玩比特幣的都知道金·多特康姆的名字。這位天才黑客近幾年龜縮在新西蘭，為的就是不被引渡到美國，畢竟他在美國背下了侵犯知識產(chǎn)權(quán)和洗錢的官司，一旦被抓到美國受審，是絕對沒有好果子吃的。與此同時，他也在忙著搞Megaupload之后的二次創(chuàng)業(yè)。Megaupload是一個在線存儲服務(wù)，也正是令他在美國背上官司的原因。

據(jù)《財富》本周一報道，多特康姆正打算請幾位YouTube的知名網(wǎng)紅來測試他的微支付系統(tǒng)Bitcache。近日他又給《財富》做了一次在線服務(wù)K.im的內(nèi)部展示。K.im也是一個在線存儲服務(wù)，內(nèi)容創(chuàng)建者可以把他們的文檔掛在網(wǎng)上收費，每次有人下載他們的文檔，創(chuàng)建者都可以收取一定的費用。

K.im類似一個在線網(wǎng)盤服務(wù)，用戶可以將他們的歌曲、電影或文件上傳至云端，然后通過一系列平臺進行推廣，比如像Dropbox和iCloud這樣的云存儲服務(wù)，Kickass Torrents之類的點對點傳輸網(wǎng)絡(luò)，或是在中國十分流行的微信和微博等社交網(wǎng)絡(luò)。用戶上傳了文件之后，就可以獲得一個訪問碼，他們可以將訪問碼嵌入自己的網(wǎng)站上，然后邀請其他用戶購買這個文件?？傊还苁钦l下載了這個文件，都避免不了收費這一關(guān)。

多特康姆解釋道：“我們有自己的文件格式。所以要打開這個文件，你就得通過我們的應(yīng)用程序，或是通過使用了我們的應(yīng)用編程界面的第三方應(yīng)用。通過這種方式，確保了不管你的文件放在哪里，內(nèi)容的所有者都能獲得報酬?！?/p>

K.im的內(nèi)容上傳者可以自己確定每個文件的價格（用美元顯示）。另外用戶也可以選擇幾個附加功能。它既可以“限時免費”，用戶也可以在顯示的價格之外進行“打賞”，而且文件也可以通過流媒體的形式展示，即限制下載。

K.im與其他網(wǎng)盤服務(wù)最主要的區(qū)別，在于可以使用比特幣進行“微支付”。每次支付的數(shù)額可能是極小的，人們可能想也不想就支付了。對于內(nèi)容的創(chuàng)建者，卻起到了聚沙成塔的效果。

比特幣是比較適合這種使用方式的。不過比特幣的區(qū)塊鏈系統(tǒng)經(jīng)常出現(xiàn)堵塞，這說明現(xiàn)在的比特幣交易已經(jīng)需要較長的時間才能完成，如果每天再增加幾千萬次的“微支付”，只會讓比特幣交易變得更慢。然而多特康姆的方法卻是將比特幣分解成所謂的“比特”，一比特相當于一百萬分之一個比特幣?！氨忍亍钡慕灰卓梢栽?/p>

Bitcache平臺上進行，而不是在擁擠的主干區(qū)塊鏈上完成。

“像這樣的服務(wù)能充分釋放藝術(shù)家的活力，因為他們可以將作品在任何他們喜歡的平臺上直接賣給自己的粉絲群體，沒有任何中間商抽成?！?/p>

說到這，我們有必要提醒一下讀者，多特康姆這樣一個天才創(chuàng)業(yè)者為什么是個爭議不斷的人物（不僅因為他狂熱支持維基解密泄密者塞斯·里奇的陰謀論）。他創(chuàng)辦的Megaupload被很多人用來非法分享侵權(quán)內(nèi)容，從而在2012年遭到了FBI的取締。FBI還凍結(jié)了多特康姆的銀行賬戶，并搜查了他的豪宅，目前還在力爭將他引渡回美國受審。據(jù)美國政府稱，多特康姆及Megaupload的工作人員非常清楚該平臺被用于不法目的，且還在從中獲利。

