Google, Micropayments, And Online Newspapers

Google's proposal to the Newspaper Association of America

This article has been making the rounds this morning among some of my friends: Google developing a micropayment platform and pitching newspapers: “‘Open’ need not mean free”.

This truly is the wild wild west.

Image via CrunchBase

Noone really has a clue. Newspapers are imploding left and right. News is more important than ever before. But newspapers are not? Journalists are not? Many people don't know how to square that circle.

Companies need focus. That is why Cisco outsources its manufacturing. And big companies don't necessarily do well in every little venture they paddle into. But Google is Google, and Google Checkout has been a minor hit, although, it has to be noted, in the aftermath of Google Checkout PayPal has only grown.

But micropayments, I believe, are a tougher nut to crack. PayPal did not show up in

Image via CrunchBase

the face of an imploding industry. It simply showed up.

Will people pay? Even small amounts? Will ads carry the day on their own? I don't know. I don't know anyone does.

We sure will see a lot of creative destruction in the space over the next few years.

My PayCheckr team has as good a chance as any, and I am sure there will be several players in the space.

(Disclaimer: I sit on the PayCheckr Board, and am a small part owner.)

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Netizen: The First Blog To Place The PayCheckr Button
The PayCheckr Promise
PayCheckr Potential
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Jay Leno Should Go On YouTube

Jay Leno: It's Not the Tonight Show. It's, Um, the Ten-ight Show Time 9/15 Everyone's asking how well Jay will compete against CSI. I wonder if his biggest rival, in the long run, isn't YouTube.

Jay Gets Bigger, NBC Gets Smaller
Leno to America: Goodbye! I’m Not Going Anywhere!
Jay Leno Is the Future of TV. Seriously Time The show could be a footnote, or it could make its host bigger than ever. But either way, the small screen is only getting smaller.

Comedy is not going anywhere. And Jay is funny as hell. What is being challenged is the business of television, the business of comedy on television. Jay could adapt to the business.

I say go on YouTube, produce one, and two and five minute clips. Embed ads in them. And produce a ton of the embeddable material: a Jay Leno joke on every conceivable topic that you can embed into your blog or website.

There would be a basic fee for the ads, and then a recurring fee based on how many times that particular clip got viewed.

I bet he would make more this way than doing his hourly thing on NBC.

I am suggesting ultimate fragmentation to a guy who many consider a holdover from the era of mass media. He might not like it.

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Tim O'Reilly Mentions Scott Heiferman On TechCrunch

Image by

Meetup

via CrunchBase

Scott 2.0, MeetUp.com 2.0
Social Networking: Where The Internet Comes Down From The Clouds

I just met Scott Tuesday evening: NY Tech MeetUp: Gravitas.

And now I read this gushing mention of him by Tim O'Reilly in TechCrunch: Gov 2.0: It’s All About The Platform. Makes me feel good. Scott started what I call a 5.0 company, one about face time. (Netizen: Web 5.0: Face Time) And he has executed well. And he has a sound business model. He charges organizers, organizers charge those who show up: everyone is happy. Wishing the guy all the best.

It’s important for the idea of “government as platform” to reach well beyond the world of IT. It was Scott Heiferman, the founder of meetup.com who hammered this point home to me. Meetup is a platform for people to do whatever they want with. A lot of them are using it for citizen engagement: cleaning up parks, beaches, and roads; identifying and fixing local problems.

In this regard, there’s a CNN story from last April that I like to tell: a

Image via CrunchBase

road into a state park in Kauai was washed out, and the state government said it didn’t have the money to fix it. The park would be closed. Understanding the impact on the local economy, a group of businesses chipped in, organized a group of volunteers, and fixed the road themselves. I called this DIY on a civic scale. Scott Heiferman corrected me: “It’s DIO: Not ‘Do it Yourself’ but ‘Do it Ourselves.’”

Image by

Tim O’Reilly / Flickr

via CrunchBase

Imagine if the state government were to reimagine itself not as a vending machine but an organizing engine for civic action. Might DIO help us tackle other problems that bedevil us? Can we imagine a new compact between government and the public, in which government puts in place mechanisms for services that are delivered not by government, but by private citizens? In other words, can government become a platform?

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Netizen: The First Blog To Place The PayCheckr Button

The promise of blogging is that anyone, but anyone can get published. The promise of PayCheckr is that any blogger, but any blogger can hope to make part or full time income blogging.

Image via CrunchBase

PayCheckr's beauty is that it economizes space. It is a button. It is small in size. It can be placed anywhere at your blog. I'd prefer to have it show at the bottom of all my blog posts, just like the Share This button.

It is so easy to create your particular PayCheckr button. Right now you don't even have to register. You pick and choose your channels, and, voila, your button is ready for you. Copy and paste your code.

Image via CrunchBase

I have started out with four channels.

1. PayPal Donate
2. Amazon Affiliate: my favorite channel
3. Ad Supported
4. My Blog's Kindle Subscription

I recommend the Amazon Affiliate program to all bloggers out there. I think your Amazon store has to go with the theme of your blog. If your blog is about digital cameras, your Amazon storefront will do brisk business if it displays digital cameras.

There is one bottleneck with using the PayCheckr button. You can't blame the button if yours is not a high traffic, great content blog. PayCheckr has not made me rich yet, but I think it is because my blog is not yet the high traffic, much linked to blog that I am working to make it. The onus is on me.


But you don't want to wait until you are a large traffic blogger before you put a PayCheckr button on your blog. Do it now. Do it right away. Get people into the Amazon store through your blog.

The PayCheckr button is beautiful for how little space it takes. It is so not intrusive.

I am obviously leading by example here. My blog Netizen was the very first blog to get a PayCheckr button. I want 10 million bloggers to follow my lead. That will allow you to experiment with various business models for your blog.

Every blog is a storefront. PayCheckr can turn every blog into a storefront. Take the plunge.

In a few months you should be able to have tens of revenue channels for your blog, and the button does not get fat in the process at all. Same small space, many different revenue models. You tweak to your heart's fill.

Go to PayCheckr and get your button now. In about 10 seconds, you will be in business.

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(Disclaimer: I am a small part owner, and part time team member of PayCheckr.)