I think the article is alluding to the fact that charging users gives a business an incentive to milk those users.

It's similar to the debate about customer support as an avenue for sales or as an expense. The business's incentive is to provide the worst customer support it can without making users drop the service.

Another example would be video games and DLC. Companies can wall off features that should be "in the game" and force their customers to pay extra for it.

I don't necessarily buy his argument, but it's not entirely black and white.