[fastball]

Not sure this is applicable to anyone else, but when it comes to being a kid with no money for me that meant literally no digital money. I had no bank account (at least not with a debit card associated) and my parents would not have given me theirs.

But the difference between a couple bucks a month and $5 once you actually have the ability to pay for stuff online does seems pretty negligible.

[kroltan]

Here in Brazil there is a very widely supported payment method "boleto bancário", where basically the seller/provider prints you a bill that you can pay with a bank account, or in cash at physical locations (usually lottery houses and post offices).

In fact, some websites even offer big discounts (like 15%) for payments in boleto since there is basically no service fee.

That is basically how me and all my friends did "online" transactions.

[sergiomattei]

You're actually right, it's an oversight from my comment. I was in the same spot: some savings, none digital, parents weren't going to pay anything.

In any case, if it gets kids learning new things under the guise of saving a very limited resource, I'm all for it!

[jjice]

Very good point. I remember being so excited when I got my first job at 16 and opened a bank account because I could finally purchase things online without having to do something like buy a prepaid debit card, which always had an overhead fee.

Even after that, I was always frugal and never wanted to spend something like $15 a month for a server for my friends. Now, as an adult software developer, I wouldn't think twice about the fun to dollar ratio of paying for a Minecraft server to connect with some old friends.

[sergiomattei]

Same here! I had access to prepaid cards, but sadly cloud providers just don't accept them. (At least DigitalOcean didn't!)