Yesterday I streamed money to podcasters WHILE I was listening to their podcast using the Breez app and relying on a huge revamp of the podcast infrastructure called Podcasting 2.0. It’s a very interesting way to listen to podcasts and pay for each second you listen to, or if you like, boost (extra money) those valuable moments in the podcast.
I’m enamoured with the ‘value for value’ way of doing business, a term I was reintroduced with by Adam Curry and John C Dvorak‘s podcast No Agenda. If you experience value, you express that by giving that value to the producer. In this case, streaming minute amounts of crypto currency per second from a pre-filled ‘wallet’, while you listen.
Unfortunately the value-for-value model is perceived as ‘quaint’ in the digital world. More common business models are based on ad-revenue, stock value and trading personal data. You know: facebook, news websites and ad riddled podcasts.
As these models are opaque, complex and also taint the quality and nature of the product in some shape or form, I prefer the good old ‘value for value’. Show how much you appreciate the product you are consuming.
Since a while I’ve been following initiatives that explore new ways of streaming and programming currency. Because next to streaming currency in infinitesimal increments, you can also pre-program where the money goes.
Say, as a producer your product is based on some cost of your time, hosting, guest appearance and music licenses. How cool would it be if you pre-program the ‘split’ of your income to the various parties? Very cool, that’s how!
This perspective of smart currency is a true game changer. Forget just in time chains and opaque value chains. This is an awesome way to explore new ways to do business, provide insight and transparency, but also accountability.
How would this impact your business? To be clear: this one way to make money from your hard work, but surely not the only way. Most companies still need upfront investments to create a valuable product, but for streaming, continues or even episodical products and services, this might be another way to innovate and progress the way we do business.
I for one am optimistic that this trend will shake out new ways to create value and get value in return.