But there IS no micropayment system. And there IS no draconian authority that will implement one. Basically all that will happen is you will cease to get email. Any email.
... but how many of us actually buy products based on annoying ads...
The problem is, SPAM works. Which is why it is out there. With 10's of millions of folks on-line, they only a small percentage to buy. Probably the same folks who buy products in infomercials. The rest of use get spammed. Funny thing, too - most anti-spam products are free because people, even though they hate spam, won't pay to get rid of it. People on this forum are technical enough to figure out a way to get rid of spam - 99% of the population isn't - but they would rather live with it than pay to get rid of it. Which raises the business model question - what does sell?
IMO - nothing but porn, spam, and multi-level marketing schemes.
You say that " I don't understand these sentiments at all, yet I regularly write free software and give it away gratis with no expectation of reward of any kind. In fact, a lot of people do that... Isn't philanthropism strange...".
Okay, and that is fine. But unless you are independently wealthy then you are an employee somewhere, or run your own non-web business (probably not - small business owners put in 60+ hours a week typically so don't HAVE any spare time.) So - if you are an employee to earn your money to eat and pay rent - and you produce stuff for the web for free, that is okay.
But think about it. That would be like...I don't know - offering to wash cars for free in your driveway for the weekend. As long as you are doing it because you think you are getting something out of it (wax on, wax off, grasshopper), fine. But perhaps after a while, buying all the materials, cleaning up all the mess, and getting bitched at because "you didn't get that spot" you might want some renumeration for this.
There is another aspect here. Folks who post in this forum are normally pretty technical - and are NOT typical of your average AOL user. Those type of users today make up 95+% of the web traffic. So really the question is - what will those folks pay for (if anything.)
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But there IS no micropayment system. And there IS no draconian authority that will implement one. Basically all that will happen is you will cease to get email. Any email.
... but how many of us actually buy products based on annoying ads...
The problem is, SPAM works. Which is why it is out there. With 10's of millions of folks on-line, they only a small percentage to buy. Probably the same folks who buy products in infomercials. The rest of use get spammed. Funny thing, too - most anti-spam products are free because people, even though they hate spam, won't pay to get rid of it. People on this forum are technical enough to figure out a way to get rid of spam - 99% of the population isn't - but they would rather live with it than pay to get rid of it. Which raises the business model question - what does sell?
IMO - nothing but porn, spam, and multi-level marketing schemes.
You say that " I don't understand these sentiments at all, yet I regularly write free software and give it away gratis with no expectation of reward of any kind. In fact, a lot of people do that... Isn't philanthropism strange...".
Okay, and that is fine. But unless you are independently wealthy then you are an employee somewhere, or run your own non-web business (probably not - small business owners put in 60+ hours a week typically so don't HAVE any spare time.) So - if you are an employee to earn your money to eat and pay rent - and you produce stuff for the web for free, that is okay.
But think about it. That would be like...I don't know - offering to wash cars for free in your driveway for the weekend. As long as you are doing it because you think you are getting something out of it (wax on, wax off, grasshopper), fine. But perhaps after a while, buying all the materials, cleaning up all the mess, and getting bitched at because "you didn't get that spot" you might want some renumeration for this.
There is another aspect here. Folks who post in this forum are normally pretty technical - and are NOT typical of your average AOL user. Those type of users today make up 95+% of the web traffic. So really the question is - what will those folks pay for (if anything.)