3 ms·
In-app-purchasing in games relies on conditioning the user across many hours of gameplay. 98% of users never take the bait. Roughly 0.15% of users make up 50%
by hapless 11y ago
In-app-purchasing in games relies on conditioning the user across many hours of gameplay. 98% of users never take the bait. Roughly 0.15% of users make up 50% of the revenue.
In short: I don't think the "skinner box" model is relevant to web content. I can't set up a pain/pleasure response in readers and condition a tiny fraction of them to pay vast sums after 10 to 50 hours of engagement. That's not an option in journalism.
(Not that this has stopped the FT from trying it: $1 for a one-month trial, $480 a year for a subscription. I wonder how good the conversion rates are?)
- MikeTV 11y agoIAP in freemium games is often a substitute for time (grinding or waiting). I wouldn't pay 5¢ for an article, but I might pay 1 token for a well-written summary of an article with the main points highlighted, if a quick skim identifies that the article is interesting.
- fraserharris 11y agoCould 98% be an artifact of the 100's of millions of people who have tried social games? 2% is at least in the high millions if not low 10s of millions of people. I (and it appears a significant number of others) ended up paying for the Economist - the 10 articles free / month was conditioning enough.