"...They deliberately cripple" is the wrong wording, they designed it so that they extract maximum value out of you. Because you, are not paying them. Their services are maximally efficient... for them, and just efficient enough for you not to ditch them.
Which is pretty much equivalent. From their point of view, it's some optimum of profit-to-usability space. From my point of view, it's a hodgepodge of subpar features, user-hostile addons and stupid engineering decisions (being on-line when you don't need to), that I nevertheless can't abandon, because everyone else is doing an even worse job.
I see where you're coming from, and I agree that they designed it to extract maximum value from their users. But when, in order to do so, they deliberately make their product punish non-data-yielding users, I think that absolutely deserves to be described as "deliberately crippled."
