Comments on: Your Subscription to the Social Web

By: Recent Links Tagged With "micropayment" - JabberTags

Recent Links Tagged With "micropayment" - JabberTags — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 19:34:23 +0000

[...] on Tue 16-12-2008 Pixel Mine Launches Fireteam Reloaded Saved by JazzyLemmon on Sat 13-12-2008 Your Subscription to the Social Web Saved by gsiemens on Tue 02-12-2008 Microphilanthropy is to traditional charity what dual core [...]

By: Joe Solomon

Joe Solomon — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 01:22:51 +0000

Rob – Way to go for sharing this idea! I think this idea has a lot of potential! My suggestion is to initially focus on one platform and empowering that platform’s content creators to earn revenue for their work. For me, the question is how do you empower YouTube stars to be a part of this program without YouTube being involved. Maybe it’s a separate chipin site just devoted to YouTube video makers — which as a video producer I could point my viewers to. Or maybe it’s a Firefox Extension that I could ask my fans to download and integrated with the YouTube site. Hmmmm….Lots of potential indeed!

By: BC Wilson

BC Wilson — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 17:22:10 +0000

This idea needs a diagram. Some sort of infographic to illustrate the relationships between the parts…I’ll get to it in a day or two if I can, but if anyone else is faster, please go ahead.

By: Max Gladwell

Max Gladwell — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 17:02:00 +0000

Will: That’s one way of doing it. I definitely see the foundation serving as the de facto role as an aggregator, but the services would have to opt in as well. If Twitter doesn’t want the $$, you can’t make them take it.

I also think the fees could be flexible. You could pay per photo, per friend, per post, or per month. I also see bloggers and vloggers as big participants, and there are millions. So it would be possible to centralize it but maybe just as easy to locate the opt-in at the point of consumption.

I also think there’s a way for people to pay YouTube video creators, as opposed to YouTube itself. If you’re logged in, you could opt to pay a couple pennies per view or maybe 25 cents per favorite…with a portion going to your charity of choice and a portion going to the creator’s charity of choice.

By: Will Boyd

Will Boyd — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 16:51:41 +0000

This is an interesting idea. I would definitely be willing to pony up monthly to ensure that the sites I love stay available. As I read the post, I kept thinking “Social Web Co-op”. I think the only way we will be able to protect the open nature of the social web is if we the consumers own it in some way. Your idea is definitely one way of doing so.

What, if anything, would change about your idea under the following scenario? A consumer could log onto the foundation’s website and choose to pay a monthly donation. That consumer would then be able to select all of the social web services that they use. That consumer’s monthly donation would then be divided between the web services. If the consumer stopped using one service, they could uncheck that service on their account at any time.

Just an initial thought. I’m sure there are lots of problems with it. I am excited about this line of thought, though. I don’t want to lose services like Twitter.

By: Holly

Holly — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 16:45:59 +0000

It’s good that you are talking about this. It’s true, people would pay for a more reliable twitter, but not everyone. The difficulty in creating a revenue sharing model is these services don’t charge a fee and some have no advertising. They seem to be buyout bait in most cases. I’m not sure if a foundation is the answer, but it’s good to get the discussion started somewhere. Thanks!

All the Best,
Holly
twitter.com/mobienthusiast

By: Max Gladwell

Max Gladwell — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 18:41:10 +0000

BC: The idea is for the foundation to facilitate the subscriptions and flow of revenue. One central platform that everyone can participate in. Sites shouldn’t have to take time away, like public radio, to promote it. They can mention it once in a while, and they can run advertising since ads on blogs and most of the web are not entirely disruptive like radio. For example, I’d have a simple button in the upper right part of the MG blog next to RSS where you’d opt in (or opt out) to subscribe. It could even be integrated with RSS. Simple and easy.

I have other ways that the foundation can sustain itself. It won’t need to take any of the fees that would otherwise go to social media providers, content creators, or good causes. All of that gets passed through.

Thanks for the comment!

By: BC Wilson

BC Wilson — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 18:22:25 +0000

Great idea, Max!

I think you’re on to something with the analogy to public radio. It’s a model for revenue-generation that works to support content in the public interest, rather than in private (corporate) interest. It takes a lot of work to maintain the model, and causes some disruption of the content flow (think pledge drives), but people put up with it because of the undeniable net benefit of having something like 11 months a year of uninterrupted, highly-informative programming.

One part of your idea did seem off, however. You suggest that none of the fees collected would support the foundation. I don’t know that this is a reasonable expectation. In the public radio example, a significant amount of the fees collected go to cover administrative overhead. I think as long as the total amount spent on administration is kept to a reasonable maximum, there should be no reason to preclude this for the Social Media Foundation, or whatever it would be called.

At any rate, I’m extremely interested. Let’s keep talking!