Category: Geeks r Us
Hi All,
I have recently discovered that there is a service being developed that might be good competition for PayPal. For those who do not know...PayPal is an Internet payment processing service. This means that you can send and receive money online, and if a merchant has signed up for PayPal, you can purchase from that merchant using your PayPal account. You can put money in your PayPal account by transferring it from your bank account or credit card, having it transferred to you from another PayPal user, or simply use your bank account or card to pay, but keep your data(account number, etc) from being known by all but PayPal themselves. This new service is currently "closed box". This means that funds can only be transferred between users. However, when they are able to "open the box" you will be able to use it just like PayPal. However, I have already noticed one plan that is different...The new service intends on supplying users with a debit card which the account holder can use to pay at local merchants or draw cash directly from the account using an ATM(after the box has been opened). Currently, PayBox(the new service) is in development. What this means for us is that we can get involved and help to make it more accessible and better than PayPal. If you become an "early bird"(a user who is willing to take the time to make PayBox the best it can be) you can start building funds now. You can build funds by answering surveys, telling friends about the new service, and reading the blogs that keep early bird users up to date on the development of the service. I have only found two(2) surveys to be inaccessible, and they were a survey covering merchants that you want to see accept PayBox, and the best debit card design. In the less than two weeks I have been involved I have already earned $160+. True I cannot truly spend it yet, but I will be able to when PayBox is able to open the service to the public. The last estimated date for "opening the box" I read was April or May. That could change...They have goals they need to reach in order to open the service to the public...If you want to help make this service the best it can be use the following link to
Sign Up!
And if you do not have an account with PayPal yet, and you want to check them out...
Sign Up For PayPal Here!
This is so incredibly cool! I'm a huge fan of debit over credit and something like this sounds marvelous, especially since you can use it on and offline! I'll definitely tell my friends about this. Thanks for posting.
This is interesting, but the debit card is not any different than PayPal. PP is already doing this. I have a PayPal debit card, and I love it. It's saved my tail many a time. You can use it to make purchases, or at ATM's, etc, just like a normal bank debit card. So, with the debit card taken out of the equasion, I'm curious what is different. But, bottom line, competition is a good thing, so I hope this service takes off.
Far as I understand things...PayPal you have to "apply" for the card(bad credit forget it...That is why I have never applied), but they intend on every customer (account holder) having one...That is at least one difference I can see from the beginning, and another difference...Is there something you can think of that you prefer PayPal had? Well, they are interested in hearing it, and maybe if it is requested enough...Then we will get it. The more creative, open minded, people we get on to help develop it, the better it can be!
I have also signed up for this service. I'm not posting a link here, as the original poster did and seems to me by all rights anyone doing a click-through from here ought to go to her referrals page.
All this being said, here are my thoughts:
- competition to PayPal? I don't know yet. Understand that what they have is virtual currency, what amounts to monopoly money or virtual points on here, or game creds.
So, with them right now, I currently have $1,093.54.
I doubt it amounts to much more than henshit on a pumphouse handle, as I have done hardly anything except fill in the simplest of surveys and have no referrals.
They are now offering you one of the many online training courses for around $30, and that's not $30 Paybox dollars, that's $30 your hard-earned cash. Is it a good buy? I have no idea: marketing has never been my strong suit and may well be a major cause of two business failures in my life. I have read countless books on the subject over the years, everything from style guides to how to market on the Internet, but I admit, I'm an utter failure at it.
So if you want to find out before you buy that, I'd talk to someone who has a proven track record approximately 180 degrees from mine.
Just be cautious with the Internet Marketing and Grow Rich schemes, as the net is absolutely full of people who ruined meta tags usage by trying to get theirs to the top, are working hard to defeat AI engines by writing "SEO-friendly" (search engine optimization) text, since the engines are now smart enough to spit out bad meta.
I'm sure there are people who are very good at it, who don't try and defeat the AI, but actually render content to your desktop or iPhone or whatever, which uses the AI to target you as a potential consumer rather than just broadcasting. The math and ratios involved aren't that difficult, though I don't know if they think in these terms.
So how does this relate to Paybox?
They need a ton of users signed up, which is all you need to acquire. Where it breaks down for me, is I don't know how this virtual currency converts into real currency a retail establishment can actually use to pay its light bill and service people with. I signed up out of pure, unadulterated curiosity, because there is no hidden cost, and at least now, you can't buy the currency.
It'll be interesting to see how they manage exchange rates and the like, because more than just end-to-end exchange between countries, you'll have the Paybox exchange rate also.
Would I be happy to get a little free gear for having signed up? Sure.
And yes, I'm sure filling out their surveys meaningfully could assist them in targeting. Early on they were asking for database aggregation software developers among other things. The blog posts are pretty skimpy on actual content, lots of empty verbiage, but probably attractive to the masses somehow.
If anything, it may turn out to compete with GoldEx or some other intra-currency exchange-based system, where sellers and buyers would exchange on the PayBox currency rather than point-to-point exchanges, and the consumer would simply buy more Paybox dollars as they need to refill their account.
What a debit card would look like, I'm still cogitating, but certainly possible given the Paybox to American dollar exchange rate could be set. That's not Amerocentric, they're simply based in the U.S. from all I can see, and for better or worse, the American dollar is usable as an international exchange measuring stick.
