While I understand the desire to make some money, as soon as you mix an altruistic effort with a moneymaking one, the former is muddled.
Sure, maybe it would 100% have no impact on decisions. The real problem is ... how would a user know? I struggle with this when listening to NPR and hearing the programming is "possible due to [huge corporate sponsor]" I want to believe NPR would not be influenced to not run or minimize a story about a sponsor, but the uncertainty makes their coverage less trustworthy to me.
That applies here. Sure, you're telling me Brave is the best choice and maybe that's true, but I also know you have a financial benefit from convincing me of that.
Private donations from users via crowdfunding is the only system that mitigates this. Maybe they just need to better promote those.