pay for digital social spaces
exploring a future of digital social spaces / networks where users pay
pay for digital social spaces
While Meta’s paid messaging tools brought in about $1 billion last year — peanuts compared to the whopping $132 billion the company earned from ads — paid messaging revenue is growing far faster than ad revenue and has more than doubled since early 2023.
Issie Lapowsky • How WhatsApp ate the world
social.coop - Open Collective
opencollective.com
social.coop - a mastodon server that charges a membership fee
Imagine a geographically-local-oriented digital social space that’s funded by a mix of local city government (tax $$) and local big philanthropy, plus allows for small individual donations too. Like the ‘bricks’ or signage in a local library or museum, the people who contribute would be recognized publicly for their support. The money would go
... See moreI wish more media / subscription products didn’t have auto-renew as an unchangeable default.
Any time I see that - even if it says “cancel at any time” - it deters me from taking action in that moment because I’m worried about forgetting to cancel it later, and then getting charged $19.99 or whatever.
A better approach would be: we’ll charge you $10
... See moreIt may be more likely to be pay-to-play. Design takes time and effort. Content creation takes time and effort. Everything that goes into a shiny digital footprint – website design, hosting, platform service subscriptions – costs money. Compare this to a random book club meet-up advertised through a single flyer made by hand and stapled to a few... See more
Elise Granata • What We Lose When Optimizing Community
an argument against “pay to play”
🧠 The puzzle of vanishing member dues - Part 2
Saumya Gupta • Build IRL Newsletter #19
from BuildIRL team; exploring challenges builders have w/ “dues”
Membership Puzzle
membershippuzzle.org
It's almost like the equivalent of going to mom and pop shops, not relying on these bigger anomalies to dictate our spending habits and our viewing habits and our work habits. And I think that there's a future in this world where Patreons and OnlyFans and Substacks and all these things, we're going to start supporting each other
Rachel Nguyen
Become a supporter
read.cv
Read.cv / Posts - free plan or “name a fair price” (suggested $6/month), gets you some perks, including ‘supporter’ badge