Don't take any of this wrong: I'm not down on Paybox, or I wouldn't have signed up in October. I'm not maximizing it, as I'm not a marketing expert. However, just be mindful in your Internet marketing efforts, that attempting to defeat the artificial intelligence used by search engines is going to backfire eventually, just as the terrible destruction of meta did in the 1990s.
I don't know what in Marketing speak they call defeating the AI, but basically if you get a pamphlet telling you how to circumvent Google or whoever, how to work around its intended purpose, how to get past aspects of search engine monitoring, you're going to end up being constantly frustrated by technological innovation designed deliberately and thoughtfully to defeat your attempts to defeat it. And, I realize I'm biased, they're better at it than you or any marketing genius are, at least in the long run.
I can only assume, though, in an age of targeted marketing, there's probably literature / programs out there which try and do what electronics are doing with power: point-to-point improvements where less is wasted and more goes to the target group to maximize efficiency, be it a drive shaft or a audience. I don't really know in marketing speak what they would call this, but there's got to be some science to it.
As it relates to Paybox, to make it big with them, you'll have to apply said techniques as their end game right now seems to be maximizing the number of users and not building infrastructure. That would make sense: To create a new and independent currency, you'd need enough people circulating it (which would equate to many many more people subscribing / using it) to give the currency any form of value.
Paypal isn't like this, because what you have in your Paypal account amounts to real currency, with whatever exchange rate you try and pull it out. Paybox is trying to create their own currency which, unlike game creds and the like, can be bridged into and with real currency, aka has a real value on the market.
I'm curious to watch this whole process, as they may be the very first really successful nongovernmental entity to create a currency with value on the open market. This will raise a lot of issues of interest for sure, perhaps as many as did the first government-issue currency approximately 10,000 years or so ago.
Might be a leap in evolution, might be just an interesting blip on the radar.
Just understand the difference between PayPal and Paybox. Paybox has its own currency, with its own values, to be exchanged for real dollars. It's not dollar for dollar, I'm most certainly sure. I can reasonbly say though I have $1,093.54 in Paybox currency, that will amount to nothing near that in U.S. currency, much as I might like it to.
What this means, and how the market will receive it, remains to be seen. Until then, they have to convince enough users to simply join, and enough joined users to do something with it, perhaps means to buy or earn more that consist of the infamous go-get-more-to-join-us pyramid scheme which is ultimately top-heavy and crashes without market value.
You could be completely correct in that PayBox might amount to nothing. I was by no means trying to put across a "get rich" idea. :) I do not believe you can get rich quick...unless you inherit, and that does not appear to be in my future...But, if they do go public, and they can convert even a tenth of PayBox money into cash...It is worth the little time required; at least in my opinion...But then again, right now the idea of even $10 extra is attractive. No, I have not, and will not sign up for any of these marketing programs they are offering. To put it simple, I do not have the money to do it, and I will not waist my money(even if I did have it) on something that may not work. I do not believe in bypassing security just to make a buck, and if they are simply trying to market by spamming or jepordizing security...Well, I am against that...Actually, by the way, meta does work, if you know how to do it...I have used it with my Web sites for years, and if you do it right it does help(help) the search engines find your site. Mind you, I also submit my site(s) to search engines, and that helps too. Anyways, I advertised PayBox for the simple reason that from my understanding(and that could well be faulty) they are attempting as their long term goal to compete with PayPal. As I said in my original post...The money in any account is only exchangeable between users, but from what I read on the site, when they are able to go public(IE, "open the box") this will no longer be the case...Whether money in early bird accounts will translate directly into American currency or not...Well, that is left to be seen, but they got to go public(2/5 million users is the goal) before we can know what their next step will be...The only thing that truly bothers me at the moment about PayBox is that there is no link to directly contact the people involved in it...At least that I could find...
My post wasn't directed at you, it appears from reading your post you were thoughtful in signing up.
I imagine meta does work, especially if you don't repetitively insert the same meta all over the place.
I admit, I'm there out of curiosity, but it sounds like you have some online marketing experience to back your presence there.
Perhaps they want to compete with Paypal, but what's interesting is the concept of unofficial currency. Is this the next stage in flattening the earth? Think about where 15 years ago we only got our news and content from publication providers. Now, you can write a blog, post it for free, I can read it, and become informed.
Gone are the days when content was delivered by the virtual priests or medicine men of print, the media, etc.
However, currency is still managed by countries and banks. There are pockets of people who agree to perform services or supply goods for barter, but they usually run into the same problems our ancestors did pre-currency: translating the value of one thing into the value of another. Note that it is totally legal to trade in anything you want on the open market. Anything but counterfeit currency and illicit items, of course. So what Paybox is essentially doing is creating a digitized system to exchange their Paybox dollars for goods and services.
Your feeling about the ten bucks is warranted: That would mean I could say yes one more time to my teenage daughter, or fill the wife's car with gas, (ok half-fill the tank with gas anymore), and so on. Most currency's value is based on the perceived and real economy behind it. In short, the strength or weakness of the American dollar is to a large extent related to the relative strength of the American economy compared to America's competitors.
How Paybox currency will attain value I don't know, but naturally it's going to become what amounts to a tradable commodity on the market. You'll probably be able to buy and sell Paybox dollars.