Many platforms have followed the trend of first offering a legitimately good product to build up a userbase, then squeezing out profit with increasingly anti-user changes, exploiting the fact it's difficult to switch (network effect and intentional lock-in).

It's not impossible that Discord stays more or less as it currently is, with a few features locked behind its paid subscription but generally a good experience, but it seems prudent to have a backup option for if/when things go further downhill.