The Kachingle social micropayment site has been nagging me periodically for the past year. It's something along the lines of Flattr, and finally I thought OK, let's try this out. All they want from me is my email address and my permission. And would you believe it – I just got a US cent. Micropayment indeed. Looking at their web site it seems that there's a way to make those cents arrive more often by installing a clickable widget. But it looks a lot like the only way for me to get that widget is to start putting money into the system myself as a subscriber. Pyramid scheme, much?
So, Dear Reader, what can you tell me about Kachingle?
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Hi Martin,
I'm the QA Director at Kachingle and would be happy to answer any questions you might have.
Allow me to clear up the confusion you've run into: Subscribers (we call them Kachinglers) put $5 a month into their Kachingle accounts. With our browser extension (which puts a small purple bar across the top of sites in our network), they can "turn on kachingling" for any site they'd like to automatically "tip" with each visit, and the extension counts those visits. If a site they'd like to support isn't in our network, they can add it themselves — which seems to be how your site ended up in the network, and why we notified you as soon as you had even 1¢ in income from these voluntary micropayments.
Sites added to our network by users can sign up for a Kachingle account FOR FREE (you only pay if you want to be a Kachingler), and we'll pass them control of their presence on Kachingle, so they can add their own logo and description, and/or EMBED the Kachingle bar on their sites so it can be seen without the Kachingle Extension, thus giving the uninitiated an opportunity to learn about supporting their sites through Kachingle. (Sites not interested in voluntary micropayments can also opt out.)
This is one part of our business, called Kachingle Anything. We're also (and primarily) a billing, bundling and co-marketing platform for applications.
http://kachingle.com/
Drop me a line if I can help clear up any other questions for you.
Thank you Rob! So how does a site owner find the code to embed this bar for free on their site?
I can tell you that they never paid me for 2 weeks of work I did for them:
http://www.smashcompany.com/philosophy/a-sad-time-at-kachingle
Also, over on App.net, I got into an interesting conversation with one of the guys at Flattr, and he had some interesting feedback about Kachingle:
https://alpha.app.net/bonq/post/1845027
And having looked at Flattr, I think their confidence is merited:
https://alpha.app.net/bonq/post/1822795