Have Micropayments Arrived For Real?
Grok Headline matches for Have Micropayments Arrived For Real?
The March Towards Micropayments
The March Towards Micropayments
06/28/2004 11:16 PMThe Next Attempt At Micropayments
The Next Attempt At Micropayments
11/17/2003 03:08 PMStop me if you've heard this one before... Suddenly,
new
micropayment technologies are hot, and everyone is talking about
the billions of dollars that could be made by selling content for just
a little bit of money. All of these estimates use silly math. They
talk about how a large number of little transactions adds up to a
large number. That may be true, but it makes a huge, unstated,
assumption: that there will be a large number of transactions. Notice
that the article linked here never looks at things from the consumer
side to see if people actually want to be nickeled and dimed for every
piece of content they find online. There may be some places where
micropayment fees will work - but it's going to be difficult to make
significant money that way. First off, people pay money to get online
because they want to access content. If everything is going behind a
paid wall, suddenly they feel like they're getting double-billed. Why
do they need to pay to get online if there's nothing there?
Furthermore, each bit of "paid content" competes with free content.
Admittedly, if the blocked off content is very very good or comes with
some other advantages, some people will pay for it. However, the vast
majority of folks will hunt out a "good enough" substitute that they
can find for free. Also, the article completely ignores the important
comparison that content providers need to make if they're going to
block off content. It talks about the potential to make money off of
micropayments, but that's a useless number by itself. The important
point is whether or not they can make
more from micropayments
than they could from offering free content supported by some other
business model? I can see plenty of content providers jumping on this
bandwagon because they haven't been able to figure out how to properly
create an online site that makes money - but they may discover that it
doesn't do them very much good. There is some content for which
micropayments will work - but it's a very limited set - and most
content providers aren't going to think this out before throwing up a
paid wall.
Successful micropayments?
Successful micropayments?
11/10/2003 11:34 PMMaybe micropayments can be successful. BitPass seems to have at least
a decent collection of merchants. I posted about Peppercoin...
Debating Micropayments
Debating Micropayments
06/09/2004 02:03 PMClay Shirky got a lot of attention last year for his essay on
why
micropayments don't work - focusing mainly on the addition of
"mental transaction costs" as an additional cost above and beyond the
monetary micropayment cost. Not everyone has agreed (especially those
involved with micropayment companies). Vin Crosbie has now chimed in
to
explain why Shirky is wrong about micropayments by saying that
the mental transactions of micropayments don't always need to stop the
transaction. As an example, he points out that people pay for water,
telephone calls and electricity in micropayment fashion and never seem
too bothered by it. This is true - but what's missing is that in all
three cases these are both necessities and there are (or, in the case
of telephone, were) no other options for providers. When there's no
competition, you can charge and people will accept it - especially if
it's a basic necessity. However, when competition does come about,
the pricing starts to drop, and the idea of additional
fees-per-transaction start to go away. Witness what is happening with
the telephone industry. With the rise of VoIP systems, almost all
telecom companies in the US are now offering some sort of flat-rate
deal where there are no micropayments for each transaction. In the
case of undifferentiated content, where there are plenty of other
content providers online (with the possible exception of
very
specialized content), it will be very difficult to charge any form of
micropayment.
return of the micropayments...
return of the micropayments...
03/11/2003 02:00 PMseveral years ago "micropayment" was the buzzword and then seemed to
fade into oblivion as so many cool tech ideas...
Micropayments Going Mainstream? Not Yet
Micropayments Going Mainstream? Not Yet
01/11/2004 09:24 PMSlashdot Jan 11 2004 8:16PM ET
Micropayments Going Mainstream? Not Yet.
Micropayments Going Mainstream? Not Yet.
01/11/2004 04:53 PMDotEdu writes "Today's NY Times has an interesting article on two new
micropayment companies, BitPass and Peppercoin, and the venerable
PayPal. More ...
Internet & micropayments market to grow
23%
Internet & micropayments market to grow
23%
08/13/2004 05:12 AMinSourced Aug 13 2004 9:43AM GMT
MicroPayments and Credit Cards - Game On
MicroPayments and Credit Cards - Game On
06/29/2004 07:09 PM"...because of a patent-pending method of lumping together individual
transactions into one transaction to reduce the cost to the merchant."
Google Wallet More About Micropayments
For Content?
Google Wallet More About Micropayments
For Content?
