Ask HN: Would you fund a world-wide-web without tracking?

Users already pay for internet access. Why pay again?

The problem is not really money but rather the distribution of funds. A portion of the internet access fee needs to be set aside for public access web sites. Commercial web sites are on their own. To qualify for a portion of the proceeds, there will have to be some sort of application and approval process. Distribution to be based on traffic level above a specified minimum. Engaging in any sort of user tracking would be a disqualifier.

Lots of details here to be worked out but this is the most logical approach that will have a reasonable chance of working IMO.

I like the intention but I suspect it will be abused. What methods are you going to use to enforce not tracking? Will each business have to put up a large bond and have a binding contract tied to third party audits that verify they are not tracking? When a company is found to violate your terms will they give back all the funds they received plus a large percentage? Do they lose their domains for a year? Is this operating on an honor system? What incentives do a company have to participate in this?

In Switzerland, public radio & TV are funded by a tax every household pays, whether you have a TV/radio or not (note that the websites of public TV & radio use quite some trackers... but are ad free; the TV is NOT ad free though). I would imagine that something similar for publicly relevant web sites would make (at least some) sense... But there would be to have legally enforced safeguards against abuses (e.g. getting financed this way and nevertheless tracking users/selling their data)

Honestly nah. Not likely.

My site is already ad free and invasive tracking free so I have no real reason to join and I don't believe anyone donates money like that. Not in high enough numbers to be worth noticing anyway. You might get the odd nerd that's like "hmmmm well acktuallllly, I .." but they've donated like a fiver across the year

I wouldn't sign up as a user either if I'm honest. I'd just go read some other blog if it was paywalled and wouldn't notice a donate link if it wasn't

I do like the idea as an idea, I just don't think the world will do anything with it. This idea plus a better funding model than donations and we're at a maybe but even then I dunno if I could be arsed. That sounds like a lot of squeeze for minimal juice

The state of the world where a comedy series, Silicon Valley on HBO really is the state of how a new Internet could form.

I suspect the vast majority of people who say yes will change their tune when you ask them to take out their wallets. The second issue you’ll run in to is paying publishers. It will be hard to convince that many publishers to sign up and receive the funds, believe it or not.

I think a possibly more successful route would be to start with a niche cohort of people who like some set of niche websites that may not monetize well via ads but still have loyal readership/user base. Ideally sites that generate good, unique content on a regular basis —- content their readership loves. In this way you will find it easier to negotiate/pay the site owners and it will come with a built in audience that is likelier to pay.

The World Wide Web doesn't need funding. What it needs is for people to understand that if you don't have a day job you don't belong on the Web. Breaking news doesn't belong on the web; archives do.

Doesn't Porn pay for the web?

I'm not paying websites to not track me, id happily avoid those that do track me. Same difference.

So, as a researcher, who is getting paid to study how ycombinator users(and those on other websites) feel about micropayments(which already exist in the form of https://coil.com/ for content and https://www.jeremiahlee.com/posts/web-monetization-events-in... for advertisements and https://www.pumabrowser.com/ for software), I have only this to say:

The only way to build a privacy respecting world wide web is to actually build it. A honor-basis system of alternative monetization where advertisements are removed and the content provider achieves remuneration for their work is absolutely not in any way insurance against tracking. If anything, it means that overt tracking methods are less likely to be used. I would rather use websites where overt tracking is used and I know about it than websites where A/B scripting, header capture and other covert methods are used to surveil, influence, and characterize me as a potential user. The very notion of A/B headlines upsets me. You look, you see content, you look again- it's been changed!

A truly privacy respecting world wide web would consist of a VPN that completely replaces the worldwide internet and enrolls you in a nym mixnet system which fully provides routing, dns, and internal node points for all websites, complete with micropay built into the access of the site. Traversing the site equals micropayment for the use of the site. A SIPRnet for the people. Something we will never have and something which the government will do everything possible to erode because it would mean the end of the surveillance state.

Nope. The internet works because of advertising.

it would have to sustain itself somehow

I remember reading about micropayments in the 1990's. I thought "this is inevitable." It wasn't then.

In the fat decade I've been on HN, I've seen micropayment a few times each year. Because people think it is inevitable.

I've realized that the simple problem is accounting overhead. There are fixed costs to processing a payment. Most of them are potentially very small. But some are not. Like chargebacks. And lawsuits (because it's money).

Assuming they are evenly distributed independent of transaction size -- a dubious assumption because if transactions are small it takes more transactions to make money from fraud -- the percentage of revenue that goes into soft overhead of chargebacks and lawsuits is larger.

There's a general principle here.

There's more money in doing business with people who have lots of money. VRBO has lots of money for ads. You can make more money doing business with them than trying to get money from people bothered by ads.

Good luck.