--- title: "How I Got $9,086 of Free Perks by Being \"First\"" description: "Sometimes it pays to be an early adopter. Here's the year-by-year list of grandfathered perks that added up to $9,086 in value for me." published: 2023-07-11T00:00:00.000Z updated: 2026-11-12T00:00:00.000Z tags: ["audio","productivity"] url: "https://davidvkimball.com/posts/how-i-got-9086-of-free-perks-by-being-first" --- ```embed https://creators.spotify.com/pod/profile/davidvkimball/episodes/How-I-Got-8-367-of-Free-Perks-by-Being-First-e26qru3/a-aa44can ``` *Updated November 12, 2026: I fact-checked every entry, fixed the ones I got wrong, added Netlify, HubSpot, and Bitly, and recalculated the total. The audio above is the original 2023 version.* Grandfathered-in perks are an often-underutilized benefit of early adoption in the software-as-a-service sphere. As startups or tech platforms try to gain adoption and enter the mainstream, they'll sometimes give users generous perks in service of an aggressive user adoption strategy. ![The Chasm graph, showing early adopters vs. the mainstream market](https://davidvkimball.com/posts/how-i-got-9086-of-free-perks-by-being-first/chasm-graph.webp) Sometimes early adopters get features so generous, it's not a sustainable business model. Interestingly, though, rather than completely taking those features away from existing users, they usually just remove them as features for new users going forward. If something seems too good to be true, grab it while you can, and there's a chance you can hold onto it, at least for a while. ## Platform Feature Timeline Below is a list of when various features were added or removed, usually beginning with a platform's launch and removed later in its life as it matures. ### 2006 - Google Apps for Your Domain (later G Suite) launched with a free edition for small teams ### 2007 - Todoist launched with a generous free plan of 80 projects - Microsoft launches SkyDrive, and bumps free storage to 25GB in late 2008 ### 2008 - GitHub Pages launched, free websites must use a public repository - Dropbox launches, lets you connect with unlimited devices, and gives you extra storage for each new user you invite - HootSuite launches with a free plan - Spotify launches in Europe with unlimited ad-supported music listening ### 2009 - Facebook rolls out unique usernames for profiles - YouTube channel URLs use your username, like /[yourname] ### 2010 - Weebly allows free users to use custom domain names and multiple websites - Tumblr allows free users to use custom domain names, automatic /forward redirects, and multiple blogs ### 2011 - Bitly lets free users use their own custom short domain - IFTTT launches publicly, entirely free with unlimited applets - Spotify caps free desktop listening at 10 hours a month after your first 6 months. This one hit everyone, me included ### 2012 - [Weebly turns off custom domains for its free users, only allows 1 site per user](https://twitter.com/davidvkimball/status/213009574691749888) - MailChimp's free plan allows 2,000 contacts and 12,000 sends a month - G Suite turned off the free option, and existing free users were grandfathered into their accounts - Microsoft's SkyDrive (now OneDrive) changed the free storage space to 7GB, but allowed grandfathered-in users to opt in to keep their 25GB ### 2013 - Patreon launches with a flat 5% fee for all creators ### 2014 - OneDrive raises free storage to 15GB. Legacy 25GB users keep 25GB, and the 15GB camera roll bonus that fall brought them to 40GB - Spotify drops the 10-hour cap for free listeners (it happened between December 2013 and January 2014) - YouTube moves custom channel URLs to youtube.com/c/channelname. Legacy /[name] and /user/ URLs still work ### 2015 - Netlify launches with a free plan - [Lynda.com](http://Lynda.com) partnered with public libraries and allowed free access with a public library card ### 2016 - OneDrive cuts free storage to 5GB. Anyone who opted in by January 31, 2016 kept their 15GB plus the camera roll bonus ### 2017 - Discord allows once a Partner, always a partner type benefits (free Nitro, vanity URL, etc.) ### 2018 - Bitly ends custom domains on its free plan. Accounts made before December 2018 become "Legacy Free" and keep theirs ### 2019 - Dropbox limits free users to only 3 devices (grandfathered in existing devices if more were connected) - Tumblr kills the custom automatic /forward redirects feature for its site pages, legacy users keep their existing redirects but can't make new ones - Patreon changes its options to Lite, Pro, and Premium, legacy accounts keep what's called their "founders" plan, kept what they had without additional costs - MailChimp limits new free accounts to one audience. Existing accounts keep the audiences they already have ### 2020 - Discord reopens its Partner Program with requirements based on server activity, and legacy partners keep their server's vanity URL - IFTTT got a paid plan, but free users were grandfathered into their number of applets (but got limited for new ones) ### 2021 - Todoist cuts free users to just 5 projects. Existing projects are kept ### 2022 - YouTube launches new `@username` handles for every