"If you want to charge somebody $0.10 or $1 a month, that will just be a click...you won't have to manage some funny thing or pay some big credit charge, where half of it goes to the clearing," Gates said.

Paypal (eBay) and Amazon Honor system are two strong competitors, especially the first. A website using these can easily charge small amounts of money (e.g. $1) to its visitors for a service or software.

Microsoft already has the Zune & Xbox Points system. The points can be bought online using a credit card or at a retailer store. Then it can be used for buying Xbox games or tracks from the Zune Marketplace. But there are rumors users who share a track with Zune Wifi will be payed when someone buys that track from the MarketPlace in the future.

This can change the buy-only system to something like an internet currency used by people to get paid small amounts of money for services. Wouldn't you give your 2 cents (literally) or 2 points for reading a day's articles on Zune-Online ?

related articles:
Making Money from the Social
Zune Sharing Affiliation rumor

Amazon Honor system
PayPal  

[via CNN Money ]