那么，K.im怎樣才能不重蹈Megaupload的覆轍呢？更危險的是，很有可能會有人上傳其他人建立的內(nèi)容，并且收費營利。

多特康姆稱，K.im的內(nèi)容商并不知道別人上傳的是什么東西，因為文件在傳輸過程中已經(jīng)被加密了。不過如果有人投訴的話，他保證會很快進行處理?！拔覀儞碛袕姶蟮奶嵝押拖录芄δ??！?/p>

在《財富》看到的展示片中還有一個奇怪的功能，那就是這些文件可以向《紐約時報》、CNN和維基解密等媒體進行發(fā)布。多特康姆表示，這個功能是專門為“泄密者”提供的。

他表示：“K.im對泄密者提供了近乎完美的保護。該平臺可能每天會有幾百萬名使用者，情報部門不可能從海量的數(shù)據(jù)里鑒別出泄密者。另外泄密者就算被抓到，也可以辯稱自己只是使用了K.im備份個人信息或者匯總文件，從而否認自己的泄密行為?！?/p>

K.im和Bitcache瞄準的是一個競爭日益激烈但前景尚不明朗的市場。很多媒體公司都面臨著網(wǎng)絡(luò)競爭日趨白熱化和廣告費率不斷下調(diào)的挑戰(zhàn)，“微支付”的理念也日益成為擺脫困局的一種可能手段。目前還沒有哪個微支付系統(tǒng)取得成功，不過新的微支付系統(tǒng)還在不斷涌現(xiàn)，有些微支付系統(tǒng)便是憑借更無縫的微交易功能，將目光瞄準了那些媒體內(nèi)容的消費者。

比如在線打賞服務(wù)Flattr就是一個例子，這家公司今年被廣告攔截服務(wù)Adblock Plus的母公司Eyeo收購。我們?nèi)ツ昃驮鴪蟮肋^，Eyeo想讓出版商采用Flattr的服務(wù)，使人們可以對閱讀的文章進行打賞。另一個例子是瀏覽器創(chuàng)業(yè)公司Brave，這家公司是由Mozilla的共同創(chuàng)始人布蘭登·艾克創(chuàng)辦的。使用該服務(wù)的讀者每月可以分配一筆小錢出來，瀏覽器會自動監(jiān)測讀者對他們所閱讀的文章的參與度，然后根據(jù)讀者的喜好，對內(nèi)容的出版商自動進行打賞。

Eyeo的公共事務(wù)經(jīng)理勞拉·多恩海姆表示：“我們知道，很多用戶都想給他們喜歡的內(nèi)容打賞，但他們并不關(guān)注自己想打賞的文章采取了哪種金融交易服務(wù)?！?/p>

下一步，多特康姆將在今年第四季度進行一次“首次公開募幣”，這也是目前方興未艾的一種融資方式，投資人可以獲得虛擬貨幣而不是股份?！拔覀冊贗CO結(jié)束后９個月里就會上線?！彼硎?。

只有那時我們才能知道，多特康姆的微支付夢想能否提供一種可靠的方式，使人們憑借自身的創(chuàng)造在網(wǎng)絡(luò)上自由地賺錢——當然前提是到時他還沒有被美國人抓回去。（財富中文網(wǎng)）

譯者：賈政景

Kim Dotcom may be spending much of his time fighting extradition from New Zealand to the U.S., where he faces copyright infringement and money laundering charges, but he's also busy working on the successor to Megaupload, the online storage service that got him into this trouble.

As Fortune reported on Monday, Dotcom is looking for popular YouTube stars to test his new micropayments system, Bitcache. Now he's giving Fortune a sneak preview of K.im, a new online storage service that lets creators upload their files and make money every time people download them.

