You're presenting a false dichotomy. I think the parent would have preferred these projects be successful and sustainable without the sleazy tactic of baiting users with free stuff, taking a mountain of VC cash, and then desperately trying to find ways of "monetizing" those users. Bleh.

F/OSS software works best when it's not a revenue source of the business that develops it. "Hey, I ran into $problem at $work and created $project to fix it! I'm giving it away so that it might solve your problem too! Hit me up on $mailing_list if you want to contribute." Red Hat is pretty much the poster child of this model. They make $0 on all the FOSS software they develop and release to the world but they dogfood it into their own products to collect dividends.