There has been this assumption that software is "free" for so long that many people must assume it is nearly trivial to create and maintain.

Perhaps every download page should have a preamble reminding people how many staff, how many collective years of effort, and how many dollars for laptops, web hosting, etc. went into what they are about to use. Perhaps every "./configure && make" should print a similar dump to the terminal. Put it front and center, clue people in.