06/22/2005 02:17 AMThere's been a ton of buzz over the idea that
Google
was working on a PayPal competitor, and it appears that Eric
Schmidt and "the powers that be" at Google finally thought it was
worth speaking to the press on the matter. In discussing the Google
Wallet concept, we did note that it came days after rumors of a Google
iTunes-like offering as well, and that actually might tie into what
Google is working on. Earlier today, there was increasing speculation
that Google was
more interested in a system to deliver micropayments for
content than direct person-to-person financial transactions -- and
that seems to be
more along the lines of what Google is admitting to.
While not clearly laid out, Schmidt did say that the solution they
were working on wasn't really a PayPal competitor, but more of
an
extension of existing programs. Many people have been saying that
it's likely an extension of the payment system they use for handling
their paid search ad program, but extending it out to other types of
content. This would also fit with Google's new
video
storage offering, which promised to allow people to charge for the
content that people downloaded. While less surprising, this is still
a bit disappointing. Micropayments seem to
go in
and out of fashion every few years, but never actually seem to
catch on, mainly because not only do they add a monetary expense, but
they
have
a mental transaction cost in making people stop and think about
whether or not it's worth purchasing. That cost is much more
expensive than most people think. Also, any micropayment-based system
always leaves itself open to competitors who realize that it's going
to be much more effective to give the content away, and make money
elsewhere.
PayPal Slashes Micropayments Fees
PayPal Slashes Micropayments Fees
12/09/2003 07:18 AMSiliconValley.Internet.com Dec 9 2003 6:37AM ET
Fame vs Fortune: Micropayments and Free
Content
Fame vs Fortune: Micropayments and Free
Content
01/07/2004 02:53 PM
Micropayments, small digital payments of between a quarter and a
fraction of a penny, made (yet another) appearance this summer with
Scott McCloud's online comic, The Right Number, accompanied by
predictions of a rosy future for micropayments. To read The Right
Number, you have to sign up for the BitPass micropayment system; once
you have an account, the comic itself costs 25 cents.
BitPass will fail, as FirstVirtual, Cybercoin, Millicent, Digicash,
Internet Dollar, Pay2See, and many others have in the decade since
Digital Silk Road, the paper that helped launch interest in
micropayments. These systems didn't fail because of poor
implementation; they failed because the trend towards freely offered
content is an epochal change, to which micropayments are a pointless
response.
The failure of BitPass is not terribly interesting in itself. What is
interesting is the way the failure of micropayments, both past and
future, illustrates the depth and importance of putting publishing
tools in the hands of individuals. In the face of a force this large,
user-pays schemes can't simply be restored through minor tinkering
with payment systems, because they don't address the cause of that
change -- a huge increase the power and reach of the individual. -
More at http://www.shirky.com/writings/fame_vs_fortune.html
A penny for your bits: micropayments to
make a comeback?
A penny for your bits: micropayments to
make a comeback?
11/18/2003 05:33 PMConsidered to be holy grail of paid web content, micropayments may be
finally ready for prime time
Digital content spurs micropayments
resurgence
Digital content spurs micropayments
resurgence
09/07/2004 06:38 AMA growing appetite for digital content helps companies that enable
small-ticket online transactions.
The New Look Has Arrived!
The New Look Has Arrived!
11/20/2002 08:39 AMWe have arrived....
We have arrived....
03/13/2003 10:23 AM So, after 2 weeks of camping out in a hotel we loaded everything up
into the monster SUV the...
The Darkness Has Arrived
The Darkness Has Arrived
04/02/2005 11:22 AMFree Internet Press Apr 2 2005 1:55PM GMT
"arrived in Baghdad"
"arrived in Baghdad"
05/20/2004 04:11 PMCisco 802.11g APs Have Arrived
Cisco 802.11g APs Have Arrived
11/12/2003 02:58 PM Cisco introduced its Aironet dual- and single-radio 802.11g APs:
Existing Aironet users can get 802.11g radio upgrades. The new APs
have WPA and also AES, though Cisco is setting the AES off until
802.11i is passed....
Google Has Arrived
Google Has Arrived
08/19/2004 12:19 PMFortune Aug 19 2004 3:51PM GMT
A new PHP based CMS has arrived!
A new PHP based CMS has arrived!
12/09/2002 06:11 AMA brand new software to build up and manage PHP web sites with
individual web design - just within a few clicks and without writing a
line of code.
Has The Time For PON Arrived?
Has The Time For PON Arrived?
09/06/2004 06:07 PMTechWeb Sep 6 2004 9:38PM GMT
Help Has Arrived for MCI Customers!
Help Has Arrived for MCI Customers!
09/10/2004 04:02 AMwww.SaveOnCommunications.com offers a helping hand to MCI customers!
