No, you're right that another company did offer to host the online service, so they could stress test their cluster of hosts. ProjectH was also offered free motion capture work by that same company. But ProjectH also took advantage of that to use it for DRM because of piracy. That was something they told their patrons.not sure if its true, but someone said that an investor gave the idea for online, i dont think it has to do with f95 completely, but even then when people pirate its more like free advertising, because i know that a lot of people actually end up supporting a project after "testing" it, as well as purchase it, i do that myself because i dont want to pay for a game that is misleading or doesnt have content. Its not like every pirate is a direct "sale loss" because someone wouldnt even know about the game in the first place nor would they even try it if it meant paying. I feel like theres a lot of misconception with pirating, i believe that AAA titles suffer the most from pirating but smaller indie devs benefit from it. I always look through the new posts and every now and then theres the small dev thats barely starting up, they show their games for free and they get a decent amount of support from posting it here.
You're also correct that piracy does convert some people over to paying customers. It converted me, but it also it's also proven that some people will only pay for a product if they are unable to get it in a free manner. This is how porn site still survive, because not all clips are freely available. Some people see that 5 minute clip and they wish they had access to the full scene.