Flattr – a “Like” button I Like

A few days ago I finally installed and activated Flattr on my website. Flattr has had my attention for numerous months and I am finally happy to have it working on my site.

Flattr is a micropayments service that makes it possible for content consumers to directly show their appreciation to content creators by making a small payment as a token of appreciation. When you sign up with Flattr you can load your account with a monthly sum starting from 2 euros. Then during that month you can flattr content “things” that you encounter online (posts, images, videos, etc.). At the end of the month the sum of money you placed in your account will be divided equally between the things you flattred and transferred to their creators.

I have come to believe that in the world of blogging there can be and often is a misperception of community. The easiest way to sense community (or lack of) is through comments – if you have a regular flow of comments (regardless of quantity) with a few regular commenters it provides a sense of community (alternately, having no comments can leave you feeling lonely). But I believe that blogs can have a much larger community – a silent community of people who simple arrive, consume and appreciate your content. I believe that Flattr can become a wonderful manifestation of such silent communities. With Flattr an anonymous click of a  button becomes a soft and meaningful cheer.

I assume it will take some time for Flattr to become widely known and used but I think it is a beautiful step in a good direction. It is founded by people who care about the Internet in a way I can relate to. One of it’s founders, Peter Sunde, is also a co-founder of the file torrent file sharing site ThePirateBay for which he is being prosecuted as a criminal (the list of law suits filed against ThePirateBay are listed on their website) . To get a sense of the spirit behind Flattr I invite you read his post on Who controls your data? and listen to an interview with him.

If you are a blogger I invite you to have a look at Flattr and if you choose to activate it then please remember to spread the word about it 🙂