I sent letters to top newspapers asking for Lightning Network micropayments. Here are their responses so far.
Hello fellow Steemians and Crypto Investors,
The following is a combined version of the letters I sent to the most circulated newspapers that are currently behind paywalls asking for Lightning Network micro-payments.
Subject: Implement Lightning Network micro-payments and tear down these walls!
Hello Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, New York Times and many others,
I'm not going to pay $15 to $30 dollars a month for a subscription! These subscriptions add up and I'm only interested in a few of the articles anyway, not a full subscription. I would be way more likely to pay a few cents for a particular article I'm interested in.
Why don't you implement Lightning Network micro-payments? You will get a lot more revenue, a lot of hype from the crypto and millennial communities and, most importantly, look cool and like keeping up with the times. You can always maintain the old subscriptions, just give an option for advanced users to micro-pay for articles.
It's frustrating whenever an interesting article from your website appears on my Flipboard feed but you can only get to the paywall. I have Eclair wallet installed and ready to micro-pay for it but the option is not yet available.
Conversion rates on the subscription pages are likely very low. If you could capture even a small percent of all those readers you are currently losing revenues would increase dramatically and you can do it without removing the current subscription model. It could be as simple as a link saying "Buy this article for 20 cents", something like that. 20 cents doesn't sound like much but when they add up, especially because your paywall rejects are way more numerous than subscribers. You could also charge more for Breaking News and Exclusives.
I'd love to see journalism return to high profitability and thus be able to afford the investigative teams and resources it badly needs and also cryptocurrency micro-payments take off. I believe it's a match made in heaven!
Get in touch with Coingate, they are piloting a gateway for these kinds of micro-payments. (I'm not affiliated in any way with them. I just think micro-payments are cool and use them for other services such as Satoshis Place and Lightning Spin)
100 Merchants Can Now Trial Bitcoin's Lightning Network Risk Free
My best regards.
Washington Post (help@washpost.com):
“We have sent the comments to relevant departments”
Wall Street Journal (support@wsj.com):
“We have taken the liberty of forwarding your comments to upper management“
Financial Times (help@ft.com):
“You have a good point in suggesting Lightning Network micro-payments in which customers can use if they want to read an interesting article on ft.com. We take onboard your suggestion and hopefully one of the things that our marketing teams would consider.”
You can help by sending your own letters to their following public customer service emails addresses: help@washpost.com, support@wsj.com and help@ft.com
Have you sent similar letters to other online service providers asking for Micro-Payments? Which ones?
Do you believe micropayments can save journalism by making it profitable again without controlling sponsors, ads, and dreaded paywalls?
Feel free to share your thoughts on this post with the crypto community in the comments below!
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thanks for crypto information! thanks for sharing
If they want fiat support well there is https://opennode.co/
which combines the LN but also has fiat conversions
Send them emails, let them know. The more interest they see from the crypto and millennials community the better. All we need is one of the big ones implementing it and the rest will follow. regards!
Very cool! Didn't know about opennode. Thanks!
I didn't know about them either. Just joined their list and am going to try them out... thanks!
Ft seems actually interested with your suggestion. But as soon as they make something out of it, others will follow for sure.
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The more interest they see from the crypto and millennials community the better. All we need is one of the big ones implementing it and the rest will follow for sure like you say. regards!
I must say it is a brilliant idea. But can it scale? Will consumers be able to pay for specifics alone? And won't that kinda jeopardize the whole need to accommodate dissenting opinions? It is a brilliant idea and I see no reason why it should not be implemented if it can address some of the more pressing fears
so the lighting netwrok microrepayments is good?
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STOPi think most of them are interested with your suggestion, im sure vy fast they will make something out of it :)
Good idea for so many things. Cynic in me wonders if they think crypto type folk are worth the time hence some of the responses. Like when you miss out on a job interview and they say "we'll keep you on record" Or am I more cynical than even I realized.
Great initiative! These are worth exploring as they help adopting for real use of the cryptos today. In a digital world, they should also see the benefits of opening their business to these alternatives!
Thanks! Don't you hate it when you encounter those paywalls? I for sure do. I'm not lying when I say I would gladly micro-pay for some articles every now and then. Why do they make you pay for the whole enchilada? Makes no sense!
Brilliant idea, but honestly I figured they would just do this anyway since I can't imagine the pay walls being all that profitable. They are very old antiquated business model that just won't hold up or attract future subscribers over the long haul.
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