Interesting note sent to me from Nelson Eduardo Pereira today, who spotted that Facebook are offering a currency. It's not a real one, just swapping credits, but it's a start.
The service builds on the gift services in Facebook.
These gift services have been tracked by Lightspeed Ventures for a while now and estimated to be worth around $15 million a year back in January 2008, increasing to $35 million by September 2008 and probably upwards of $60 million today.
The credit-based system is described in more depth in Venture Beat:
and what it implies is that Facebook has launched a first phase, virtual currency for swapping appreciation in virtual units amongst their now almost 200 million users.
Tomorrow?
Cashing in those credits for trading in real money?
Can't be far away ... oh yea, that's Spare Change isn't it?
Chris M Skinner
Chris Skinner is best known as an independent commentator on the financial markets through his blog, TheFinanser.com, as author of the bestselling book Digital Bank, and Chair of the European networking forum the Financial Services Club. He has been voted one of the most influential people in banking by The Financial Brand (as well as one of the best blogs), a FinTech Titan (Next Bank), one of the Fintech Leaders you need to follow (City AM, Deluxe and Jax Finance), as well as one of the Top 40 most influential people in financial technology by the Wall Street Journal's Financial News. To learn more click here...
