The gamble
Pay-per-use has an obvious winner and an obvious loser. Watch four films a month at 720p and EidoOS costs about $1.19 — against a €14.99 subscription. Watch three hours a day at 4K and it costs about $77.68 — 3.5× a subscription. The second viewer is the most valuable one on any platform, and pure pay-per-use punishes them. That is why no incumbent has tried it.
The cap
The viewer sets a monthly spending limit in the wallet (setSpendingCap). When usage reaches it, one of three things happens, chosen in advance:
- Stop — playback pauses until next month or the cap is raised.
- Continue with ads (default) — the viewer keeps watching; SkoopoS ads cover the cost; the creator keeps earning.
- Drop to the cheapest quality — 240p at $0.021/hour, so a month of heavy viewing costs a few dollars.
The promise it makes possible
Cheaper than a subscription if you watch little; never more expensive if you watch a lot. Both halves are now true, and both can be put on a landing page without a footnote.
For creators
Under options 2 and 3 the creator is still paid — from ad revenue or from the cheaper tier — rather than losing the viewer entirely. The 70 % share applies to whatever the viewer's usage generates.
Why it belongs to the ecosystem, not to EidoOS
PhoonoS (music and podcasts) has the same shape: pay per megabyte of audio. The same cap, with the same three behaviours, is specified for it. The rule from the EidoOS economics: any pay-per-use product in the ecosystem should carry this mechanism.
What it does not fix
A public backend (not yet). A first paying viewer (none). The cap is code with tests; the platform is in internal testing. The page this replaces invited people to a gaming celebration in a city; this one explains a number in a settings screen that decides whether a video platform is fair.
Based on the EidoOS pay-per-use economics (2026-08-21).