Overview
Currently, the majority of the paid content on the internet is monetized using a subscription based model. Companies like Netflix, Hulu, The New York Times, and other content providers require that you pay a monthly subscription in order to access the content that they offer. Unfortunately, this model makes the content less accessible to consumers that wish to view the content, but will not use the platform enough to make a full subscription worthwhile. Our platform provides an alternative payment platform to this subscription-based model being used by many companies. The goal of the project was to create a payment platform that allows content creators to monetize their content using a pay-per-view revenue model that allows users to pay small fees to view individual pieces of content. This framework benefits both content creators and content consumers by making content more accessible to individuals that do not wish to purchase a subscription. This project is an exploration of a new way to monetize content on the internet. We believe that this new payment concept will make content more accessible to consumers and allow content providers to reach a greater audience than they could using only a subscription based model.
Deliverables
The project team delivered a prototype, proof-of-concept framework that consists of an API, a Site Integration Component, and a Customer Web Client. The Site Integration Component can be incorporated into the existing code base of businesses and content creators and will allow them to configure how individual pieces of their content are being monetized. The Customer Web Client will be downloaded and used by customers to purchase access to individual pieces of content within the sites that they are visiting. The API will communicate with Customer Web Client and Site Integration Component to facilitate the transactional framework we developed.
Acknowledgements
This project was proposed by our project partner Nathan Jewell. A big thanks goes out to Nathan for all his help and guidance with the project.
