Why am I doing this?

Why is a cartoonist trying to patent a micropayment system, and what does one have to do with the other?!

Actually, it's not as far off from each other as you would think.  Ever since the Internet got started, cartoonists have been looking for a way to make money from their cartoons, and not just a few cents a month because someone accidentally clicked on one of your Google ads on your website.  No, I mean like every time someone clicks on one of your cartoons and reads it, you make a penny or two, directly supporting you, the cartoonist, and giving that cartoonist the opportunity to actually make enough money from their cartoons on the Internet to make some decent income from their efforts, and maybe even make enough to go part time or full time with it.  Wouldn't that be cool?!

I know, I know, what does this have to do with you and other non-cartoonists?  Bear with me, I'm getting there, I just have to explain a little background first.

Anyhow, so through the years cartoonists have tried just about every form of trying to make money from their content known to man, whether it's a PayPal donation button (begging button), subscriptions, selling merchandise with their cartoons on them, Google adsense, banner ads from website sponsors, and, even micropayments.... You name it, cartoonists have tried it!  But NONE of these methods supply a guaranteed income each time someone reads one of your toons.  And to make any money from ads, you have to have a lot of website traffic, and let's face it, most of us aren't cranking in millions of hits a month.

So after mulling this problem over for years, it pretty much came down to micropayments being the only sensible method.  But all the micropayment companies that had been tried so far had failed because of two primary reasons.

The first reason for their failure is credit card transaction fees. Micropayments by their very nature are purchases of very small amounts, typically for fractions of a penny up to about $1, but usually average only a few pennies. Most credit card transaction fees cost more than that, so it’s not practical for credit card companies to process micropayment purchases. Therefore, until a micropayment system can make it practical for the credit card companies to process small transactions, but still make the price website visitors pay for content reasonable, any internet micropayment system will fail.

The second reason micropayment systems have failed up to now is because of the prevailing attitude that everything on the internet is free, which has forced website owners and content providers to rely heavily on advertising models like Google’s Adsense, commercials before videos, or subscription models to generate revenue.

But for small or niche websites that don’t attract as many visitors as busier websites, or have the ability to attract large advertisers to pay for ad space on their website, their ability to make any money from their content is dramatically reduced.

While at the same time, over the last couple years, the recession has forced many newspapers and magazines and other niche publications to either fold or go online to try and survive, yet there are only so many advertising dollars available to go around, and those dollars usually go to the most popular sites, leaving the small local papers and niche publications and specialty sites out in the cold.

The solution is to monetize the internet and balance the playing field, giving small websites the same ability to generate revenue from their content as the large websites. This will create more competition for website visitors, which will encourage content providers to compete for the best content, keep content fresh and up to date, allow quality sites to become successful and bad sites to disappear, creating a much healthier internet.

And as the internet becomes more sophisticated, users are demanding more options and choices and the ability to customize those choices, which is something a blanket subscription model or advertising model doesn’t allow for, but micropayments do.

So what's the point? Who besides cartoonists would have a use for ala carte' internet? Well, anyone that has valuable content they would like to sell on a per view usage, such as:

 

• Newspaper articles
• Magazine articles
• Playing online games
• Archive access
• Web cartoons and comics
• How-to articles
• Tutorials
• Short stories and poetry
• Pornography
• Videos, - TV shows, music videos, tutorial videos, video sharing sites
• Informational articles
• Entertainment features
• Social networking sites
• Arts and Crafts patterns and instructions
• Website memberships or access to special areas on the website
• Purchasing downloads

 

 Okay, here it comes, the counter argument I hear the most... "But that will create an internet where I'm going to be nickel and dimed to death!"  or "That will make the internet only for the rich!"  Yes and no to both of those arguments.

 

As far as being nickel and dimed to death, yes, most people will tell you that they don’t want a pay internet, but it already is a pay internet and the currency is your time. It is getting harder and harder to access content without having to jump through some kind of advertising hoop or another before you can access that content, whether that’s having to watch a commercial before viewing a video or annoying pop-up ads that you have to close again and again. Monetizing the internet with an effective micropayment system that has you pay only for the content you use will cut back on unnecessary advertising, while directly supporting the content providers and websites you visit, which in turn will give them the capital to expand, grow, and provide better content.

 

Think about it, on YouTube, would you rather pay 2 cents to bypass the 30 second commercial and go directly to the video, or spend 30 seconds of your time each time you want to watch a video?  I don't know about you, but my time is more than worth 2 cents for 30 seconds!  But on the other hand, you'll still have the option of sitting through the commercial if you like.  Adding the option of a micropayment to content isn't a all or nothing deal, it can be a supplement to traditional ads. 

 

I'm not advocating monetizing every click on the internet either, no way!  All I want to do is level the playing field, so everyone with a website, big or small, has the same chance to fail or succeed as the other guy.

 

Thanks for your support!

 

Laters!

Geoff