During the development of any program there is a conflict in the choice of priorities. I think a simple and effective solution would be to create the exchange for new features. We need to create a list of potential new features and enable users to vote for each of them by means of money.
The Exchange is a mechanism for resolving conflicts of interest. Developers could get money, users could receive new features. All together we might to see what features more in demand, and which are less in demand.
Technically, such an exchange can be realized at this forum, it is only necessary to choose a universal payment system.