I also running an open source software I developed for free. It's one of my hobby so it helps too. Issues or suggestions are no problems, I can choose what I want to fix or implement.

A free software can have good things like there could be a lot of users which is good learning experience on how to deal with it. If you are already experienced, then it would not be as much valuable.

There is also argument that paid software is better. I can't say that it wrong. With less people using it, and the developer has fund to run the service on good machine does make a difference.

I don't think there a right answer to free or paid. Just do it the way that align with your goal.