21–30 of 59 posts
Why do they need to charge 10% service fees if they want a "free" society?
- To put the button on your website you have to also be a paying Flattr user (pay a minimum of €2/month).
- You are forced to pay a hefty 10% cut of everything you earn to Flattr. Also, you further have to pay all PayPal fees (those are not included in the 10% Flattr cut). And possibly taxes depending on where you live.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
To flattr the OP or HN? If it's the first one, that could be deeply controversial (see also: the squawk on Metafilter about the same thing).
I do it for the submitter on my site. I understand why some might think it is controversial, however. Actually, it might be best to keep it to comments only. -That's user created content. I'm going to consider that for my site. Thanks.
Flattr is not rare on German sites and those who use it seem to be doing reasonably well if they are fairly well known. Tim Pritlove, for example, (a podcaster) is making close to 2.000€ per month (chart and German blogpost: http://tim.geekheim.de/2011/04/14/ein-jahr-flattr/ ).
The european/american thousands separator always manages to confuse me for a second: "Two Euros a month? Who gives a crap?"
"It is an incredibly simple process and there is no downside."
is:
"The minimum amount of money needed to continue use of Flattr is €2 (about $3) each month"
I love how immediately following: "It is an incredibly simple process and there is no downside." is: "The minimum amount of money needed to continue use of Flattr is €2 (about $3) each month"
Can I disable/inactivate my account?
- No. As long as there's money in your means
account, these will be used each month. When they
run out your account will be deactived until
you add more funds.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The european/american thousands separator always manages to confuse me for a second: "Two Euros a month? Who gives a crap?"
I hear a lot of people saying that. Interesting, however, is that I, as European, don't even think twice about it[1]. My brain must be wired to look at the context primarily. Why that is, I can only take a stab at: I guess we see a lot more from you guys on the other side of the pond than you see from us. :) [1] Comma overload -- my English teacher would kill me.
Even within Germany, there's no consensus about where to put the Euro sign (before or after). Americans don't write times like 20:00 and say "eight" aloud. After several years in Europe, I'm fairly adept at accepting all inputs.
I love how immediately following: "It is an incredibly simple process and there is no downside." is: "The minimum amount of money needed to continue use of Flattr is €2 (about $3) each month"
Another fun feature, from the FAQ: Can I disable/inactivate my account? - No. As long as there's money in your means account, these will be used each month. When they run out your account will be deactived until you add more funds. I signed up thinking Flattr was a way for people to pay me who hate paypal. It turns out it's not anything like that, at all. But there's no way to immediately get off Flattr and close my…
Maybe Flattr should do that as well. For example they could extend the service so that you could put a button on your website which when someone presses it, it pays a fixed amount from their website to yours, which could be used as an easy-to-use micropayment scheme allowing people to pay for content.
I don't completely think that this is an execution issue. Do we really think there is a large market out there for "flattr-ing" blogs and other sites? I don't know how many people would pay for/donate to something they're getting for free. Something about not buying a cow when you're getting milk for free comes to mind...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I do it for the submitter on my site. I understand why some might think it is controversial, however. Actually, it might be best to keep it to comments only. -That's user created content. I'm going to consider that for my site. Thanks.
Not just controversial. Getting Flattr'd for things you didn't create can get you banned (1). Comments would be ok though. [1] http://flattr.com/support/faq