Google announces micropayments via Google Wallet

[superticker]

Google has announced a new feature of Google Wallet, a micropayments service, that will let websites collect small payments from visitors for services/products via a single click. Google Wallet micropayments

This service will also allow web visitors to sample services, and then get a refund within 30 minutes, if they don't buy. This micropayment feature is in trial (beta) at Google Wallet as an experiment.

[mouser]

Interesting..

[daddydave]

The service gives users the ability to sample the content (e.g. text or image) before they buy, which can be done with a single click. Those who are not satisfied can get their money back within 30 minutes. Of course, Google has safeguards in place to prevent users from abusing the refunds to get free content.

So if you don't like to read kneejerk reactions, stop reading, because here is mine.

I see an article that may or may not be worth a dollar, read it, decide it is crap, and get my money back. The content provider thinks I am abusing the system, they tell Google, and they disable my Google account..

[superticker]

The service gives users the ability to sample the content before they buy,... Those who are not satisfied can get their money back within 30 minutes.

I see an article ..., read it, decide it is crap, and get my money back. The content provider thinks I am abusing the system, tells Google, and they disable my Google account.

Probably not on the first refund attempt, but if you asked for 9 refunds over a week, then yes. The question remains what the user's refund rate has to be before it's considered abuse. That's why this service is considered experimental; it will need some tweaking. Perhaps Google sends the user an early warning if he's approaching his refund-rate limit.

[daddydave]

My second kneejerk reaction is this.

Consolidate a library of articles into kind of an article app store on one site (Google Play?), to faciltiate impulse purchases of 35 cent articles, similar to the way mobile app stores facilitate impulse purchases of 99 cent apps.

Maybe the only important thing about the refund policy is that there is one. The sales pitch should use words like a "eight article refund limit per week" instead of "abuse," and requesting a refund of the ninth article will just be blocked, and has zero chance of disabling your Google account (speculating here).

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In current form (controlled by the site owner vs app store), I could see the Wall Street Journal or somebody else with articles already behind a paywall doing something like this.