Just need a way of putting a little real money into some service, and then painlessly transferring a little of it into sites when they ask for it (and I want to pay it). "This page costs x" or "stream y minutes of video for x" or "24 hour access to this site for x" etc.
Sometimes the solution is out there but it's not been made simple enough or is not adopted by enough high profile sites or whatever. There's flattr, a popular one, apparently, although I've never actually seen it used in the wild. You'd need a paywall but where the wall is only a few pennies or a fraction of a penny high. My objection to a paywall is not the need to pay, but the need to sign up for a site ("great, another site i have to trust with my credit card details") and the high cost ("you want £20 now for a months access? I only want to read 1 article"). You'd not buy anything in a real shop if you had to pay up front, in each shop, separately, before you'd even decided you wanted anything from that shop.
I think it's up to the user to avoid click-bait. Possibly, knowing that they're directly (or very nearly directly) paying for visits will make some users think twice before following a click-baity link.
But TBH, I'm not convinced people in general hate click-bait as much as people on HN seem to. People buy magazines like National Enquirer, which to me are the print version of click-bait dross.
I don't see how clicking on click bait means you pay/nearly pay. You're only paying if money leaves your bank account. You're just wasting a little time (not much though; just click the back button) and feeling a little stupid for falling for it. Just don't click on linkbait, and make a note not to ever visit that site again. Actually, it'd be nice if adblockers let you blacklist sites and turned their urls into the text "linkbait url removed". I think people DO hate linkbait generally because nobody likes being lied to, which is essentially what's happening.
Well, there's really no reason why Bitcoin should/would be a part of it. Bitcoin is no better at microtransactions than any other payment solution, it's actually worse. So you're left with solutions that involve "off-chain"-type transactions and even then, you have a MAJOR adoption hurdle with Bitcoin that you don't have with credit cards and ACH.
I guess the reason Bitcoin is used is because the payments are to be decentralised and without opt-in from the site's that are getting paid. As opposed to services like Flattr that require signup from the site's before hand.
How about they are not? Radical I know, but what about having a button on the bottom of the page where you could click to say "this was a good article, flattr it"?
Now you might say very few people would pay for it, but if we assume something like flattr, then your money is already spent. All we are talking about is who gets the booty. And if you aren't a flattr user, then you just get an excert and a signup button.
That version kills click-bait, because who really likes those kinds of articles?
Thing is, if sites are automatically compensated once users visit how does that change the motivation away from click bait?