R-E-$-P-E-C-T

Megatokyo, spurred by Blue Mountains Arts deciding to charge for their e-cards, has a long reflection on respect and the Web economy. MegaTokyo is serving up 10,000,000 page views a month and thus has some skin in this particular game.

I think that an understanding of human nature is almost more important here on the web than in any other business environment. Why? because unlike in the real world we are used to, we’ve been trained to an ‘us and them’ mentality in regards to our entertainment and things that we purchase in stores – we are consumers, they are providers. On the net, its different. … We all have the same basic presence on the net – its how we use it that makes us who we are here.

This doesn’t change the fact that Blue Mountain Arts has picked the wrong business model. Rather than charging the sender, they ought to charge the recipients: “You’ve received a card from A Secret Admirer. Please deposit $0.50 to retrieve it.”

[Thanks to David Landgren for pointing me to MegaTokyo.]

Categories: Uncategorized dw