channel. Legacy vanity URLs /[name] and /user/ and /c/ still work - Google tells G Suite legacy free users they have to pay, then backs down and lets personal accounts stay free - MailChimp cuts new free accounts to 500 contacts. Mine stayed at 2,000 contacts and 12,000 sends ### 2023 - [Tumblr turns off free custom domains for its users, allows legacy users to keep their custom domains](https://help.tumblr.com/hc/en-us/articles/231256548-Legacy-Domains) - [Weebly forces legacy custom domain users to pay](https://news.slashdot.org/story/23/03/01/2051203/free-weebly-legacy-plans-with-custom-domains-are-being-discontinued-now-pay-up) - HootSuite ends its free plan for everyone on March 31. No grandfathering on this one - IFTTT cuts every free account to 2 applets and turns off the rest - Discord username rollout prioritizes partnered, verified, Nitro-subscribed and early Discord accounts first - Patreon closes its Lite plan to new creators, so the lowest cut for new creators went from 5% to 8% ### 2024 - MailChimp's classic email builder is only available to accounts made before March 2024. Seven of my eight templates still use it - HubSpot caps new free accounts at 2 users and 1,000 contacts. Mine still runs 4 active users for free ### 2025 - Bitly starts showing ads on free links before the redirect. That was the last straw for me: I moved dvdv.kim to Short.io - Patreon raises the cut to 10% for creators who launch after August 4. Founders keep their 5% - Netlify switches new accounts to credits on September 4. Old free teams keep 100GB of bandwidth and 300 build minutes a month ### 2026 - MailChimp cuts new free accounts again, to 250 contacts and 500 sends a month. My plan still shows 2,000 and 12,000 - Netlify halves what new free credits cover in April - Google starts flagging G Suite legacy free accounts as commercial and making them pay or appeal. Mine's gone - Netlify adds a "Powered by Netlify" badge to every new Free project on August 19, legacy teams included - but you can turn it off at least ## The Netlify Badge Netlify is the one that bugs me the most right now. My team from 2020 still has the old free plan: 100GB of bandwidth and 300 build minutes a month, flat. A new free account gets 300 credits instead, and since April that covers about 15GB of bandwidth. When the credits run out, every site on the team goes offline until next month, and you can't buy more on the free plan. Then on August 19, 2026, Netlify started stamping a "Powered by Netlify" badge on every new Free project, legacy plans included. It's injected at the edge, so it never shows up in your code, and you'd never know it was there unless you looked at the live site. My older sites are spared, but anything new I spin up gets it by default. You can turn it off for free under Project configuration, then General, then Powered by Netlify badge. Do it on every new project. ## So, how much value have I gotten for free, based on the lowest-possible monthly pricing? - G Suite/Google Workspace: $1,320 (grandfathered in until 2026) - Todoist: $270 (grandfathered in) - OneDrive: $350 (grandfathered in) - MailChimp: $750 (grandfathered in) - Weebly: $980 (grandfathered in until 2023) - Discord: $250 (partnership + early adopter) - Dropbox: $920 (grandfathered in) - IFTTT: $48 (grandfathered in until 2023) - Netlify: $126 (grandfathered in) - Bitly: $600 (grandfathered in until I left in 2025) - HubSpot: $570 (grandfathered in) - [Lynda.com/LinkedIn](http://Lynda.com/LinkedIn) Learning: $2,880 (via the public library system) - Patreon: $22 (grandfathered in plan) Based on these estimates, that's **$9,086** in total value saved. ## The Takeaway If you have an opportunity to become a user of a SaaS product with a free option early, you should. You don't know what's about to hit the mainstream, or what currently-free features you have now will be deprecated in the future. ## Other Ways to Save: Cancel Your Free Trials Everything listed above doesn't even take into account starting and canceling free trials, which I've done a lot of as well. Audible, Amazon Prime, Netflix, Adobe, LinkedIn Premium, Asana, Xbox Live, you name it! Start the habit now: don't let the allure of free trials trick you into unintentionally paying for premium services. Instead, start and then cancel or set a reminder in your calendar to cancel just before it ends. Or even better, just use [Privacy.com](https://privacy.com) and [create a virtual card with a lifetime spending limit of $2](https://davidvkimball.com/posts/free-trials-the-trick-to-never-paying-after-they-end), and then you'll never accidentally get locked into a monthly subscription ever again. If you want to learn about more tips like this, check out my free course for content creators, [CheapMarketing.io](https://davidvkimball.com/courses/cheapmarketing). I dig into how you can leverage deals and free tools to maximize your cost savings and optimize your online presence. ## Linked mentions - [The History of My Personal Website](https://davidvkimball.com/posts/the-history-of-my-personal-website) - [Marketing Philosophy & Core Principles](https://davidvkimball.com/courses/cheapmarketing/marketing-philosophy)