I am similar to you in that I’m happy to pay for quality content, but not everyone has that luxury. It’s great that we have some free material on the internet nowadays for those that need/want it. I’d imagine if you wanted free content back before the internet, you would like just have to rent a book from a library.
BTW, did you see that Ariane has a June cohort open right now? There is an upgrade to it from the self-paced one for $275. I upgraded from the self-paced course to that one. Looking forward to it. But if self-paced works for you then I wouldn’t worry about this. I need that extra structure and help when it comes to music theory.