> The thing is maybe those groups aren't willing to pay for such a solution?

Actually I think they want to pay more. At least I do. HipChat charges $2/user; I would pay $5 or $10.

The real problem is that tools designed for companies consolidate the billing. If I start a chat for my local user group then I am on the hook socially to upgrade my plan to let new people join. If I am successful in cultivating a useful chat then essentially I am punished for it, and the punishment grows without bound. One of the groups I participate in has over a thousand members.

Meanwhile I would be happy to pay for a friend or three, with the understanding that the other 997 people who may want to join need to pay their own way. And with mostly individual accounts you can probably ask for significantly more per user than HipChat can.

And the effort to get people to sign up might be effectively free if you funnel part of the license fee back to the organization who no longer needs to pass the hat around for pizza money or whatever. This may create regulatory problems, but if we're just talking about the customer acquisition equation, there are a lot of awkward situations where somebody forgot to bring cash that I would very happily roll into a monthly debit to forget about.