this post was submitted on 05 Jun 2023
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Technology

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How the web became unreadable (infosec.pub)
submitted 1 year ago by q5VtXnYt@infosec.pub to c/technology@lemmy.ml
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[–] aksdb@feddit.de 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I like your suggestion with easily payable small amounts. Because the way payment currently works is just not scale-able on an individual level. Sure, $20 per month for a technical news site would be worth it ... if that was the only news site you are consuming. But it isn't. I consume multiple tech news, local news, etc. I can't get back my full worth of spent money per site, because my time is split between multiple sites; and my time is finite.

I also can't just say "well, this month I consume only site A, next only site B, etc.", because that defeats how "news" work. In the end I skim headlines (or even sometimes content) and THEN it shows what is actually of interest and where I stay longer/dig deeper/actually read full.

In a perfect world we probably could have a "tip jar" at the end of every article that people throw in digital cash when the article was worth it. Unfortunately too many people would abuse it and simply not pay at all, so authors will have to ask for payment upfront ... but then I pay for something which I don't even know will be good. Maybe after seeing the full article (not yet reading it in detail) I realize it's not the kind of content I hoped for.

That thing was indeed easier with print media. You go to the store, flick through the magazine/paper and if you like it you pay for it and go read it.

[–] nhgeek@lemmy.ml 8 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

I worked for a startup in the 90s, pre-enshittification, that wanted to empower micropayments on the web. Obviously, even when mostly "frictionless", users rejected the concept. Capitalism is going capitalize, but this is also the fault of users who demand "free".

[–] interolivary@beehaw.org 8 points 1 year ago (1 children)

this is also the fault of users who demand “free”.

This is in my opinion the crux of the matter. People want content for free: they won't pay for it directly and they won't watch ads (because they're often much too intrusive.) Of course the root problem is the economic system, but barring a near global revolution that's not going to change

[–] argv_minus_one@beehaw.org 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Especially now that cost of living is through the roof. Who can afford to pay for content online when they can't even afford to feed themselves every day?

[–] interolivary@beehaw.org 2 points 1 year ago

I don't disagree with that at all, but content creators need to eat too