Releasing version 1.6 of the MedioPay WordPress Plugin

Posted at 11:33h in by admin in Uncategorized

Three weeks ago we launched version 1.0 of our Micropayment Plugin for WordPress. Since then we have gone through a series of updates. With the newly released version 1.6 we add some often requested features and reach a point of stability.

The MedioPay Plugin for WordPress is a tool allowing all WordPress based websites to integrate micropayments in their business model. The core features are a paywall and a tipping button, but beyond this MedioPay enables streams of micropayments around articles, allowing the readers to get money back or even earn from buying and sharing an article. With the first version, MedioPay was already the most sophisticated paywall in the Internet.

Writing software for WordPress is great, as it can be easily deployed on millions of websites on the world. But it comes with some serious challenges: Every wordpress runs in its own environment, consisting of the hosting services, the php versions and, more than anything else: the themes and plugins of the blog. You can test you plugin as much as possible, on different servers, different machines, with different plugins and themes – but there will always be an environment in which it produces bugs.

We tested our first release of MedioPay in a small, but very enthusiastic community. The feedbacks we received got immediately in the next releases. During the first two weeks we released about ten updates of MedioPay, from which most fixed different kind of bugs, which emerged under different settings and environments. But we also integrated new features.

Here are the most notable new features which made it into release 1.6:

Hardening the paywall : It was possible to hack the paywall by injecting JavaScript and either get the hidden content in the console or even lift the paywall. We have been aware of this since the beginning, but didn’t think it is a problem for a long time. Risks are always an economic function, and as long as such hacks are not systematically exploited – for example with a browser plugin that breaks MedioPay paywalls – the damage they do is absolutely negligible. But to increase trust – and because it has to be done at some time anyway – we hardened the paywall, so that it is no longer possible to hack it.

: It was possible to hack the paywall by injecting JavaScript and either get the hidden content in the console or even lift the paywall. We have been aware of this since the beginning, but didn’t think it is a problem for a long time. Risks are always an economic function, and as long as such hacks are not systematically exploited – for example with a browser plugin that breaks MedioPay paywalls – the damage they do is absolutely negligible. But to increase trust – and because it has to be done at some time anyway – we hardened the paywall, so that it is no longer possible to hack it. Integrating Cookies : One of the first request was that readers, which crossed the paywall once, should not have to pay again to read the post again. We agree, and implemented Cookies, so that the paywall goes automatically down, when a reader visits the post again after he paid. This will only work when Cookies are allowed, not deleted after the closure of a session, and when the reader uses the same browser. In new posts it is automatically activated; to activate it for old posts, bloggers must update the post .

: One of the first request was that readers, which crossed the paywall once, should not have to pay again to read the post again. We agree, and implemented Cookies, so that the paywall goes automatically down, when a reader visits the post again after he paid. This will only work when Cookies are allowed, not deleted after the closure of a session, and when the reader uses the same browser. In new posts it is automatically activated; . Set your own texts in the paywall and the tipping field: Creating a wordpress plugin is sometimes detrimental to building a platform. While it’s good for an own site to make a consistent design, a plugin must have as less design as possible and allow as much individualization as possible. That’s why MedioPay plugin allows bloggers to pick any color for the paywall fields. With version 1.6 we introduce another individualization: Bloggers can now set their own text on the paywall and the tipping field. They know best what is needed to persuade their readers to pay. The text can be either set in the options for all posts, or above the second editor field for a single post.

Here’s how to set the individual paywall message for a single post in your editor:

Beside these major features we integrated a lot of minor updates. For example, if you view your post in preview mode and pay for it, the payment doesn’t increase the number of payments counter. So you can test it as often as you want, without taking the income share of your readers. We also fixed an issue sometimes emerging with affiliate links, added more onchain metadata, so that independent content curators can now access tags, language and the picture of the post; we also reorganized the setting page and much more.

We owe our testers a lot of thanks. We look forward to continue this journey with you and keep getting valuable feedback from you. If you want to become a MedioPay tester too, install the plugin directly from the wordpress directory. To give feedback, you can reach us through the contact form on our site, through twitter, in our Telegram group or with twetch.

To find blogs which offer exclusive content with MedioPay, you can have a look on our Value List.

For the next month, there will only be a new release of MedioPay in case of a bug. We will reorganize the plugin code, so that it will be able to incorporate more features. Beginning next year, we should be able to start integrating a large array of new payment models and other features.