Amazon Starts 'Tip Jar' System

BeFiend writes "Looks like Amazon is trying to develop a "micro-payment" tip jar system for Web sites. They're calling it the Amazon Honor System and looks like you can give as little as a buck, while that's not really a micropayment it is a step in the right direction. I've only seen a couple of sites BBspot and SatireWire with the pay box already, but I'm sure we'll see them popping up all over the place with banner ad revenue plummeting." Amazon says says they don't track you on sites that use this system, even though since the payment box is served from their servers, they easily could (indeed, Amazon's regular No-Privacy Policy directly conflicts with the above page - which one controls?). And Amazon takes a hefty chunk of each payment in processing fees. But perhaps this model could be useful for sites which need cash but don't want to serve advertising.

Truly annoying

From the satirewire tipbox:
"Shoeboy, you CAN save a dotcom. This is one."
That's truly annoying. Any time I see my nick, I look. Even my parents call me shoeboy. It's more recognizable to me than my real name.
If this thing takes off, I'm going to have to delete my amazon cookies. The last thing I want is to have my attention drawn to advertisements.
God, imagine if they applied this tech to banner adds.
--Shoeboy

Re:I tried, it's failed.

First, your site is called Bangable, rate chicks and stuff... your clientel might not be into donating money. Second, your site is a ripoff of so many other sites... (there's event a rate the Rating Sites site out there!). Third, why would I donate to you? What do you offer me exactly? I could easily take my $1 and give it to something more charitable, or at the very least, a site that interests me on a daily basis and keeps me informed/smiling/whatever. Rating sites just plain don't do it.

Answer: PayPal

Isn't X.com's pay pal doing the same exact thing but at no cost to either the recepient and the person payng? (I think they have a small fee on larger accounts though)

Places like blogger.com have been having paypal funding drives where they asked people interested in helping out to send money by paypal, and as far as I know these have been pretty successful.

I guess this may not be sufficient prior art for the USPTO though...

Oh thank God...

...I thought it said, "Amazon Starts 'Jar Jar' System". I was about to have a heart attack... I mean just imagine, that idiot Gungan keeping track of your purchases...

Finally

Finally some big players are moving towards building a viable voluntary payment system. After all, we know that the barriers to building this system are more political than technical.

In a world where you can't stop people from copying your work (unless you never release it), I think artists and authors will find that they make the most money by letting their work spread into as many hands as possible and make it as easy as possible for people to tip the artist, no matter where they get the work from.

The Grateful Dead pioneered this model by giving away their live performances. Phish showed that anyone could become successful this way, it was not something unique to the Grateful Dead. Now there are a bazillion Jam Bands [jambase.com] that allow recording [wagnerone.com] and trading of their concerts. Pretty soon they will be able to actually get income directly from tape trading as well!

Burris

Amazon's Micropayment Strategy

I'm beginning to see a pattern in some of Amazon's actions: they think the micropayment business is beginning to take off, and they want in. You'll notice that zShops and Amazon auctions don't require you to pay through Amazon, but they do make it difficult.

So they come up with a slightly slicker version of Paypal's Web Accept [paypal.com] program. (One of Amazon's innovations is a personalized greeting on the payment button -- a feature that may backfire given the privacy issues.) But everyone's going to ask, Doesn't Paypal already do this? And why should an emerchant use Amazon -- a competing emerchant?

So they don't market the thing as a micropayment system. They call it a "tip jar" system, which makes it sound like something new, and gives them a foothold in small sites that are noncommercial or don't compete with Amazon. That creates "brand awareness" (a holy concept with this company) and a chance to get a foothold in a market dominated [pbs.org] by Paypal.

I think the whole thing's gonna be a big bust. Paypal has done a good job of designing a simple, usable payment system and building a loyal customer base. The Amazon payment systemis one of those half-assed initiatives that works better as a Powerpoint presentation than in the real world.

__________________

Re:charities, donations

If we each sent a few dollars to a particular charity, the cost of processing the individual checks would easily exceed 15%. Think about all the people needed to do the simple stuff like opening envelopes, writing all the check numbers down, writing the deposit slips, making sure there are no errors, bringing them to the bank, reprocessing the bounced checks..I think you get my idea. The non-profit would easily send spend 15%. One example, the company I worked for donated 100k in matching funds to the earthquake victims in India through UNICEF's web site. Fortunately, UNICEF is large enough to process their own transactions to cut out the middlemen, but it would still be worth it. Imagine the amount of individual donations and time to process 100k worth of donations. The Indian earthquake victims need the food now, not later.100k was collected in less than 48 hours from my company's employees. Electronic is the way to go.

