21–30 of 119 posts
Facebook as payment system? I still don't have enough confidence on how secure their system is. Also, sharing home address with them is not a smart move.
All power to Facebook to make it work though: maybe if they can monetize themselves through means like this they'll pay more attention to privacy issues as they will have less incentive to make everything public for advertising/selling data.
I would probably click "yes" if it's Not for every FB 'friend', but there's a 'sufficiently close' threshold where, yes, I'd click that button. Even better if it's day-of fulfillment. And I bet I'm not alone.
Oooh, now that's the way to get real names + addresses out of people. Neat. It also involves social pressure -- now not giving away your address will mean rejecting a gift.
I swear, I really was born on 1/1/1970. I'm a epoch baby! Ok, maybe not.
I'm friends with a few people on Facebook who I'd consider to be very popular. 1000+ friends with many guys vying after their attention. Every time they post a picture of themselves it will be hit with 50 likes (mostly from males) in the first hour. I bet these people will be swimming in gifts once it's released.
"It's Mary's birthday in 3 days - send her a birthday cupcake?" I would probably click "yes" if it's Not for every FB 'friend', but there's a 'sufficiently close' threshold where, yes, I'd click that button. Even better if it's day-of fulfillment. And I bet I'm not alone.
All depends on the quality of the gifts. If they're chintzy, good luck. But if it's quality stuff, cool. It's got to be of a higher level than Zynga was for apps. Facebook would be served best by controlling gift quality with an iron fist. I'm a little skeptical they'll do that, but maybe. This is very cool, though "Friends ... can swap for a different size, flavor or style before the gift ships." Still. Quality. Qua…
Another thing that will be tricky is separating signal and noise. If I'm buying a birthday gift for my punk rock friend, they shouldn't bother showing me cupcakes and chocolate boxes. Seems like a no-brainer to show me gift options based on his likes.
"Now you can do something more meaningful" (than a hey, happy birthday call or message). It disappoints me when I hear wording like this, there is nothing more meaningful about paying money for a present that took you two clicks and is probably already part of a pre-selected group of items from their profile/history, than thinking of something to write on their wall in two clicks. All power to Facebook to make it wor…
This seems like the entirely wrong thing to optimize. There are so many other opportunities for Facebook to monetize: - group buying around deals, or group buying in general - "Pay by Facebook" Facebook Connect based payment system - Facebook Presence based loyalty programs among many other easier things than gifts. Gifting does not seem like low hanging fruit.
This is fundamentally social and something that pretty much only Facebook can do. I know that there are a lot of companies trying to compete in the loyalty, group buying, and payment platforms.