Those are the cons to having email posting for free.
The pros would be: possibly more content being posted, which DW needs. Additionally, DW is often blocked at workplaces, making posting quite difficult otherwise, and this would help with that. It could encourage dual LJ/IJ/OtherJournal citizenship by giving people the ability to post to their other journal, whether paid or free, through email by DW's automatic crossposting mechanism. I think that email posting is a bit more of a power user feature or something used out of necessity--that less people will use it than, say, things like icons, and throwing open the gates won't lead to most people using it (but I could very much be wrong on that). Additionally, we are already adding unique, significant incentives to paid account upgrading like personal journal search, and have plans for more, so I don't think it will gut sales.
I feel weird in thinking that maybe this might be a decent idea--my usual response to requests like this is in most instances a kneejerk no, and I have to think a lot to get beyond that. But I also know that one of the top complaints I hear about DW is the lack of posting or content, and so after thinking a lot about it things that could help, even a little, become more attractive if they're not going to cost the service overly.
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The pros would be: possibly more content being posted, which DW needs. Additionally, DW is often blocked at workplaces, making posting quite difficult otherwise, and this would help with that. It could encourage dual LJ/IJ/OtherJournal citizenship by giving people the ability to post to their other journal, whether paid or free, through email by DW's automatic crossposting mechanism. I think that email posting is a bit more of a power user feature or something used out of necessity--that less people will use it than, say, things like icons, and throwing open the gates won't lead to most people using it (but I could very much be wrong on that). Additionally, we are already adding unique, significant incentives to paid account upgrading like personal journal search, and have plans for more, so I don't think it will gut sales.
I feel weird in thinking that maybe this might be a decent idea--my usual response to requests like this is in most instances a kneejerk no, and I have to think a lot to get beyond that. But I also know that one of the top complaints I hear about DW is the lack of posting or content, and so after thinking a lot about it things that could help, even a little, become more attractive if they're not going to cost the service overly.