I stopped using them.

I once bought many a things from amazon, but no more. Why would anyone want to buy from them? I can name off many places that have the same products at a cheaper price. Most of all the part they seem to love to sell is the private data of users, thats way too much to pay for a service like that. So how many slashdot users use them and care that they are being sold as stats? And how many of you just buy natalie portman dolls only to send them back and throw off their demographics?


Fight censors!

Yuck....

Great, now when anybody puts up some lame site like 'Newz about My Cat Mittens', not only will they go to great lengths to irritate the public at large, but they'll also expect to get paid for their efforts...

Backwards US banking

I find it very strange that banks in the US are so backwards as to necessitate things like PayPal. In the UK (and I think the rest of Europe) as long as you know someone's account number and their branch sort code, you can make an instantaneous transfer into their account, either by telephoning your bank, or through Internet banking -- for free, and without the need to hold a "buffer" of money in a service such as PayPal.

Frankly it beggars belief that this protocol does not extend worldwide. Why can't I pay eBay sellers in the US in this way? I'd even pay a small surcharge, but not the £25 or so that an international banker's draft costs.

Um, this is sort of irrelevant to micropayments (although it points us in the direction of how things *should* be done) but since PayPal got mentioned so often here I thought it was worth dropping into the mix.

--

Paypal

I've been using paypal for a while now, just for transactions between myself and friends and the occasional auction. And you don't even have to have a credit card to use it. I've got it patched into my bank account.

All transactions on the personal level are free, but they go to $.30 for all purchases under $15 and 2.2% (for credit card) or 1.6% (for non-credit card) plus $.30 for all purchases over $15 if you're using the premier or business account.

I haven't checked the amazon rates, but these seem fairly reasonable to me for any normal transaction. It gets a little tricky when you're just doing micropayments, but you can stick with a personal account if you don't plan to be raking in lots of cash.

This should be used on Slashdot.

It would have a number of advantages. People would care more about the site, and not troll it as much because they are paying for it. The editorial policy would be more independant of commerce, as they would no longer rely on advertising. This would also chime with the ideals of the readership. Hostile, flaming AC"s would become a thing of the past.

I also expect that the average intelligence of the posts would increase, as only those who were reasonably intelligent would have the foresight and drive to actually register. I expect that /. could increase its revenues by doing this too, which would give them more money to invest in the site and improve slash (and perhaps employ someone to proofread articles for typos and read Taco's mailbox).

In addition, it need not cost much. I expect a couple of dollars a week automatically paid by credit card would do the trick.

Just imagine the improvement in the quality of discussion and commitment to the site and community that would occur! It would be a vast improvement from all the goatsex, I am sure.

I am also sure that many of these arguments could be applied to other sites.

They fuck you up, your mum and dad.

I tried, it's failed.

I tried doing the whole PayPal donation thing, which is very similar. Had it up for about a week now on my site (the one in my sig).

I've received a grand total of 20 cents.

If I get another nickel, I can buy that gumball I always wanted.

It's very depressing, actually. It makes me question why I'm doing this, if it's obvious people don't appreciate it that much. There's next to no money to be made in banners, and the cost of the server will soon become too prohibitive to handle by myself, so I'll likely be forced to shut it down. Kinda blows, but I guess that's survival of the fittest for you.

Question:

How long before Amazon patents the Digital tip jar? A week? Two weeks? Start getting your prior art ready

charities, donations

When you see one of those cans in a store, or see some donation place, it's often run by someone else who takes most of the money for themselves. Amazon has set up an interesting paralell. While %15 is not much by first look, it really does add up when you have a few million in donations cross their wires. I think it would be better for them to send a check in to the people, despite the convience of this type system. That way you are sure all the money goes to the group it belongs to. And I wouldn't trust their privacy policy as far as I could throw it. It would be rather easy to slip a web bug into an image for the "donation system."

Lightbulb went on in my head....

Imagine. Now we can tip all of those live-feed strippers on adult websites.