> 5. There are two proposed models: ad-supported and subscription. For the record, there are many other possible models. (I realize you may be saying that in t

> 5. There are two proposed models: ad-supported and subscription. For the record, there are many other possible models. (I realize you may be saying that in this thread there are 2 proposed models, but I want to say this because people here seem to think there are only ever 2 possibilities.) Some other models include: 1. Patronage ala public radio/TV where you are asked to pay for it, but don't have to. If enough people do, everyone can use it for free. (Wikipedia, one of the top 10 sites on the internet by traffic, works this way.) 2. Donations (probably not viable for most businesses, but sometimes works out) 3. Partially or fully funded by some other business which benefits from people using it. For example, if Apple wanted to start their own search engine without ads, but that only worked with their devices, they could probably figure out a way to do that and they would make money from selling the devices, and not ads on the search engine. (Not that they wouldn't try to have ads, too these days. Ugh.) 4. Pay as you go - instead of a subscription that is recurring even if you don't use the product and that you eventually forget about, you just pay whenever you actually use it and pay for only as much as you use. Not sure it work with a search engine, but nobody's ever tried, so it's hard to say. 5. Government funded. I realize this would rub people the wrong way, but a government search engine funded by tax payer dollars that had no ads could be very useful if done correctly. You just wouldn't want to use it to look up illegal things. (And it doesn't necessarily have to be the Federal government. A state government might benefit from running it, as well.) Edited to add: For the record, I pay for and use Kagi and love it.