Comment by tpoacher

I don't think donation approaches are necessarily bad, but yes it should not be as simple as putting a kofi link at the top of a page.

This person doesn't just do that though. Right after the part where you've uploaded your own examples, there's a reminder: if you had fun buy me a coffee.

Though this is slightly offset by the fact that they state you have 2 free trials and then you pay. It's a complete incentives mismatch if you ask for coffee for something you explicitly presented to them as a marketing offer. Though, I suppose leaving the donation option on doesn't hurt in this case either.

In my experience, donationware works best when the donation request is polite, personal, uncoercive, unintrusive, and comes at a moment of surprise right after you would have seen actual value from a product, and from a product that has not otherwise asked you for any money so far (including showing you ads).

KeepassXC Android is a good example: the guy asks for a beer during octoberfest :)