Cursor is trapped in a cat and mouse game against "hacks" where users create new accounts and get unlimited use. The repo was even trending on Github (https://github.com/yeongpin/cursor-free-vip).
Sadly, Cursor will always be hampered by maintaining it's own VSCode fork. Others in this niche are expanding rapidly and I, myself, have started transitioning to using Roo and Cline.
literally any service with a free trial--i.e. literally any service--has this "problem". it's an integral part of the equation in setting up free trials in the first place, and by no means a "trap". you're always going to have a % of users who do this, the business model relies on the users who forget and let the subscription cross over to the next month or simply feel its worth paying
This is true but Cursor’s problems are a bit worse than a normal paywalled service.
Cursor allows users to get free credits without a credit card and this forced them to change their VSCode fork on how it handles identification so they can stop users from spawning new accounts.
Another is that normally, companies have a cost for each free user. For Cursor, this cost is so sporadic since it doesn’t charge per million context, they use credits. Free users get 50 credits but 1 credit could be 200k+ context each so it could be $40-50 per free user per month. And these users get 50 credits every month.
Lastly, the cursor vip free repo has trended on GitHub many times and users who do pay might stop and use this repo instead.
The Cursor vip free creator is well within his rights to do what they want and get “free” access. This unfortunately hurts paying customers since Cursor has to stop these “hacks.”
This is why Cursor should just move to a VSCode extension. I’ve used Augment and other VSCode extensions and the feature set is close to Cursor so it’s possible for them just to be an extension. The other would be to remove free accounts but allow users to bring their own keys. To use Composer/Agent, you can’t bring your own keys.
This will allow Cursor to stop maintaining a VSCode fork, helps them stop caring if users create new accounts (since all users are paying) and lets users bring their own keys if they don’t want to pay. Hell, if they charge a lifetime fee to bring our own keys for Agent, that would bring in revenue too. But as I see now, Roo and Cline’s agent features are catching up and Cursor won’t have a moat soon.
> but 1 credit could be 200k+ context each
There is a thread on Cursor forums where the context is around 20K to 30K tokens.
> Cursor is trapped in a cat and mouse game against "hacks" where users create new accounts and get unlimited use
Actually, you don't even have to make a new account. You can delete your account and make it again reusing the same email.
I did this on accident once because I left the service and decided to come back, and was surprised to get a free tier again. I sent them an email letting them know that was a bug, but they never responded.
I paid for a month of access just to be cautious, even though I wasn't using it much. I don't understand why they don't fix this.
The AI support triage agent must have deemed it unworthy.
> I don't understand why they don't fix this.
It makes number go up and to the right
What I don't understand is why maintain a fork instead of just an extension? I would assume an extension like this would be pretty difficult to create but would it be more difficult than literally forking VSCode?
Cursor was one of the first AI editors and there was no way to add those features to VSCode thru extensions at that time. Another issue was that VSCode made special exceptions and opened APIs for CoPilot, Microsoft’s product, but not for other players. Not sure if this has changed now.
Cursor took the best course of action at the time by forking but needs to come back into the fold. If VSCode is restricting access to APIs to CoPilot, forking it publicly and putting that in the Readme, “We forked VSCode since they give preferential treatment to CoPilot” would get a lot of community support.
There will be a fork-a-month for these products until they have the same lockin as a textbox that you talk at, "make million dollar viral facebook marketplace post"
They can just drop any free usage right?
Tradeoff with slowing down user acquisition
Yes and no.
In a corporate environment, compliance needs are far more important than some trivial cost.
Embrace, extend, extinguish.