A method begins with a computing device receiving a request to acquire digital content from a digital content provider and forwarding the request to a dispersed storage network (DSN) pre-paid module. The method continues with the DSN pre-paid module validating the request, generating a plurality of sets of at least a threshold number of digital content read requests, and sending the plurality of sets of the at least a threshold number of digital content read requests to the digital content provider via the computing device when the request to acquire the digital content is validated. The method continues with at least one of the DSN pre-paid module and the computing device receiving a plurality of sets of at least a decoded threshold number of encoded data slices and decoding the plurality of sets of the at least a decoded threshold number of encoded data slices to produce the digital content.