Just like on Soundcloud, Vimeo, Instagram etc you just like creators on YouTube to send a microdonation to them.

We think this is a big thing. Most of the creators on YouTube never sees any money for the content they produce.

How to flattr on YouTube
1. Go to your settings page
2. Connect with YouTube (make sure your YouTube account is connected with your Google account)
3. Like videos. We love Anita Sarkeesian and her video series Feminist Frequency
4. Tell the world you’re supporting creators on YouTube. Or, if you’re a creator, that your fans can support your work.

Voilà! You are making the internet a better place for creators.

More to come
We are hard at work to enable you to flattr creators on more services. Like us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter or here to hear about it first.

So we are extremely sad to announce that from today (16th of April 2013) at noon CET we will remove the possibility to flattr tweets via the use of favorites, as per instructions from Twitter.

What we do
To enable support for flattring tweets we use two sources of data our users have created. The data about what a user favorited on Twitter, and the data about the tweet that was created. To do this we need a Twitter API key.

What Twitter said
Recently Twitter contacted us and told us that we are violating their API terms citing the second part of a clause (IV. Commercial Use, 2C. Advertising Around Twitter Content) saying “Your advertisements cannot resemble or reasonably be confused by users as a Tweet. For example, ads cannot have Tweet actions like follow, retweet, favorite, and reply. And you cannot sell or receive compensation for Tweet actions or the placement of Tweet actions on your Service.”

This is a quite logical clause as it would stop companies to sell e.g. retweets and followers. It’s an understandable rule to keep the Twitter network clean but in this case the rule is strangely stomping out innovation on their platform.

However, the term Twitter call to is a term about advertisment that states that we can not be compensated. One can argue that we can not get money based on this clause. Even though we think that is not obvious.

So we suggested to forgo our 10%, to not be compensated as a service. This would mean that the flattr donation go from supporter to creator in it’s entirety. That did not help.

Twitter said: “Our API Terms of Service state that you cannot sell or receive compensation for Tweet actions or the placement of Tweet actions on your Service. This includes compensation attached to a Tweet Action sent to either a service or through a service to another user.”

The idea of not letting people use their favorites in the way they want is in no way is mentioned in the API terms. We feel that Twitter is reading things into their terms that is not there.

With Flattr you can not of course pay people to retweet, follow or favorite you. Flattr is the opposite, a way to voluntary reward someone for something that they have created. It’s not possible to use Flattr to pay creators to get a certain result.

Well, the reality is that this was not how Twitter read it. After mailing with Twitter’s “Platform Operations” about this Twitter replied to us that, “If your service compensates content creators … in a manner that is not attached to Tweet Actions, this would be in compliance with our API Terms of Service.” To favorite somebody is considered a Tweet Action.

We have tried to suggest different solutions asking for an exception to the terms, even forgoing our cut, etc, without any result. But, this does not mean that we will give up negotiating with them over this on behalf our users and also their users.

Twitter users create the favorite and just like they own their tweets they should own the result of their action. If you favorite something we argue that you should be able to decide what you want to do with the data you create. If you want to use it to give Flattr donations to other Twitter users you should be the one to make that decision.

What is happening now?
From noon today (the 16th of April 2013) at noon CET we are forced to remove the ability to support creators by favoriting their tweets. This to comply with their API terms of service.

We are working on other ways to support creators on Twitter, and will keep the discussions going with Twitter towards a more acceptable resolution.

Remember, you can still use our browser extension to flattr tweets.
And, there are still eight great services, a lot of blogs, and other awesome content you can flattr.

Adding YouTube!
Starting today we have enabled supporters to send microdonations to creators on YouTube! Just like on Soundcloud, Vimeo, Instagram etc you just like videos on YouTube to flattr them.

We are on a mission to help creators get paid for their work. It’s their work that makes the internet so valuable to us all.

