It's all relative
It's all relative ... we're talking about the price of a good hamburger here - $5.
In my experience, nobody in the model railroading hobby is getting rich - the hobby's a niche and iphones/ipads, while growing in popularity quickly, are still a niche. So with model trains mixed with iphones and ipads, you've got a niche of a niche, out of which you then need to find who's interested - and that could be a very small number indeed.
As to selling your information, be careful making that accusation - suspicions aren't enough. You need to know definitely that's the practice before you start making wild slanderous statements about a company.
Finally, while readers can freely access MRH, it is not free. Advertisers foot the bill and it costs many thousands every month to produce. Readers get it for free and they always will get it for free, but even readers pay a cost - they have to put up with lots of ad pages in every issue, ads on the MRH web site, etc.
Be careful insisting everything should be free - if something is of value, there is nothing wrong in asking you to pay for it. If you don't think it's worth the money, then don't buy it. Nobody's holding a gun to your head insisting you buy it or else.
