Readability's new service
marco.org
Readability's new service
1–10 of 41 posts
Re: Readability's new service
#2The only pages I am using the Readability bookmarklet on are those that are impossible to read in their native design. Rewarding authors of such pages (and effctively excluding well-designed blogs from the rewarding process altogether) seems counter-productive. Also this gives them a tangible incentive to not improve the usability of their websites. I'm all for micropayng for the content, but this solution is backwards.
Re: Readability's new service
#3Seems to be a riff on flattr / kachingle / contenture / others I can't remember right now. The key difference is that they value-add through the Readability reformatting service.
I've seen this called a number of things -- crowd funding, social micropayments. I had the same basic idea (Contenture was closest) back in August 2008. By carefully hiding the idea I have parlayed my insight into literally zeroes of dollars.
Personally I call it microsubscription.
One thing that Readability have solved neatly is the problem of trustworthy allocations by requiring users to go through their application. My own secret sauce (apart from the business model) is a prototype secure protocol for tracking users in a fraud- and theft-resistant fashion without relying on a trusted application -- just a web browser.
While announcements like these continue to fill me with fear and dismay, watching the rise of Facebook over MySpace et al has taught me not to be such a giver-upper and to get into it. After the fashion of Messrs Page and Brin I am planning to do it as an honours project this year. Might as well double up on the benefits.
Re: Readability's new service
#4The only pages I am using the Readability bookmarklet on are those that are impossible to read in their native design. Rewarding authors of such pages (and effctively excluding well-designed blogs from the rewarding process altogether) seems counter-productive. Also this gives them a tangible incentive to not improve the usability of their websites. I'm all for micropayng for the content, but this solution is backwar…
If I understand the model correctly, they want you to browse various sites through their applet. They'll dish out money based on which sites you visit.
Re: Readability's new service
#5> ...give most of the proceeds to the authors of the pages you choose (by using the Readability bookmarklet on them, or adding them in other ways)
I'm glad "in other ways" was added there. To me Readability serves two purposes - To make long-form content nicer to look at, and to make awful websites bearable. I can understand people supporting providers of long, interesting articles, but I'd hate to accidentally donate to a site covered in obtrusive ads because I thought there might be some interesting content hidden somewhere.
Re: Readability's new service
#6I often feel like my reading on the Internet is more hurried and distracted. Part of that is due to the medium, but I wonder if part of it isn't due to the writing style of writing for the Internet. It will be interesting to see how writing on the Internet changes if this takes off.
Re: Readability's new service
#7The only pages I am using the Readability bookmarklet on are those that are impossible to read in their native design. Rewarding authors of such pages (and effctively excluding well-designed blogs from the rewarding process altogether) seems counter-productive. Also this gives them a tangible incentive to not improve the usability of their websites. I'm all for micropayng for the content, but this solution is backwar…
I agree, I only use Readability on sites that are difficult to read in their native format. It seems that the Readability guys are presupposing that most users use readability on everything, and that the user would be happy to see money going to sites the user likes and visits often. However, I don't really like most sites I end up using Readability on, and they also rarely need any more money. This will probably last a short time and spend most of its lifecycle entirely gamed by publishers.
Re: Readability's new service
#8super great idea but monetization strategy will fail or make 500 bucks a month divided over 5k pages...
Re: Readability's new service
#9The only pages I am using the Readability bookmarklet on are those that are impossible to read in their native design. Rewarding authors of such pages (and effctively excluding well-designed blogs from the rewarding process altogether) seems counter-productive. Also this gives them a tangible incentive to not improve the usability of their websites. I'm all for micropayng for the content, but this solution is backwar…
I agree, I only use Readability on sites that are difficult to read in their native format. It seems that the Readability guys are presupposing that most users use readability on everything, and that the user would be happy to see money going to sites the user likes and visits often. However, I don't really like most sites I end up using Readability on, and they also rarely need any more money. This will probably las…
Like eps, you've assumed that this application is like the Readability bookmarklet. It isn't. It's an almost completely different thing.
Here's the model.
1. Publisher embeds Readability code on their site.
2. Subscriber reads sites through Readability application.
3. When the Subscriber visits a known Publisher, Readability records the visit.
4. At the end of the billing period, Readability dishes out cash, divided up according to how many times the Subscriber visited each known Publisher.
I understand this model well because it is almost exactly the same model I dreamt up in 2008, that Contenture launched with circa 2009 and that Kachingle filed a business method patent application for in 2007 (as I recall). Not long ago another such company / site, Sprinklepenny, was up for sale on flippr.
Because I am a big sook, I pretty much gave up on this idea in late 2009 when I learned about Kachingle and Contenture. Since then Contenture have quit the field. Kachingle has remained but their site basically seems like a social network for crazy cat ladies. Flattr have gotten awesome publicity because of the PirateBay connection, but their model is flawed in that it requires all parties to pay in.
I am hoping to get back into this space myself this year. My advantage is technological -- basically a secure tracking protocol that doesn't require a special application or any buttons to be clicked. Other than that I'm probably doomed to fail, but fuck it, so was every other successful startup of the last 10 years.
Re: Readability's new service
#10My old readability bookmarklet isn't working now.