In reality, there’s not much of an appreciable difference between the “user” and “beneficiary” in the case of building standards. It’s your right to develop your property (within the confines of the applicable codes), whether you add a porch, or build a mini-mall, or raise a skyscraper.
The situation now is probably most analogous to that in the music industry, where once the technical limitations of reproducing the product were a cost/nuisance barrier, it is now no longer the case. It is simply that the “product” that supported the business model of the code developers is no longer viable.
Code development and code publication are not (and should not be) synonymous. There can be a way to support one without being shackled to subsidy of the other.