Certainly inevitable if you look at the trends in newspaper industry, where revenue from readers is starting to be higher than the from ads. But there are lot’s of different ways to go, from a rigid wall to an open approach where all material is available with the possibility for readers to pay for what they like.

A global payment solution
It’s becoming quite a hassle to read news online. All news sites are implementing their own walls and subscription plans. The problem is of course that we don’t consume content in silos. Never had, never will.

If your news company isn’t The New York Times it’s highly unlikly that readers outside your absolute proximity sign up to read the one article they were referred to by a friend or that is the talk of the web.

When will publishers implement a FrictionFree MicroPayment so an article can be read/paid for without headache ? cc @amanda @mikebutcher

— Shakil Khan (@shak) 14 april 2013

Here’s how Flattr can be utilized on news sites

The button
There are a lot of ways in which Flattr can be used by news sites. The obvious way is to embed the Flattr button next to the articles, as Taz.de is doing.

The fly out
To increase clicks, the button can be featured in a fly out that appears when the reader scrolls down towards the end of the article:
“Hey, it seems that you like what you read. Show the writer your appreciation with a micro payment!”

The auto flattr
Why not build a solution that much like Grooveshark’s Flattr integration where you just “Listen to Flattr“? News sites can enable readers to automatically flattr articles they’ve finished reading, by measuring how long they’ve scrolled the page.

The freemium
A soft way to lock content is to allow readers to read a part of text and flattr it to read the whole thing, or Flattr to read exclusive material, insights from the author etc.

@eileentso @shak @mikebutcher once @flattr works seamlessly to read paywall articles from the FT and Sunday Times consider me a customer :)

— Amanda Rose (@amanda) 14 april 2013

The “nag screen”
For sites that want to force people to pay but believe that it’s better to be a part of a payment system that works all over the web, Flattr can be used for that as well. By using Flattr in a nag screen you can find a the perfect balance between completely open and completely closed by asking your readers to flattr after reading one or many articles to forcing them to flattr before reading an article .

The wall
A full paywall, forcing people to flattr to read, isn’t something we recommend, we believe that it’s smarter to make let the payment be voluntary and have good arguments to why people should support the work they’ve consumed. But, if you really want a wall, you can absolutely use Flattr as the gate opener.

Tell readers why they can read your articles and why they should voluntarily pay
The more articulate you are with why you need your readers money, how much better quality your journalistic work will have etc, the bigger the motivation for readers to pay you will be.

This is a big part to the success of crowdfunding platforms like Kickstarter. The first thing you see is a video and text describing why the creator wants you money and what he or she will use them for. We all need good reasons to buy. Good quality needs to be proven, the best way to let it show is of course to let readers read first and pay second.

The big German news outlet Taz.de is a good example of this. In the sidebar they give readers a prompt to pay. If you read further they say:

“With a few clicks you can support the journalistic independence of the taz and the free access of taz.de – regularly.”

And they’ve made a nice video

Our intention
Our mission is to get people to value all the amazing content we get on the internet every day. Think about it! We are giving creators a way to say yes to money and supporters a way show appreciation directly to the creators.

@shak @amanda part of the problem is that some people would simply copy/paste the piece somewhere else online

— Mike Butcher (@mikebutcher) 14 april 2013

The idea that everyone have to pay doesn’t apply to a digital environment. Rather it’s its best advantage to the physical world. A copy doesn’t cost anything and you can increase reach and monetize at the same time. The idea of freemium is very common on the web. “Some pay, the rest get it free”. It’s a proven concept to increase the number of paying consumers. The real quest is to create a solution that makes the most people possible pay. It’s a case of changing the way we pay to be in line with our online behavior. Consume first, pay after.

It’s not about getting everybody to pay for everything, it’s about enabling all that finds specific pieces of content valuable for them to pay.

We believe in an open internet, where as much awesome content as possible remains open. To make that happen, think outside of plans for single site paywalls and get the readers to pay you voluntarily for the content that is valuable to them.