Competing with free is challenging, but maybe there are other examples to choose from. Snapchat doesn't cost money for consumers to use it, same as Facebook. That's not due to competition with Facebook, and arguably it's not competing with a Facebook offshoot either. There are a number of analytics platforms depending on what you're looking for (eg Mixpanel and New Relic) that come to mind readily. eBay faces competition from a little company called Amazon.