
Ask HN: Why is microtransactions not a solved problem already? - butimnotarapper
Why is microtransactions not a solved problem already? Im not talking about crypto specifically, just in general; what stopped anyone from creating a payment solution that didn&#x27;t charge tons of money for each transaction? Whats so hard about microtransactions?
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kjksf
1\. Psychologically, people do not want to pay small amounts. People think
that people are more likely to pay small amounts. The reality is that even
though amounts can be very small, cognitive cost of making a decision to pay
is great and stops people from spending that way.

Even if we had micro transactions with zero fees, it wouldn't take off.

2\. Most people use credit cards / debit cards / paypal. Processing fees for
those are just too big and Visa etc. is not interested in changing their
business model.

So you would have to built an alternative payment system that doesn't
interface very often with banks / credit cards etc. but that's pretty much
impossible.

And if you built it just for micro transactions, people wouldn't use it
because #1.

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butimnotarapper
> So you would have to built an alternative payment system that doesn't
> interface very often with banks / credit cards etc

Why could it not interface very often with banks / credit cards?

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mtmail
They charge a minimum per transaction [https://www.valuepenguin.com/what-
credit-card-processing-fee...](https://www.valuepenguin.com/what-credit-card-
processing-fees-costs) "These fees are often presented as some percentage plus
an additional fixed amount - usually no greater than $0.25"

