Ask HN: Stripe/Google/Apple squeezing the little guy?
I started a small website as fun project. My goal was to create the fastest p2p content transfer site. It's a free site that allows anyone to send files p2p files. No signups needed. User can send a file anywhere in not more that 3 clicks.
It was a project that grew and gained some traction. I got feedback from customers who loved the simplicity.
Naturally, as it grew I needed to pay the bills for hosting and my DNS (about $20/month). This is where my difficulty began. Initially, I was able to accept stripe payments but then that got abruptly canceled. Stripe will not allow me accept payments, Google will not allow me to host ads, And apple will not allow me to distribute my app in the app store. I get vague reasons ranging from violation of TOS , hidden features in app, poor performance. I'm a solo developer and my app is far from perfect but it's very frustrating that I'll will be unable to generate any income to keep the service going even though it used by thousands of users. I'm old enough to remember a time when you could host ads on a self hosted blog without so much bureaucracy. It's troubling how centralized the internet has become over the years.
Are there any alternative tools for monetization that early stage founders can use? Essentially, in my business model, the site is free to use, but users can purchases namespace that they can own to transfer content. I'd would like a simple payment provider that can facilitate this.