Seems like the lesson for you here is: never give free hosting, people feel terribly entitled once they have it and their negative feedback may cause trouble in your actual products.
I currently pay ~$215/year for a linode account.
I will continue to pay for linode.
Paying for a service forever in advance is a devious mis-alignment of incentives. The customer will feel that they are owed everything. The business of it won't work out.
As I said, the lesson is, don't give shit for free - even for an initial payment. Ongoing services need to be paid for in an ongoing manner.