Isn't this just the path of an immature company?

There's a guy who is probably a programmer and he makes a thing, starts trying to sell it. Nothing here stands out as bad intentions, it just makes me think of what it might look like if I tried to start a company (a lot of stumbling).

Plus the blog post is pretty clear it's their personal views. They spend a lot of time talking about the AI crap but when using Kagi it seems less intrusive than Google, and you can turn it off.

I dunno, I've seen this blog posted around a few times and there isn't anything in here that puts me off so long as I treat it as what it is, a subscription for that month, not an investment in the future. If the company goes bankrupt because the CEO spent investors' money starting a t-shirt company then I'll just use a different search when they shut down.

Probably worth noting I use a relay email address not my main one, but I do that for almost everything.