Awhile ago, someone mentioned to me that when analyzing problems I was able to provide a tapestry of detail about the issue, but I was depressing them. They further explained that my analysis showed a bleak future and that I offered no solution. In turn, I responded with the fact that my goal as a writer is to display what I see are problems in the world and carefully make you aware of them in an entertaining format. That, I am not a person who can produce a solution, but I am someone who has chosen to be the megaphone to rally the people around the problem, and in doing so, support those that are in a position to produce the solution.
But I did agree, if I had a possible solution, then I should present it. That same person read my previous post (Weaponizing the Internet) and engaged me in discussion to see if I was just ranting and raving or if I had a better model. Now, I sometimes forget where I have ranted and raved about issues – this blog is but a minor glimpse into the world of problems I discuss regularly. Normally, I have solutions floating around in my brain box. So here are some that would shift the way we consume:
Subscription Model
I am a strong believer in the subscription model. It forces me to use my resources and purchase only the things I need. However, it makes it difficult to find products or new content that I would enjoy, since I am probably not willing to spend money on something I haven’t consumed. Therefore, if you pair a true demo (not one where you take my credit card information and auto bill me when I forget to cancel my subscription) with a subscription model, you probably could entice me to spend money at your website every month. The reason is I can see what I am going to get and then I commit capital to continue getting that product.
Now we are seeing YouTube and Hulu perform subscription models to their services. That’s great, except they keep creating new subscriptions and the old new subscriptions get infected with advertisements as they move up through the different ranks of subscriptions. Netflix has learned not to fiddle with advertisements but had to raise their prices.
However, Netflix is one of the most successful models of a business using subscriptions for content delivery on the market. So, I would argue that subscriptions work.
Version Purchasing
This is an old model for selling software. Basically, children, the software you would use was purchased from a store and there was no way for a company (internet wasn’t strong enough yet) to push updates to you. As such, they sold you a bug free version of the software (taking them 3-6 years to develop) and then you kept that software forever. It was yours, you owned it, you could use it indefinitely and without spending a cent more. In order to get more money, they would create a new version of that software with a few new bells and whistles and would work hard to sell you that new product.
How this would apply to the internet content delivery system? No idea, but it is an option. It could definitely work with certain web applications – paying for your email so advertisements and datamining don’t happen to you.