Solution to piracy: Micropayments?
 

Paypal is reported to be working on a micropayment platform http://techcrunch.com/2010/10/06/pay...er-conference/

My thoughts:

As shown by Western movie distributors in some Asian markets, piracy goes down when the price of content goes down. The end effect is the market gets larger and more segmented (and more lucrative).

Do you think micropayments--pay per play, pay per view, etc (as opposed to membership / recurring systems) would slow down the damage done by wholescale piracy?

The cost benefit analysis tips easier to the content producer's favor because why download a shitty vid for free when you can get a high quality version for close to free? Also, wouldn't micropayments turn FREE (but crappier quality) CONTENT into VIRAL TEASERS that would drum up demand/branding even more?

please please no innovative solutions. we would rather sue...my divorce lawyer is handling all THAT...thanks.

Micropayments is the solution.... its needs to be seemless and easy for the customer.

I've been saying this for 7-8 years.

lots of processors offer micropayments - don't see why this is so innovative?

trying to convert those micropayments people to memberships or something more profitable is a whole different ball game though

That's because people will only pay what shit is worth and porn aint worth a whole lot these days. Sure, certain niche / interactive stuff is but regular paysites? Pfffffff

its a good idea, but will definitely have an impact on a lot of things now.

taking this into adult, isnt this just like a version of clips4sale?

outside of adult, id love to see this on first run movies. i hate going to the theatre and wait until its out on bluray or Vudu to watch it. Id easily pay $15 or more to view the movie in my own house

You raise an interesting point. Wouldn't this PUSH content producers to LISTEN to their audience better and produce HIGHER QUALITY materials? Long term WIN WIN?

Which processors current offer payment of a nickel?

PayPal micropayments would probably just be used by the file-sharing hosts for downloads of stolen content. They laugh all the way to the bank together with PayPal.

few cents per tube vid watch, and you will make millions that way :)

yes i got one sponsor who changed to "almost" micropayments...before i earned with him over 300 $ each months, now it's barely 150........

eh

I agree.

No! I still want to pay $25 for a DVD-movie I want to watch just once and $75 for a boring PC-game that haven't even released a demo, just a fucking trailer!

Prices are so fucked up and people are whining about piracy and don't understand why people download their shit.

Micropayments might be the solution. In the US you got Netflix where you can see how many movies and TV-shows you want for ~$8/month, right? I'm sure something like that would work in Sweden too. But the kind of services we got is priced at x5 the price of Netflix. I wont pay that much, I rather download everything I want.


We got Spotify in Sweden. Since I got my hands on it I haven't downloaded a single MP3 except from the artists material I cant find on Spotify.

I can choose between paying a couple of dollars each month or listen to commercials once in a while and it's fine by me.
The artists that haven't got their shit on Spotify doesn't get a cent from me.

I'm glad to see a few sensible people around here. Most sites are overpriced and the economy isn't going to make it all better anytime soon.

Hell no. Clips4Sale is the ghetto version of micro-payments thrown online by greedy ass adult webmasters that can't see the big picture.

A real micro-payment would be something like "Watch this video for only 25 cents!"

If it were adopted by a large chunk of the industry with ONE main processor money would be flying everywhere.

Exactly. Plus adult programs would be selling MICRONICHE / CUSTOMIZED content. That's the other prong of the solution to piracy--selling an experience/microniche custom content targeting only a small group of afficionados.

Some glimmers of future directions of digital media monetization?

you have any clue how hard it is to get someone to take out their credit card and buy somethign from you? 50% get declined due to scrubbing no matter wtf you charge. The other 50% are so horny they are wiling to pay whatever the fuck you want to charge them usually. Anyone who knows how this business really works, would know micro payments is retarded.

oh and charging .05 per movie is not micropayments. that is charging some guy $50 then deducting .05 per movie he watches. big fucking difference. what idiot is gonna bust out his cc for a .05 movie.

You are the one stuck in the 90's. A 2 hour fucking movie costs $1 to rent these days. The reason you are dealing with 50% yes and 50% no customers is your price point. It is a proven fact that once you price something in the impulse buy range that many more people will pony up.

No shit? That is why I said ONE processor to charge the cards and delegate as it is spent. Hard aint it? :1orglaugh

For first time customers, let a 3rd party, like the payment processor, offer safe account and a personal email where he can administrate, organize and watch/download his purchases from different paysites.
"Add to chart which HD movies you want to download or watch for X cents per movie".
Make it browseable by models, categories, price etc.
Market it with previews, also for tubes.
Generate difference and variety for marketing instead of everyone using same streams.
Optimize by popularity and feed new releases.
Give offers and on less popular movies and bonus based on amount of purchase.
Introduce a feed that can show the price/offers live on the websites marketing it.
Introduce better and more payment options. SMS and virtual prepaid cards that can be used across programs.
Centralize the model and stimulate competition with quality instead of shady high payout for affiliates.
Encourage production with a central database where paysites can bid on standard or unique content.
Attach a unique digital fingerprint on downloaded movies, but also tell the buyer he "owns" this movie for personal use.
Hire a common law firm to deal with piracy.

Micropayments for DLC on the PS3 and XBOX 360 have made them both big bucks.

Some of the best games this year, have been cheap and downloadable.

The webcam business has worked on putting money into a credit wallet and it being spent as the minutes tick by for years. Adapting that to a paysite would be easy, I imagine.

Convincing affiliates to send traffic where $30 in a members wallet will last him 3 months or more is the problem.

I don't think it would be difficult. The affiliate would just have to be offered a life-time 50% revenue share.

wallets /= micropayment

The problem is the idiots have been banging cards for 10 years now and doing all sorts of stuff. Most surfers aren't going to believe them when they say they are only taking 25 cents. Something like paypal (third party) might help but most surfers don't trust the industry.

The best way to slow down piracy would be to charge a bandwidth premium to those that use 10 times more than the average user. If some guy that's downloading 2 blu ray movies a day finds out he has to pay a $60 over-usage surcharge, he'll just start buying DVD's instead -- or not. I guess he could just say, "I wouldn't have bought it anyway.":)

Micropayments are great but it has to be done by a popular & trusted reputable payment processor, would be good if paypal allowed porn.

The best model for a porn site today IMO is one that doesn't even require membership, just put all your content out there, with free samples and $1/$2 pic set / clip downloads.

If you want proof look at iTunes, people used to pay $30 bucks a CD too, now they DL songs they like for 0.99c and everybody's happy.

All porn sites I know that used micropayments (sold clips 1 by 1 for example), died.

:2 cents:

We actually have a lot of sponsors that offer micro payments for countries that can't use credit cards, thus allowing those customers in hard to bill countries the option to purchase their content. :2 cents:

You have a point. That's why with micropayments, it becomes a HUGE POSSIBILITY that the TONS of FREE STUFF floating out there, instead of ERODING the value of the premium content for sale, would act as VIRAL BRANDING tools. They act as mere funnels for highly targeted, highly converting, EXPERIENCE-BASED/MICRONICHE content.

Win win solution?

Anything is better than the current solutions of piling on more free porn.