Personally, I put #4. 

There is good payware and there is good freeware  ... more importantly, there are still folks that will lay down a chunk of change for payware models, scenery and utilities, and others who won't.

<----- voted #!

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Couldn't have said it better myself.
I also voted #1.
Don't putdown payware until you have tried it. Sure some of it is not that great but there are more than a few things that are worth alot more than they cost. I personally will pay for something if it is good enough, after all, these people put alot into some of this stuff and only ask for a small price in return for their work.

Kevin

Well I like both, there are exellent freeware add-ons out there, and I love them.

But I've gotten to be real picky cuz most of the planes I've gotten dont have a DVC, and the author doesnt say so in the description. So I've gotten to where if it doesnt specificly say it has one I wont bother.

there's almost no payware planes that do not have them, and if they dont, at least the maker says so in the description.
A good DVC is a must for me cuz that's where I'll spend 95% of my time, and it's a must for realisim.

Plus with payware, you have a greater support system behind it, and you have every right to complain if it's not what you wanted or expected.

Plus one more thing with many freeware planes is that they are incomplete in some way, and you have to go get something else to have it work, or have sound or whatever. If you are not too savy, you wont know what or where to get to have it complete.
With payware, this wont be the case.

A good example is the Grumman Albatross I just got this morning, it's obviously the same one I have in FS2k2, but modified for 2k4, as the VC is not clickable. Not complaing mind you, it does have one at least.
But then I start it up and what do I hear? Well not the crackling, coughing, and rumbling sound of  radials, but instead I hear what sounds like turbines. Well, there went the realisim.
Again, I cant complain............it was free. So I'll just have to hunt around for a sound set that will be to my liking. Had this been from a payware outfit, and I paid my hard earned money for it, I'd be at the website giving them what for. But im sure this fellow gave it his best effort, and I still appreciate it, it's a beautiful plane.
But, I'll have to "fix it" so it's to my liking, with something you pay for though, this would not likely be the case.

Payware models exist for two reasons:

1. The Auther needs money to pay some common expenses [bills, cost of distribution, etc.].

or

2. The Auther is just plain greedy.

I have already released the Mercedes-Benz SL600 for FS2004 [as you already know]. And it's freeware.

I made it freeware because I was new to the field of "car-modeling" for FS. Also because I didn't have a bank account for on-line purchases from customers, and I am not greedy like a few people in the Payware Market.

Project Mercedes has greatly expanded my skills and knowledge for car-modeling in Gmax for FS.

Now that Project Porsche has begun [Porsche 911 GT2], my new skills and knowledge will make this new car project a better one.

The Porsche will still be "Freeware" as it is intended to be, along with new and improved features. I'm a Freeware freak.

It is very "UNLIKELY" that this new car will be "Payware" as well. Even if it did go payware, I would have priced it at no more than $2 and it would have eventually become freeware [as the case of the Golden Eagles' Cubbie].

However, I do know that making "payware" models is a very delicate operation and a very serious one. Especially for a person like me who will forever make detailed car models for FS.

PS: My Mercedes may not have a 2D panel as it was supposed to, but at least it has a DVC and other stuff.

Professionalism,........ yeah. I like that word.

"Professionalism is like pornagraphy,......you'll recognize it as soon as you see it."  ( John Lauber, National Transportation Safety Board, retired.)

As I said though, I like them both, the freeware is good, some are even exellent, but when the bucks are laid down for the stuff you get a "product" which has been thouroughly refined usually by a team of individuals and it's well tested, and not just a project in the works.

Again, this is not to take away from the hard work I know that folks have put out, I admire their work and have 100's of their works that I love to fly and use.
But there have been some, that have been great disappointments, incomplete or frought with errors that have even caused problems. But an individual cant be expected to be able to work out every possibility, or have the resources of a team.

But a freeware vs payware is much like the difference between a used car, and a new car which you bought from a dealer.

Here are my 25 cents:
What´s wrong with someone to earn some honest money by making some add ons? I mean you paid for your copy of fs, and it was made by a group of professional modellers and programers etc.
before i started with flight sims i was a plastic modellers, mostly 50 to 80´s planes, and i never got one for free,  yet i kept buying them, and they are still being sold, just like flight simming it is a hobby,  it is fun, just like flight simming. Ok, yo cna get a lot of good freeware models, but oyu can get better ones paying for them, and you can get ripped off too, it is the way things work, BUT,  a honest man work is a Honest man work, and if he thinks that he deserves some money for his hard worked project then let him, at the end is your decision if you buy it or not.
Making an aircraft is a hard, time comsuming, effort.
anyway, here are my 25 cents.
best regards

Prowler