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Jonathan's Card

jonathanstark.com

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Re: Jonathan's Card

#61

Post by jerf »

jonathanstark wrote: post #51
wallflower wrote: post #47

> Plus, it’s actually kinda fun to see those rewards stars drop into my in-app coffee cup. Well, Jonathan may get the Rewards so it is not completely altruistic. A real-time map of where transactions have been made ala http://twittervision.com might be interesting if this card goes viral https://www.starbucks.com/card/rewards

Jonathan here: Yes, unfortunately I do get the rewards. I get a free coffee for every 15 purchased. I figured that the free coffees would accrue to the card itself and therefore every 16th person would get a free coffee. As it turns out, sbux mails free coffee coupons to me: http://yfrog.com/keup3hxj I'm not sure how to redistribute them fairly, but I was thinking that I could at least pass them out at my local store…

If you're willing to throw the dice a bit, and you wouldn't consider this a tainting factor (no sarcasm), contact Starbucks. There's a distinct possibility they may work with you. Depending on how you judge the risk, you may want to do this anyhow, lest they simply shut the card down entirely in the near future. There is of course the risk that contacting them may cause that result sooner, but... in the long term you're probably better off contacting them anyhow because if they're going to shut it down when you bring it to their attention, they're going to shut it down when they discover it anyhow. I think you still come out ahead in the case where you contact them and they end up not shutting it down when they would have if you didn't contact them.

Otherwise, you're "stuck"; be open about it (as you are), and use them or not. I wouldn't hold it against you either way, personally.

Re: Jonathan's Card

#62

Post by mkorfmann »

lucianof wrote: post #59

I tried to load it, but all I got was: "This recipient does not accept payments from non-U.S. PayPal accounts." (I'm Swiss) Why would Starbucks restrict from where they get their money?

Paying with CC from outside the US works.

Re: Jonathan's Card

#63

Post by lucianof »

Peaker wrote: post #57
brk wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems to kind of defeat the point? Use it when you can't afford coffee, refill it when you can afford a coffee plus a little more...

I don't understand: Do people really alternate between being able to afford a coffee and not being able to, more than a couple of times in a lifetime?

Being able to afford something and having enough change in the pockets is not necessarily the same. Plus, I guess a coffee you got for free because of the kindness of a stranger might taste sweeter than your regular venti.

Re: Jonathan's Card

#64

Post by lucianof »

mkorfmann wrote: post #62
lucianof wrote: post #59

I tried to load it, but all I got was: "This recipient does not accept payments from non-U.S. PayPal accounts." (I'm Swiss) Why would Starbucks restrict from where they get their money?

Paying with CC from outside the US works.

Hm, I didn't feel like giving *$ my email. But now that I tried it it says: "Please select a state or province." (I cant find anything in this list that is not US/Can) and "Please enter a ZIP Code at least 5 characters long" (we just have 4 digits). They just don't want my money..

Re: Jonathan's Card

#65

Post by SoftwareMaven »

wallflower wrote: post #29

I know it is a fictional movie but if you haven't seen it, "Pay it Forward" is a movie that might make you briefly think about your impact.

But stop watching 15 minutes before the end. The end of the movie totally countered everything they were trying to say in the rest of movie, IMO.

Re: Jonathan's Card

#66

Post by duck »

jonathanstark wrote: post #51
wallflower wrote: post #47

> Plus, it’s actually kinda fun to see those rewards stars drop into my in-app coffee cup. Well, Jonathan may get the Rewards so it is not completely altruistic. A real-time map of where transactions have been made ala http://twittervision.com might be interesting if this card goes viral https://www.starbucks.com/card/rewards

Jonathan here: Yes, unfortunately I do get the rewards. I get a free coffee for every 15 purchased. I figured that the free coffees would accrue to the card itself and therefore every 16th person would get a free coffee. As it turns out, sbux mails free coffee coupons to me: http://yfrog.com/keup3hxj I'm not sure how to redistribute them fairly, but I was thinking that I could at least pass them out at my local store…

Buy a homeless person a coffee this winter and have a chat with them.

Re: Jonathan's Card

#67

Post by startupfounder »

jonathanstark wrote: post #44
ookblah wrote: post #26

Hmm, I think posting the value of the card affects the data points. I understand why it needs to be done, but my thinking is that if nobody knows how much is on there it leaves it less prone to outright abuse. If the card suddenly gets a $100 recharge I'm sure it will be abused a lot more. Maybe that's part of the experiment, but I'd like to see what people do in general without that knowledge. EDIT: or maybe even ju…

Jonathan here: I've been thinking about this quite a bit. One the one hand, last week some jerk saw a $50 balance and spent the whole thing in one shot. On the other hand, people need to know when there is money on the card if they are thinking about walking down to a sbux to get a coffee. I might try the "there's more than $10 on the card right now". I've also experimented with delaying the reloaded messages, and do…

How about putting everything in units of coffee? "There is at least 1 coffee on me" etc. "5 coffees were just added to me". This might take the emphasis off the amount of money on the card and onto the giving and receiving of coffee.

Re: Jonathan's Card

#68

Post by mkorfmann »

lucianof wrote: post #64
mkorfmann wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Paying with CC from outside the US works.

Hm, I didn't feel like giving *$ my email. But now that I tried it it says: "Please select a state or province." (I cant find anything in this list that is not US/Can) and "Please enter a ZIP Code at least 5 characters long" (we just have 4 digits). They just don't want my money..

"Please select a state or a province" I selected "Armed Forces Europe" ;)

Re: Jonathan's Card

#69

Post by CrazedGeek »

snprbob86 wrote: post #58
pangram wrote: post #4

Whenever I go through a toll bridge, I frequently pay the toll of the person behind me. I've sometimes wondered if it propagates backward at all. For the Starbucks card, I would love to live in a society where this could work. Unfortunately it's one of those things where one anonymous bad egg will ruin (i.e., drain the account) for everyone else. Some way to restrict it to a community with less anonymity would help (…

> I frequently pay the toll of the person behind me In what country/state/city? Is that legal? In most (all?) US cities, it is illegal to fill other peoples' parking meters because that robs the city of fines. But maybe it's not a concern for tolls? > I've sometimes wondered if it propagates backward at all. At most, it would only reach exactly the car behind you. If that driver decides to pay the toll anyway (or the…

    In most (all?) US cities, it is illegal to fill other peoples' parking meters
Is that true? A quick search brings up http://theexpiredmeter.com/2009/04/parking-ticket-geek-arres... , which suggests that, at the very least, it's legal in Chicago.

Re: Jonathan's Card

#70

Post by olefoo »

jonathanstark wrote: post #44
ookblah wrote: post #26

Hmm, I think posting the value of the card affects the data points. I understand why it needs to be done, but my thinking is that if nobody knows how much is on there it leaves it less prone to outright abuse. If the card suddenly gets a $100 recharge I'm sure it will be abused a lot more. Maybe that's part of the experiment, but I'd like to see what people do in general without that knowledge. EDIT: or maybe even ju…

Jonathan here: I've been thinking about this quite a bit. One the one hand, last week some jerk saw a $50 balance and spent the whole thing in one shot. On the other hand, people need to know when there is money on the card if they are thinking about walking down to a sbux to get a coffee. I might try the "there's more than $10 on the card right now". I've also experimented with delaying the reloaded messages, and do…

What about requiring interaction from purchaser.

Require a photo of the purchase.

It would add a level of social obligation. You could go further and require a tweet explaining the purchase. You could even add a little homily about good manners and not being greedy to the explanatory text.

I think you are doing a very interesting experiment with new financial entities, and I'm curious to see where this leads.

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