Re: Micropayments are Crap

[bryce@digicash.com]

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Simon Spero wrote something like:
>
>  Micropayments allow each author to be her own wire-service. _This_ will 
> be the triggering point for the new media. These services can be combined 
> into edited newspapers without the editors needing to set up complex 
> traditional arrangements (I'd pay for John Young's Daily News :)
> 
> Freedom of the Press belongs to those who own the vending machines


There are three things necessary for the New Media Paradigm to
take full effect:

1.  Many-to-many connectivity.  Check.  (infinite bandwidth blah
   blah..)
2.  Micropayments.  Coming soon to an electronic wallet near you.
   (Ecash(tm), bearer bonds, cheap tokens, coupons, blah blah..)
3.  New ratings systems.  Um...  Well, it would be easy to do 
   but few people seem to have really caught on to it yet.  
   I remain hopeful that it will come to pass as millions more
   come on-line and cetera.  I suppose having a certificate
   standard and a public key authentication infrastructure might
   help, although I secretly suspect that the good ole' Web O
   Trust would be sufficient for this purpose.  (After all, you
   only really take ratings from people you know, right?  Or
   people who have a "reviews" column in your local newspaper.)


Of course, despite all of our fond techno-utopian daydreams,
there is no telling whether this New Media Paradigm with its
absolute freedom-of-the-press and its free (or at least cheap)
presses is going to be good or bad for the current pop-culture
millionaires and the ugly tripe that they peddle.


Bryce

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