> <i>WinRAR became infamous for offering a "30-day trial" that never actually expired. Instead of cutting off access or locking features, it simply asked users to consider purchasing it if they found it useful. It ran on goodwill</i><p>No, it did not. It ran on annoyance. If you wanted to avoid having to dismiss the "30-day trial" dialog on startup, you needed to pay. And some people paid. I'm not saying that it was immoral, it was just... annoying. Plus, for most (?) of WinRAR's existence, you could really do very well with alternatives such as the 7zip utility - www.7-zip.org , that was perfectly free-as-in-beer.