LOL. Whisper may be free (I use it in at least 1 project), but it doesn't come with a GUI, hooks into mic audio and keyboard trigger, and other things necessary for something to work well on macOS.
I am willing to pay for things that work well (and don't forget support afterwards) because I know from experience that simply having an "open-source core" just gets you halfway there, if that; the last 5% of polish to a finished, reliable, supportable product is at least 50% more work.
And, to put it bluntly, since we don't live in a communist society, eventually SOMEone has to put food on the table from their efforts. I'm 100% fine with paying for that.
Lastly, I have a kid, which means that I have 0% time to spend on troubleshooting non-working open-source stuff (which I actually enjoyed doing before the kid); I am ALL about reliability now, which is why I paid for Eero home mesh networking (despite cheaper or free options), a NAS from iXSystems (despite me being quite capable of installing TrueNAS on my own hardware), pay for Apple products (despite loving my NixOS Framework laptop as well), and don't upgrade my 10 year old Tesla (because it still runs like a top, and that's my highest priority right now- reliability)
Once you get a kid, trust me, your views are gonna change, because you clearly do NOT have one.
This is what happens to your tinkering-around-with-open-source time after it:
tinker time before kid: [--------------------]
tinker time after kid: [-]
You're the same guy who's wondering why software quality is so low on iOS?
You refuse to vote with your dollar. You buy Apple's failed products like Vision Pro, and reinforce their insular self-destructive business model. You tacitly defend their right to commercialize free software and victimize yourself when alternatives are identified. There is zero feedback loop between you and Apple, just a wallet that keeps vomiting cash. The only outlet of communication that you can use to tell them to focus on the Mac or iPhone (eg. buying more Macs and iPhones) is being eschewed to support "the ecosystem" and replacement apps.
Therefore, you reserve no right to tell Tim Cook to stop focusing on the Vision Pro. You own one. You are one of the (sole) customers begging Tim to divert his attention away from the Mac, so he can focus on his visionary iPhone replacement. You wanted it bad enough to spend $3,500 that could have gone towards a college fund, three iPhones, six Macs, or an entire 16th birthday "come to the garage" surprise.
"WTF Apple" my ass, either take your lumps or buy a new product. We only hear this sort of moral floundering when monopolies form and people have to make themselves look helpless rather than an accomplice. Clearly Apple has no incentive to compete, but you also lack the balls to indict them despite rearing an entire family. Instead of commiserating with your faux helplessness, I will tell you to participate in a market economy to enforce the product of free market competition. You cannot make demands from a position of captivity.
Fair enough