MCI Long Distance Rate and Fee Increases to Affect Most Subcribers
[PRWEB Sep 10, 2004]
The Picturephone Has Arrived
The Picturephone Has Arrived
01/10/2004 02:13 PMAlmost as good as being there: Apple's iChat AV and iSight deliver
powerful audiovisual communication of the fly. By Jon Udell (InfoWorld
via MyAppleMenu)
Developer Kit arrived
Developer Kit arrived
06/24/2005 09:39 PMMy Developer Transition Kit arrived today! I’d post a
picture—but it looks just like
Stev
en Frank’s, which is to say it looks just like a G5.
Beyond that, I don’t think there’s much I can say, for nda
reasons.
Fall Has Arrived
Fall Has Arrived
09/18/2004 10:30 PMA cold front came in from the North today, bringing with it a full day
(Saturday) of clouds and cool weather. I doubt that it was above 67
degrees all day. It's nice to see a bit of the next season in the Bay
Area. Given how similar our seasons tend to be, this is a good change
of pace. It shouldn't be too long before the first snow falls in the
mountains. A couple days ago I was trying...
PowerBook Arrived
PowerBook Arrived
05/04/2004 04:52 PMThat was damn fast. I ordered late last week and most of the pieces
have already arrived. Wow! I have the machine, extra ram from
Crucial.com, 40GB iPod, iSight, and a few adaptors sitting in my cube
now. Kick Ass Now I need to figure out how to move all my important
data (iTunes, Mail, etc.) to the new machine. Hopefully I can do some
sort of Mac rsync to copy my home directory over and be done with
it....
Mac Mini arrived
Mac Mini arrived
02/01/2005 09:33 PMOoh, got the Mac Mini this morning. The box it comes in is Tiny. tiny!
actually. It's very spiffy. More like my DP 1.4GHz PowerMac than my
867MHz PowerBook. And a lot cheaper than either. I haven't been in a
properly quiet environment with it yet, but it seems very quiet so
far. It arrived with iLife '04 installed and iLife '05 on a separate
DVD. iWork didn't get here yet, but should soon. I'm really looking
forward to using...
MSN Search Has Arrived
MSN Search Has Arrived
02/01/2005 09:39 PMSlashdot Feb 1 2005 2:59PM GMT
3G Wireless Has Arrived
3G Wireless Has Arrived
02/01/2005 09:47 PM The New York
Times outlines the current and future offerings of major
carriers, saying that "for now, the leader in offering true 3G
services is Verizon
Wireless."
Workspaces v1.1 has arrived!
Workspaces v1.1 has arrived!
11/18/2003 11:17 PM-Access control, by user and group
-Notifications on file and bug changes
-Shorter Workspace aliases (http://workspaces.gotdotnet.com/alias)
-File/image hosting for project documentation
Doom 3 has arrived
Doom 3 has arrived
08/03/2004 10:54 AMCanadian Press via Canada.com Aug 3 2004 3:36PM GMT
The diva has arrived!
The diva has arrived!
03/19/2003 10:25 PMThelma and Louise are 50 miles from us right now. YEAH!!! I'm headed
over there after work to meet them...
Help Has Arrived For AT&T Customers!
Help Has Arrived For AT&T Customers!
08/16/2004 02:20 AMwww.SaveOnCommunications.com offers a helping hand to AT&T customers.
[PRWEB Aug 16, 2004]
PHP Magazine: The TOC Has Arrived!
PHP Magazine: The TOC Has Arrived!
11/22/2002 10:30 AMKitchen has arrived
Kitchen has arrived
03/13/2003 10:23 AMHey! The kitchen has been delivered! -Terje...
Help Has Arrived For Norvergence
Customers!
Help Has Arrived For Norvergence
Customers!
07/17/2004 03:15 AMwww.SaveOnCommunications.com offers a helping hand to Norvergence
customers. [PRWEB Jul 17, 2004]
WiFi VoIP Has Arrived
WiFi VoIP Has Arrived
10/28/2003 11:06 PMThe name Jeff Pulver is synonymous with Voice over IP. He co-founded
Vonage, Free World Dialup, and the Voice On...
Help Has Arrived For Michigan Business
Owners!
Help Has Arrived For Michigan Business
Owners!
09/22/2004 02:13 AMwww.SaveOnCommunications.com offers a helping hand to SBC Business
Customers in Michigan! [PRWEB Sep 22, 2004]
Grok Description matches for Have Micropayments Arrived For Real?
GrokA matches for Have Micropayments Arrived For Real?
Have Micropayments Arrived For Real?
