Exactly

There are 2 things people don't like:

1: suddenly paying for something that was originally free

2: changing platforms

Unfortunately for these social media sites people don't like #1 way more than #2

So if you give them an ultimatum to choose between the two, most people are gonna choose #2 so that they can keep using whqt they believe should remain free to use.

And all these social media sites know this, its why none of them did (or ever will) make that switch to paid only - its not like they can't, they could have done this at any point throughout their existence.

But they won't, they'll just keep emshittifying the free version as much as they can with no end in sight.

Eventually people will start leaving and once that happens the social media sites will try to salvage themselves by increasing the costs of paid memberships which in turn will start to encourage their paid members to start leaving and flock to whatever social media site the free users have been flocking to which will be free.

And they will leave because social media sites rely on user-based generated content, its why people use social media sites.

The moment people start to leave there will be a drop in content generated leading to a drop in perceived value for their paid customers.

I don't think youtube will disappear, I think it will end up as this weird hub of corporate generated dlop with no user generated content turning it essentially to... a paid TV channel.