(I have no idea the true intent of this post, whether its a condemnation of people complaining or a subversive social commentary on Gaia's new practice, so I'm interpreting as I first read it.)
And this right here is the biggest problem with the world today. Because businesses have gone from caring about their customers to caring about the almighty dollar.
Yes, I understand that the point of a business is to earn money, for its owner, for its investors, etc. But that wasn't the point of Gaia, not originally. They created the site as a community and made the money to keep the site up and running by selling donation items, the Monthly Collectibles. Not everyone bought one, but Gaia continued to maintain the site for all its users, not solely for the users doling out $2.50 or more every couple of months.
Those non-buying users saw the items they weren't paying for, wanted them, grinded out daily to earn the gold to purchase them in the Marketplace, increasing the number of ads they saw (which generated profit as well) in the process and by purchasing these items with gold, the demand for people to spend money to then turn around and sell them for gold brought everyone into the loop. This practice is still going on, but with the massive influx of GC, it's made that cycle damn near unattainable for the people who can't or won't sink money into the system. So, we had a Gaia that catered to everyone, cared about everyone and made money. Now we have a Gaia that cares about no one and nothing but money.
Somewhere along the line, they lost sight of what mattered. There is a difference between customer service and customer care. I've been in the business for thirteen years, I do have some insight into that notion. Customer service is what greedy, money hungry businesses do. They are so concerned with increasing the bottom line that they will do anything to make money. Such as selling pixels for a thousand dollars. At the same time, they become less and less competent about actually providing good service. Kinda like how Gaia has neglected so many aspects of the site, that keep everyone happy, in favor of focusing on making bank. I see this every day at my job and people read about similar incidents in the news, most notably in the recent debacle with Comcast. Comcast provides a product everyone wants but are absolutely awful with providing good service. They are one of the biggest companies with the highest rates of customer dissatisfaction.
Customer care is actually treating your customers like a precious commodity. Whether they spend $10 or $1,000, customers are treated exactly the same. Businesses with this model understand that a customer is a customer is a customer and if you spend more time catering to the big spender, you will lose the small spender. They risk ruining their reputation, especially in the age of hyper connectivity, where one bad review can lead to ten potential customers taking their dollars elsewhere. There exists in business an idea that it is cheaper to spend money on retaining repeat customers than it is to draw in a new ones. Competitive advantage. You'll make more money on a frequent customer with good service and care, than you would creating splashy advertising to draw in a new customer, who might just be in it for the deal and leave for greener pastures once that deal is done. Many businesses experienced this with Groupon and Living Social. These people would spend the money to purchase a cheap hotel or meal, but refused to come back and pay the regular price. Whereas frequent customers would spend the extra because the customer care was phenomenal, the service is great and it's worth it to dig a little deeper to pay for that good experience.
But I've gone a little off point. By pointing out that Gaia has no reason to care about its non-paying customers, you've stumbled about why so many users have become so incensed by the new business model Gaia has adhered itself to. This site was founded as a community for all. They've now turned their back on a big portion of the community, in favor of only caring about the users with the open wallets. So that means the only option for users (according to my interpretation of your post) who are adamantly against this subtle shift to pay-to-play is to realize that Gaia no longer cares or wants or values the opinions of those not dropping their hard earned dough on the site and either suck it up and stop complaining, or leave.
And that's crap. This site was built for us, whether we spend money or not. We, as customers, need to demand better care, lest Gaia finds out what happens when they sacrifice customer loyalty for cash. I'm not suggesting Gaia stops attempting to make a profit by selling cash and Cash Shop items. When they were first introduced, it was great. We got a few items a month or over several months, and we didn't have them shoved down our throats with sales, flash sales and dozens of announcements. I bought a few cash items. Others I bought in the market from people who'd paid cash for them. The model worked and everyone was happy. People were willing to pay the little extra, knowing it would help with profit, help maintain, fix and expand the site, and they were happy knowing that the influx of cash was going to help ensure that everyone had a great experience... then it snowballed into something much worse. Inflation, customer dissatisfaction and poor customer care.
Yes, we could just throw our hands up and leave, but why? The popularity of this site was built upon user dedication and this is what we get in return? People need to keep complaining. They need to keep fighting against Gaia to create the change they want, because anything else is telling users to keep silent, go with the new status quo and just accept things as they are.
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