2010-12-16 12:45 am
Flattr Social micropayments by admin
When speaking about innovation and new business models, people tend to come up with all sorts of things, not all of them being equally well thought-out. Today I would like to share my thoughts on Flattr.
People at Flattr are good at identifying the problem, that's for sure. There is a lot of online content, crafted by people who would like to get rewarded in more than a "great job" way. Even I sometimes would like to get a few cents for replies I give on helpdesk boards and such... It would be a great thing if we could - in a way - pay people for things we find to be helpful.
Flattr offers you the possibility to donate a small amount to things you like on the web (and have a Flattr button). If you click ten different Flattr buttons, your monthly amount will be spread over these ten authors. Great, not?
Will the system kick off or not?
I - Money in advance
First of all I have my doubts about people giving away any money in advance or, to put it in other words, make a payment plan on something they haven't yet looked at. I don't think it is in anyone's, how should I say, "payment culture" to do anything like that in real life, let alone over the internet.
II - Payed according to the users' activity level?
As clearly said in the introduction video, your amount might be divided over ten people, or a hundred people, depending on how many links you click that month. That's a rather strange way of doing business when looking at it from the publisher's side. Your Flattr'd article might bring you €0,20 a click or €0,01 a click, not depending on its quality but more on the activeness of your visitor on other sites. It gets worse when you start thinking about which people would be subscribing for Flattr, people willing to pay. They will also encounter this feeling of "being dishonest towards an author" when making his article one of your hundred clicks, while you know it might be the best article in ages.
III - There's good and excellent
People like rating so again not every click should have the same weight. I would rather subscribe to a system that let's me choose how good I think something is.
IV - Take off?
I'm not sure about yet another -r service. The web is filled with "likes" and "stumbles" and "tweets"... if one of those services implements your idea, you're out. And as one of the video comments on the Flattr introduction video clearly states, there is a lack of instant gratification by using the service as a publisher or as a user. Users can't yet find Flattr buttons, publishers will not be very likely to already find many Flattr users so there won't be "lots of small amounts" coming in. The service will not take off unless you find some way of integrating with something that already exists or some major site...
Just my two cents
On the overall, Flattr makes you loose control over your spending, and I'm not fond of that. I would suggest a Flattr 2.0 with the following features:
- Make people choose the amount when clicking. (Make them choose from a few options, no input field.) This way people can more accurately "rate", and boy do we love rating.
- No fixed amount a month. If I don't want to spend anything, that should be fine. If I want to spend €200, let me do it, without the hassle. It's voluntary payment, remember? This way, you also pay when you have the feeling of having received something (like having read a great article).
Learn more on flattr.com
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