The next Generation of electronic accounts:
There are approximately 5.5 Trillion dollars worth of retail transactions made face-to-face in the U.S. driven by a 400 Billion dollar advertising industry. Many analysts believe that the next platform for money transfer will use mobile devices (as clients for web transactions) in lieu of debit cards or cash. Companies such as PayPal expect to be the greatest beneficiaries of this trend and are predictably promoting and developing the transaction modes.
The big hurdles will be security, friction, and privacy
Mobile to web transactions introduce any number of hacking opportunities. Furthermore, PayPal, The Wireless Carrier, Marketers, The Bank, The Federal and State governments, and a host of other intermediaries are taking a piece of your paycheck and your data profile along with that Slurpee you just texted.
A huge amount of anti-social friction is imposed on the consumer in the name of convenience
Most people are unaware of the latest technology in debit cards that will allow them to transact in social currencies. Vendors can issue electronic coupons directly to a customer’s debit card. New social media applications allow people to exchange coupons from different companies among each other without necessarily converting them to dollars. This scrambles the data, preserves anonymity, and escapes taxation. Yet they can be just as easily redeemed for dollar denominated discounts at the point of sale.
The Social Value Game
Most people are also unaware of a new class of business methods being deployed in social media based on The Social Value Game developed by The Ingenesist Project. The Social Value Game allows people to leverage their social influence around a product or service to attract coupons from companies willing to sponsor the customer’s social activity in their marketing strategy. As such, social priorities will drive Wall Street priorities
A New Generation of Social Business Methods
When combined, these two technologies can vastly reduce the frictions of electronic commerce, reduce advertising, improve anonymity, scramble personal data and increase the security of transactions while introducing a strong bias toward social value in commerce. Instead of encrypting the device, these technologies encrypt the currency. At the point of sale, coupons will enter an exchange pool and the customer will receive their discount. In effect, they are selling their access and their data instead of having a gatekeeper sell it for them.
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