If you’re talking about FaceTime and iMessage… They might technically not cost any money, but if I wanted to use them I’d first have to pay for an overpriced badly designed phone, which means they’re debatably free. They’re used to enrich the iPhone- just look at the whole blue/green text bubble thing. ‘If you don’t also have an iPhone you get treated differently’ hardly sounds like something a totally ‘free’ software would include. It just feeds into their ‘exclusivity’ bubble.
I recently learned that one method for companies to get around data selling laws is to give the data away for free in order to attract certain types of advertisers, then, they sell ad slots for people with specific demographics or interests.
They don’t sell the data because that is harder to do with laws restricting it, so they just use it as advertiser bait in ways that bypass the law.
Further reading: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/03/google-says-it-doesnt-sell-your-data-heres-how-company-shares-monetizes-and
Worth noting that harvesting organs from non-consenting people would also be logical from a business perspective, provided it were legal. Free high value produce!
Not to put words in the mouth of the previous commenter, but logic is an extremely different argument compared to their argument of ethics- I don’t think they were confused about why it happened but rather concerned that it happened despite the ethical issues around (potentially, Im not familiar with the Rocket League situation) removing a game from a platform that many people bought it solely for :)
Regardless, I think it makes sense for people to be upset as, to your point, the most logical business decisions often run counter to the ethical or emotional considerations of the customers.