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Those people who are willing to pay $50 per year for such thing are worth more than 50$ per year as targets for advertising.

Because it's a boring, safe, traditional business model.

Instead they've bet on harvesting and exploiting information about the behaviour of the many, to ultimately allow them to exert some 'control/influence' over individuals.

And they're winning the business lottery with it.

More shame us for only considering ourselves when deciding whether or not to use a service like google. I can choose not to use google/facebook, but if everyone else uses them, they'll still have incredible power over me through the insights they gleaned about everyone else

It would probably raise them so little money at their scale it's not worth the trouble, that's why they don't do it.

Sort of like Youtube Red except for their search interface and other properties, too?

Count me in. I subscribe to YT Red as well.

Use fastmail instead of gmail and some alternative search engine that respects your privacy.