OP here, and I honestly didn't expect this post yesterday to get so big, or to cause a debate.
Sync looks fantastic. Ads and ad tracking stuff isn't abnormal and is totally up to the devs, but I just wanted to express my gratitude here in /c/Liftoff for managing to offer an awesome app for free, without any of that.
I totally get that, and the sync dev seems like a good guy who should charge whatever he feels is reasonable for his time. To an average end user like me though, it feels a bit like there are 5-6 booths offering bananas for free, but then someone set up a booth right next to them selling bananas for $20 a pop or requiring me to sit through a sales pitch.
I just wanted to show my appreciation for the guy at my favorite booth who is doing it for free when they really didn't have to.
Instance blocking would be really nice. There are also some bot instances that mirror content from reddit, and while I get the appeal, I'd rather not have it in my feed. I've just been blocking the bots individually.
I like Thunder a lot too. One thing I can't seem to figure out though is how to post images in comment replies.