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Flattr 2.0 launches to the public

blog.flattr.net

61–70 of 147 posts

Re: Flattr 2.0 launches to the public

#61

The key to a concept like this is massive, massive adoption by content creators. Flattr has been around for 7+ years and it's still relatively non-existent. Heck, the subreddit has 63 subscribers. Don't get me wrong. I love the idea and was trying to pitch people for funding on this almost 10 years ago and never hit anything but a brick wall.

Classic chicken-egg problem. 1. Why should a creator subscribe if it's not going to be a relevant revenue stream? 2. Why should a consumer subscribe (at a fixed fee, no less) if their favorite creators do not support it?

Patreon solved this problem by being developed as a solution to the founder's own problem (getting paid), and priming it with his own fanbase. Do flattr's founders use it for their own creative work?

Re: Flattr 2.0 launches to the public

#62
post #52

This might seem super nitpicky (I apologize in advance), but the domain and blog UX needs a little fixing. My 30 second experience: - skim blog, yeah, looks good, heard of this before, hope they're successful, , whatever - click logo to try and get to main site - sent to blog.flattr.net instead - go to address bar, remove "blog." - 404 - ugh, maybe they're one of those that only left "www." to go their root page - ad…

For me, I have no idea what Flattr is and trying to read through their .com site gives me no insight really. I see it is supposed to be something that supports content creators and or creatives on the internet, but how and what?

It's like Brave payments https://www.brave.com/introducing-brave-payments/ but from Flattr

Re: Flattr 2.0 launches to the public

#63
post #59
post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never understood why they decided to coorperate with the AdBlock Plus creators. From a technology point of view, that might have been a gain for them. But does this outweigh the loss of the "trust in advance" that they would otherwise receive? Also, what's about the risk of being dragged into bad reputation? (Which might happen as soon as AdBlock Plus gets bad media coverage, once again.)

As Flattr 1.0 did not get any traction, my guess is that they went with AdBlock Plus creators (Eyeo) just because Flattr run out of cash and Eyeo was the one who offered to invest and later on to buy out. Simple math. Even though I'm not fan of what Eyeo have done in the past, fact that old team was able to continue to work on this, makes me hopeful, that this will not turn out to be some sort of malicious or grey ar…

> makes me hopeful, that this will not turn out to be some sort of malicious or grey area project

Looking at their "all-knowing, privacy-friendly algorithm", they are already there:

https://blog.flattr.net/2017/06/key-elements-of-the-new-flat...

Even the title is an oxymoron, let alone the scary description.

Re: Flattr 2.0 launches to the public

#65
post #52

This might seem super nitpicky (I apologize in advance), but the domain and blog UX needs a little fixing. My 30 second experience: - skim blog, yeah, looks good, heard of this before, hope they're successful, , whatever - click logo to try and get to main site - sent to blog.flattr.net instead - go to address bar, remove "blog." - 404 - ugh, maybe they're one of those that only left "www." to go their root page - ad…

i was going to say this, but you nailed it.

Re: Flattr 2.0 launches to the public

#68
post #63
post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As Flattr 1.0 did not get any traction, my guess is that they went with AdBlock Plus creators (Eyeo) just because Flattr run out of cash and Eyeo was the one who offered to invest and later on to buy out. Simple math. Even though I'm not fan of what Eyeo have done in the past, fact that old team was able to continue to work on this, makes me hopeful, that this will not turn out to be some sort of malicious or grey ar…

> makes me hopeful, that this will not turn out to be some sort of malicious or grey area project Looking at their "all-knowing, privacy-friendly algorithm", they are already there: https://blog.flattr.net/2017/06/key-elements-of-the-new-flat... Even the title is an oxymoron, let alone the scary description.

Even though it's scary topic, currently they are still in good standing. At least in my eyes. Even though they collect data (how else can you evaluate who to flattr), its stored locally and they do not send it off. If there will ever be a situation where they send something more than they should, this project is dead and there will be no way back.

Re: Flattr 2.0 launches to the public

#69
post #28

Some things to consider about Flattr: you have to install a web browser extension; the extension requires access to your full browsing history; it was bought by the parent company of Adblock Plus, Eyeo.

And they're explicitly tracking and logging it all to their servers:

> With the Flattr button it was only possible to flattr creators that joined Flattr. The new extension does not use the button so it does not need to know if there is a signed up receiver or not for flattrs. So simply put, if there is an owner they gets your money, if not the flattrs become the statistics we need to convince the creators.

Yikes. Don't use this, they clearly don't care about privacy.

Re: Flattr 2.0 launches to the public

#70
post #15
post #6

Seems like a lot of hassle. Why shouldn't creators just keep using Patreon? None of the buzzwords in the post would convince me to switch.

For creators: Because (assuming it gains a decent userbase) Flattr will give you money from people that not explicitly subscribe to you. For users: because it'll spread your contribution between people who made the content you consume, without individually selecting them and managing that distribution over time. It'll automatically distribute it between sites you visit. It doesn't handle the exact same thing as Patre…

I always appreciate one-off sales/donations, but they aren't really dependable the way a subscription is. You can't plan or invest around it unless the thing you make is the kind of thing that gets a hobby/business-sustaining amount of sales or donations.

A sale/donations says "this is cool." A subscription says "I want to see more of this." For the former, there are sites that popped up and got better established while flattr was twiddling its thumbs for 7 years. If I were going to ask for donations, I'd post a ko-fi link or a bitcoin address, not ask people to install an extension.

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