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Ask HN: Why aren't micropayments a thing?

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Re: Ask HN: Why aren't micropayments a thing?

#141

Post by auxym »

setr wrote: post #136
phoinix wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At the gaming industry, noone i know of that plays chess has implemented this. At Lichess there millions and billions of games played each month and they don't pay with micropayments for each game. Other chess websites charge monthly fee. Micropayments are a hassle for any system that has people, actual human organisms, being responsible for a gazillion of small transactions. The involvement of a human increases the…

The common solution to the flat-cost-per-transaction problem is to use not-money. Do microtransactions with company script, and buy the script in bulk units (eg 100 NYT coins for $5) Which is generally how games do it

FYI, I think you mean "scrip".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scrip

Re: Ask HN: Why aren't micropayments a thing?

#142

Post by 0xy »

phoinix wrote: post #135
paxys wrote: post #114

People are mentioning technical & payment processing hurdles, but those are all easy to figure out. Look at the gaming industry, mobile app stores, iTunes, online gambling, toll booths, tipping on various online platforms. Micropayments are most definitely already a thing, and have been for a while. A better version of your question is – why do newspapers charge for a monthly subscription instead of a per-article fee…

At the gaming industry, noone i know of that plays chess has implemented this. At Lichess there millions and billions of games played each month and they don't pay with micropayments for each game. Other chess websites charge monthly fee. Micropayments are a hassle for any system that has people, actual human organisms, being responsible for a gazillion of small transactions. The involvement of a human increases the…

That's because the average chess player would rather pay a $9.99/month subscription than pay $0.10/game. Even if they played less than 100 games a month this would be true.

Consumers despise paying for usage. They'd rather pay a monthly fee and have unlimited usage.

Re: Ask HN: Why aren't micropayments a thing?

#143

Post by paxys »

phoinix wrote: post #135
paxys wrote: post #114

People are mentioning technical & payment processing hurdles, but those are all easy to figure out. Look at the gaming industry, mobile app stores, iTunes, online gambling, toll booths, tipping on various online platforms. Micropayments are most definitely already a thing, and have been for a while. A better version of your question is – why do newspapers charge for a monthly subscription instead of a per-article fee…

At the gaming industry, noone i know of that plays chess has implemented this. At Lichess there millions and billions of games played each month and they don't pay with micropayments for each game. Other chess websites charge monthly fee. Micropayments are a hassle for any system that has people, actual human organisms, being responsible for a gazillion of small transactions. The involvement of a human increases the…

Look at how much money Fortnite, GTA Online, FIFA, Clash of Clans etc. are making. If there is a business justification for it then every problem you mentioned above will be solved.

Re: Ask HN: Why aren't micropayments a thing?

#144

Post by phoinix »

0xy wrote: post #142
phoinix wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At the gaming industry, noone i know of that plays chess has implemented this. At Lichess there millions and billions of games played each month and they don't pay with micropayments for each game. Other chess websites charge monthly fee. Micropayments are a hassle for any system that has people, actual human organisms, being responsible for a gazillion of small transactions. The involvement of a human increases the…

That's because the average chess player would rather pay a $9.99/month subscription than pay $0.10/game. Even if they played less than 100 games a month this would be true. Consumers despise paying for usage. They'd rather pay a monthly fee and have unlimited usage.

Consumers are different with one another. I would gladly pay, for something i like, a bit more money to have some luxuries. A faster car may be it, or maybe i pay to lichess, to pair me for a game with good players, so as not to be cheated for example. Or maybe analysing my games, with some state of the art chess engine to spot mistakes or improvements. Other chess players however may not be so keen about more, just play a game and that's it.

Re: Ask HN: Why aren't micropayments a thing?

#145

Post by DoreenMichele »

You can give someone as little as a dollar via a service like PayPal. In the world today, that's pretty small.

I think the endless discussion of a desire for "micropayments" is just another excuse for "We don't really want to pay for content and we imagine if you get it down to a penny, that's so close to zero, we think it would basically be free."

I imagine if someone solved it, there would be some new complaint (like "Do you know how many articles I click into each week? I am getting charged a penny for every single one! This is killing me!")

The internet doesn't like paying writers/content producers. The internet loudly objects to every means to pay content producers: ads, content marketing, tip jars, etc. It all gets decried by someone, somewhere for existing at all.

