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Comment by eliblock | Hacker News Reader

I had an idea for a pay-per-minute youtube, where your time watched gets credited to the creator. I would rather just pay per use than worry about whether I'm using my subscriptions enough to be worth it.

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That's sort of how YouTube premium actually works; creators are paid an allocation based on time watched for premium users to replace ad revenue.

Yeah I guess in general I would just rather pay per use for streaming. Also it might feel more like directly supporting the creator.

Most people aren't like you FWIW; there's a lot of research that suggests consumers prefer higher fixed prices to lower variable prices. The trouble with PPV (even if it's much cheaper than something like YouTube Premium) is that now before I watch any video, I have to consider whether that particular video is worth watching. For lots of content on YouTube, that bar would be too high to clear. It's much more comfortable knowing I've already paid for the service and don't need to think twice.

> research that suggests consumers prefer higher fixed prices to lower variable prices.

I'm one of them. I value predictability pretty highly when it comes to expenses. The less mental energy I have to spend on money-related things, the happier I am.

Me too. I'd imagine anyone who values time more than money would prefer the fixed-cost option. (And I learned a long time back buying time is the best possible use of money!)

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