The idea behind K.im is to let people upload their songs, movies, or documents once and then propagate them across a plethora of other platforms: cloud storage services such as Dropbox and iCloud, peer-to-peer networks such as Kickass Torrents, and social media services such as WeChat and Weibo. When a creator uploads a file, they also get the code for a widget that they can embed on their own websites, inviting people to buy the file. Essentially, wherever the file goes, it takes with it the functionality to demand payment for using it.

"We have our own file type," Dotcom explains. "So to open [it] you will need one of our apps or third party apps that will use our [application programming interface]. That way we ensure that no matter where your file is hosted, the content owner gets paid."

People uploading to K.im can set their own price (shown in U.S. dollars) for each file, and choose from several extra features for the file's availability: it can be a "limited giveaway," people can pay more than the price that's shown, and the files can also be set to be streaming-only, obviating any downloads.

The key advance Dotcom is proposing here is the ability to use bitcoin for micropayments—payments that may be so small that people won't think twice about making them, but that will add up to reward creators for their work.

Bitcoin is generally unsuitable for this use case, because congestion in the bitcoin blockchain system means it already takes a long time for transactions to clear, and adding millions of very small payments would make things even slower. However, Dotcom's solution is to break the bitcoins down into what he calls "Bits"—each being worth a millionth of one bitcoin. Payments using Bits take place on the Bitcache platform, not in the main, clogged-up blockchain.

"Services like this will unchain the artists, because they can sell directly to their fan base on any platform of their choosing. No middle men," Dotcom says.

At this point, it's worth rewinding and remembering the main reason why Dotcom is such a controversial figure (apart from his championing of the Seth Rich conspiracy theory). Megaupload was used by many people for illegally sharing copyrighted content, which led to its takedown by the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation in 2012, the freezing of Dotcom's bank accounts and the raiding of his mansion, and the ongoing extradition case against him. According to the U.S. government, Dotcom and his colleagues knew full well that the service was being used for illicit purposes, and profited from that fact.

So, what's to stop people using K.im for the same thing—or, worse, uploading files made by other people and then charging people to download them?

According to Dotcom, the proprietors of K.im will have no idea what people are uploading to the platform because the files are encrypted in transit. However, if someone complains, then he promises a swift response. "We have robust notice and takedown features," he says.

One odd feature in the demo Fortune was shown was the ability to distribute files to media organizations such as The New York Times and CNN—and Wikileaks. This functionality, Dotcom explains, is for whistleblowers.

"K.im provides near perfect protection for whistleblowers," he claims. "We expect to have millions of users every day and it will impossible for spy agencies to identify the whistleblowers within that mass traffic. And whistleblowers have strong deniability because they can say they used K.im for a personal backup, file aggregation, etc."

K.im and Bitcache enter a competitive though as-yet-unproven market. As media companies struggle with online competition and falling ad rates, the idea of micropayments keeps cropping up as a possible route out. No micropayments systems have succeeded thus far, but new ones keep popping up—and some promise more friction-free methods for parting media consumers from their cash.

A notable effort is Flattr, an online tipping service that was this year bought by Eyeo, the company behind the ad-blocking service Adblock Plus. As we reported last year, Eyeo is trying to get publishers to adopt Flattr as a way for people to pay for the articles they read. As with Brave, a browser startup from Mozilla co-founder Brendan Eich, the idea here is to get readers to set aside a certain amount of money each month, then monitor their engagement with the articles they consume and automatically reward the publishers based on that engagement.

"We know that many users want to pay for content they like. What we also know is that they don't want to think about a financial transaction after every article they've read," says Laura Dornheim, Eyeo's public affairs manager.

For Dotcom's latest endeavor, the next big step is an initial coin offering (ICO)—a trendy fundraising technique in which investors get virtual coins rather than shares—in the fourth quarter of this year. "We will go live within nine months after the ICO," Dotcom says.

Only then—and, presumably, only if Dotcom has managed to stay out of prison by that point—will we be able to see if his vision of micropayments really does provide a viable way for people to monetize their creations online.