One of reasons I left facebook (the other is that I didn't find any use for it).

As for cookies, I use Opera, their ad blocker. And Ghostery.

I can understand that a giving your application for free will not give you any money (I would be surprise if it do). The only value you might get it is to promote your software.

However, I do not understand the reason of showing the 54k on the statement, unless is a plan to commit fraud on promotions. Something in the lines of, "the average developer makes X amount of money." Of course, it could just simply be a bug on their online software.

That said, a better promotion for a developer (whose source of income is the app) would be to make 2 versions of the applications. One free (either limited or with ads) and one for pay. People like free stuff, but dislike ads and limitations.

Another way would be to make a free app that would only work with an online service that have a subscription model. There you could either give the first month for free or offer a limited service for free. (So that people can try your service.)

The most stupid way to promote your app (when the app is the product and not a cookie to attract to your real product), is to give it away for free forever.
Some side effects on this:
- People that bought your application before will feel cheated. And might wait before buying another application from you (to see if you will also place it for free).
- Potential buyers that got your application on the free day will have no reason to buy your application. In this case you sales will lower instead of rise.

I wonder if by combining C++ with .NET they mean that all code will be managed code. AKA: not real machine code, but a layer over it.  While most applications do not need speed, there are some that do.

The win32 api might be old. But so is the unix api. Both have the benefit of being time tested and relieved of many unexpected features (aka. bugs). They also have the benefit that many developers know how to work with them.