motivator behind was mitigating our costs. The previous company I worked for was a video hosting company and there were lots of issues with abuse. Lots of people would sign up for free accounts, upload full tv shows or movies and post them on popular sites for illegal tv or movie watching. We'd delete these accounts as quickly as we could, but the second we did that, they would just open another. The cost of storing, encoding and streaming those videos to get a few paying users was something we didn't want risk. I can tell you that the majority of users who have signed up for a trial have yet to cancel their account. So, I don't know if we're getting less signups, but I have a feeling the quality is higher.