You definitely have a point about the “thank you”-messages. I don’t think I’ve ever sent a message like that to the author of any software, but I think it might be time to start, especially for software that is the product of (or spawned from) the hard work of a single person or a small group.
Anything that gains too much steam and mainstream attention is ripe for corporate takeover/infiltration. Federation should hopefully keep them at bay for a while.