People basically think content producers are supposed to be slave labor and then don't like it if you put it that way.

Edit: to be clear, I think chasing the mythical beast of "If only we had micropayments, then we could pay for content!" is like friends who say "If I won the lottery, I would give you half." What they really mean us that in theory they would like to do something for you, but in reality they aren't going to do anything for you in the here and now and probably would change their mind if they really won.

Both winning the lottery and solving the micropayments problem are sufficiently long shot that you probably won't have to pay up. It's frequently code for "I wish you people could get paid. It's sad that writing is slave labor. But I don't want to give you my hard earned money."

Re: Ask HN: Why aren't micropayments a thing?

#146

Post by phoinix »

paxys wrote: post #143
phoinix wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At the gaming industry, noone i know of that plays chess has implemented this. At Lichess there millions and billions of games played each month and they don't pay with micropayments for each game. Other chess websites charge monthly fee. Micropayments are a hassle for any system that has people, actual human organisms, being responsible for a gazillion of small transactions. The involvement of a human increases the…

Look at how much money Fortnite, GTA Online, FIFA, Clash of Clans etc. are making. If there is a business justification for it then every problem you mentioned above will be solved.

Human fraud is not an easy problem to solve. Micropayments can enable a fraudster to commit microfrauds, and by the time someone else finds about it, it's too late. The incentive of internet companies to solve it is huge, i however argue that the best way to solve it, is with an immutable public ledger fully automated which records pseudonymous transactions. Fully automated by proof of work machines, and no human involvement in the transactions.

Re: Ask HN: Why aren't micropayments a thing?

#147

Post by freeone3000 »

benlivengood wrote: post #122
paxys wrote: post #114

People are mentioning technical & payment processing hurdles, but those are all easy to figure out. Look at the gaming industry, mobile app stores, iTunes, online gambling, toll booths, tipping on various online platforms. Micropayments are most definitely already a thing, and have been for a while. A better version of your question is – why do newspapers charge for a monthly subscription instead of a per-article fee…

> A better version of your question is – why do newspapers charge for a monthly subscription instead of a per-article fee? The simple reason is that the numbers just don't work out. They'd have to charge a lot per article and have people pay for a lot of them to break even with the current subscription or ad-supported model, and that's not going to happen. And even if they do, there would just be too much day-to-day…

> ASCAP isn't even exclusively licensed

I think this might actually be the innovation here. Artists can use their normal distribution channels, and also sign up for ASCAP because, why not, it's free money. If enough people do this, they become a very useful distributor simply due to the size of their catalog.

Re: Ask HN: Why aren't micropayments a thing?

#148

Post by [deleted] »

paxys wrote: post #143
phoinix wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At the gaming industry, noone i know of that plays chess has implemented this. At Lichess there millions and billions of games played each month and they don't pay with micropayments for each game. Other chess websites charge monthly fee. Micropayments are a hassle for any system that has people, actual human organisms, being responsible for a gazillion of small transactions. The involvement of a human increases the…

Look at how much money Fortnite, GTA Online, FIFA, Clash of Clans etc. are making. If there is a business justification for it then every problem you mentioned above will be solved.

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: Why aren't micropayments a thing?

#149

Post by 1ark »

zaptheimpaler wrote: post #104

The problem is the mental overhead, not the fee. If every single article click adds an extra mental overhead of "is this worth paying for? how much have i spent this month on reading?", people will simply stop clicking. Headlines are already super optimized to get you to click. The impact of a mental tax before every click would be at least -10x a good headline and seriously puts the media company at risk of bankrupt…

We've seen this play out in the Apple App Store over a decade. Paid games, a dollar, were quickly left in the dust by freemium titles. Bypassing "is this worth paying for?" and replacing with "is this worth installing?" Once you are emotionally invested in a game, you pay, not before.

Re: Ask HN: Why aren't micropayments a thing?

#150

Post by setr »

auxym wrote: post #141
setr wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The common solution to the flat-cost-per-transaction problem is to use not-money. Do microtransactions with company script, and buy the script in bulk units (eg 100 NYT coins for $5) Which is generally how games do it

FYI, I think you mean "scrip". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scrip

You’re correct.
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