I've noticed a lot of ads for free apps lately (I downloaded and played as many as I had time to) and it seems like you guys are financially hurting. Here are some suggestions I have to keep your awesome service running:
(1) Get rid of the Music section. While it's a nice feature, most of use use separate services or apps for our music. Apple did well because it specialised in making one thing really well; by adding music you're diversifying too much and wasting server costs and time on something that's not as useful as your main service.
(2) Show a monthly progress bar that describes how much more money you need and perhaps what this equates to in app downloads. If I saw that you guys only needed another $10 or something for the month I'd be more than happy to send you some through Paypal. Speaking of which...
(3) ...In addition to the progress bar, also list the various ways we can donate (Paypal, Bitcoin, Dwolla, etc.) and provide a list of sponsored apps we can download. If it's a viable option, perhaps consider offering those mobile offers many apps use to pay for microtransactions (such as apply for the Discover credit card, etc.)
I hope you take at least some of these suggestions into account;
Regards,
Jake
