On the Fireside Fedi interview with Jerry ( the admin of Infosec.Exchange Mastodon instance ) a scary truth was suddenly revealed ( on 34:11 ): Just to keep the instance up and running he needs to spend up to $5000 a month, pretty much out of his pocket. Donations to the instance barely cover any of that. And if he will ask people to pay to use it, they will, rightfully so, switch to a different instance.
I think that we need to have a panic making notification when some instance is below a comfortable ( of it’s operator ) level of money. So that people could direct their money into stopping the panic. Basically I want automatic sense of urgency when and where it’s needed. FSF does it well. When they are low on money they just make a progress bar on every page they operate, with a link to a donation page. It works amazingly for them, because it immediately creates a sort of soft panic about the health of the FSF.
I still feel like you are talking about one “ideal” scenario, but all your examples fall short of it. I’d really have a hard time to see anyone working on any of the projects from the FSF that is “worthy of envy”.
That is because the problem is not solved yet. Again “We have to solve the money problem!”
That means it is nowhere near being solved. It will be solved when FSF staff ( from donations ) will have a life worthy of envy. And any fediverse admin too. And any libre software developer too.