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>I'm really glad all these ads are keeping this site in business. You know what would suck? Paying for Gmail and Facebook.
by brianwillis 16y ago
>I'm really glad all these ads are keeping this site in business.
You know what would suck? Paying for Gmail and Facebook.
- rimantas 16y agoWhy would it suck? What's wrong in paying for the product?
- zachrose 16y agoIt's an email address and a personal website. How expensive should it be to have a quality version of both?
- Udo 16y agoA few years ago I'd have agreed with that, but recently I changed my mind: why not pay directly for things you like? Ads on the web a scourge, they really do make the whole experience of using a site worse for the customer. And they can't really be a good deal for advertisers either. I can't remember the last time I ever clicked on an ad, and I definitely never purchased anything after clicking on a banner. Ads are a scam business. Sure, Facebook and Google are basing their business on it, but how long until this house of cards finally collapses? However, alternative models are scarce. Subscription-based sites mostly don't work. Donation-based models can be somewhat successful, but only with huge user bases and even then they'll never be as financially successful as the ad-based fantasy businesses of Facebook et al. I think a karma-based economy is worth exploring. For example, if everyone allocated an arbitrary sum each month to spend on services they like, then we would just need one or more payment services that distributed this sum among all the sites you gave "karma" to in a given month.
- mcantor 16y agoYou know what would be totally awesome? Paying for Gmail and Facebook so I don't have to deal with any fricking ads, and so I can expect a commensurate amount of commitment from the companies that run them.
- pfedor 16y agohttp://www.google.com/apps/intl/en/business/index.html http://www.google.com/apps/intl/en/business/index.html