Its not ridiculous though. Its 75% cheaper than the Twitter API pricing and the free tier is good enough for MVPs & experimentation.
The API pricing is a way to force users to see ads.
They could, I dunno, send ads through the API. And sure, clients can still ignore the ads but as of a few weeks ago I think all the 3p clients would have been willing to play ball given the alternative world we're in right now.