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Facebook Will Make You Pay for What They Have Done!
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by Truemorist | June 2, 2009 at 04:42 pm
3387 views | 2 Recommendations | 7 comments
Bringing together the worst of all web 2.0 worlds into one giant clusterbook of fun is Facebook's raison d'être.
But now they've really taken things too far. The social network is planning to introduce its much-ballyhooed "internal payment" system that would transform the site into a bizarre, virtual-goods-exchanging platform for friends to sell each other things that aren't even real.
Sounds like a perfect internet business model, no?
Plucking a proverbial page from the profitable playbooks of PayPal, Second Life, World of Warcraft, and eBay — Facebook is hoping that people will be bothered to spend real-world dollars on 3rd-party apps and virtual goods — so that the site may then reap a marginal percentage of per-transaction-profit from its ballooning billions of users.
Would you pay to be poked?
Or, darker still, maybe FB's latest dubious business move will herald an underwordly dawn of one's digital acquaintances being bought and sold for hard-earned dollars.
Commodified friendship is the future, "friends".
The long-rumoured payments system, which is in its early stages, will allow users to purchase Facebook “credits”, then use those credits to buy virtual goods from the third-party applications that run on the site, or from Facebook itself.
Facebook hopes that by offering a site-wide currency it will encourage more commerce on the website. By serving as the payment provider, it will capture a percentage of every transaction.
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at 16:54 on June 2nd, 2009
It's really not a bad idea if they handle it correctly and respect the users. I would definitely be willing to pay for some quality apps as opposed to the garbage heap that it is now. Plus they already have started this a little with the gift system right?
Regardless of what they do I'm sure there will be a Facebook petition to stop it.
at 16:55 on June 2nd, 2009
Great. Now they can go "phishing for dollars" and steal the credits that people actually paid real money for. That will be awesome! Can't wait!
at 17:01 on June 2nd, 2009
This is nothing short of SCARY! Remember the Beacon FIASCO? Sorry folks but I am not trusting Zuckerburg and crew with any of my financial information. Add to that the fact that the Gifts, Pokes and quizzes are more than irritating and I will just jump ship from FB to Google Wave once it launches.
Great post!
at 17:03 on June 2nd, 2009
"I am not a macodity!" --Dr. Tran
at 17:15 on June 2nd, 2009
i think that building a virtual marketplace is a great idea. Virtual means digital, and increasingly we are using digital content/solutions that work and exist in the virtual world. Being in touch with friends is just one of the facets (a major one) of this network.
at 17:25 on June 2nd, 2009
I know Ill be blasted for this by family and friends but were'nt the "virtual farms" enough. Surely I hope this just rumor and nonsense.
Now a Pro or Private version, with limited access like affluence.org? This I would be interested in parting with some cash.
best,
Rob
RGriffin@WitLinx.com
www.WitLinx.com
at 17:32 on June 2nd, 2009
This is ridiculous and the sad thing is it will probably make great money for them. Are we all really so sad that we must pay our hard earned cash to buy virtual flowers and poke our friends. Here's an idea, let's get out of our cave and smell REAL roses. While we're at it maybe we should walk those flowers over to a real friend and have a good old fashioned face to face conversation. Just imagine...