It sounds like you have valid reasons for your rule-breaking, and that's a-okay by me. If we all followed the rules all the time, there wouldn't be any progress.

It also sounds like you're deeply passionate about what you're doing, which is great.

My only caveat to that is that it's hard to have both success at a grand scale and a dedicated group of users at the same time. If you're not looking to be successful, or aren't looking to strike it big (ala Facebook or Twitter), there is of course nothing wrong with that, but for the type of service you're operating, you'll have a harder time tracking statistical trends with a smaller audience I'd suspect, which could make the service overall less effective.