4 ms·

This pretty much combines the three things big media companies hate: - Someone else owning and displaying their content. - Someone else owning data on their v

by zapt02 10y ago

This pretty much combines the three things big media companies hate: - Someone else owning and displaying their content. - Someone else owning data on their viewers. - Not being able to set their own prices. For those reasons, I don't see any chance of serious publishers being interested in this sort of deal. There's just very little in it for them.

lhnz 10y ago
You wouldn't own or display their content, nor would you set their prices (you merely give them the option to collect micropayments from a central wallet). Also, all social media companies already have data on their audience - that's just the way things are. All publishers with paywalls have massive bounce-rates due to people not wanting to subscribe. This would help them make more money.
- zapt02 10y ago
  Micropayments on that level are a race to the bottom. Why read The Times content when you can be presented with a similar article written by some blogger. And why would media companies give Twitter any percentage of the cut? Twitter already supplies them with free traffic, it's in their mutual interest. Facebook tried a similar approach with Instant Articles and the only publications that have jumped on it are the ones that are desperate for revenues. Big media companies are playing the long game. Content is king. Regarding bounce rates, this is not as big of a deal as you think. There are many examples where paywalls have increased the overall revenue. https://medium.com/@getdrizzle/paywalls-are-on-the-rise-with-many-success-stories-3a7101f55bea#.9ziq3xn2o https://medium.com/@getdrizzle/paywalls-are-on-the-rise-with... In the end, news is a business like any other. The number of users doesn't matter, it's the size of their wallet that does.
  - lhnz 10y ago
    > Micropayments on that level are a race to the bottom. > Why read The Times content when you can be presented > with a similar article written by some blogger. Because "Content is king" [0]. I'm not talking about the big companies that publish clickbait and make money through advertising at scale. I'm talking about smaller, niche, high-quality magazines and newspapers that need to show people that they're worth subscribing to. And that would like a more granular version of a subscription that allows more people to read them (instead of having to make their content freenium or free). [0] You cannot talk about fungibility of publishers in one paragraph and then turn back on that to say 'content is king' in the next: you either believe one or the other.
    - zapt02 10y ago
      Fair point, but I think my meaning did not come across correct. Most articles today can be substituted with lower-cost versions of the same articles (news/reviews are good examples of this). There's your fungibility. Regardless though, publishers still hold onto their content, because it's one thing that Twitter/Facebook is lacking.

by zapt02 10y ago

lhnz 10y ago

You wouldn't own or display their content, nor would you set their prices (you merely give them the option to collect micropayments from a central wallet). Also, all social media companies already have data on their audience - that's just the way things are. All publishers with paywalls have massive bounce-rates due to people not wanting to subscribe. This would help them make more money.

zapt02 10y ago
Micropayments on that level are a race to the bottom. Why read The Times content when you can be presented with a similar article written by some blogger. And why would media companies give Twitter any percentage of the cut? Twitter already supplies them with free traffic, it's in their mutual interest. Facebook tried a similar approach with Instant Articles and the only publications that have jumped on it are the ones that are desperate for revenues. Big media companies are playing the long game. Content is king. Regarding bounce rates, this is not as big of a deal as you think. There are many examples where paywalls have increased the overall revenue. https://medium.com/@getdrizzle/paywalls-are-on-the-rise-with-many-success-stories-3a7101f55bea#.9ziq3xn2o https://medium.com/@getdrizzle/paywalls-are-on-the-rise-with... In the end, news is a business like any other. The number of users doesn't matter, it's the size of their wallet that does.
- lhnz 10y ago
  > Micropayments on that level are a race to the bottom. > Why read The Times content when you can be presented > with a similar article written by some blogger. Because "Content is king" [0]. I'm not talking about the big companies that publish clickbait and make money through advertising at scale. I'm talking about smaller, niche, high-quality magazines and newspapers that need to show people that they're worth subscribing to. And that would like a more granular version of a subscription that allows more people to read them (instead of having to make their content freenium or free). [0] You cannot talk about fungibility of publishers in one paragraph and then turn back on that to say 'content is king' in the next: you either believe one or the other.
  - zapt02 10y ago
    Fair point, but I think my meaning did not come across correct. Most articles today can be substituted with lower-cost versions of the same articles (news/reviews are good examples of this). There's your fungibility. Regardless though, publishers still hold onto their content, because it's one thing that Twitter/Facebook is lacking.