Election Day, and Money on the Internet

First off, happy Election Day. It's been a "rough" political season from/to both sides, but all in all, we still live in a country where elections matter. And I think that's pretty fantastic.

Second, I read an interesting article about Dave McClure's thoughts on Facebook. He basically says taht Facebook should be wary about their privacy issues because people could gravitate--people both being the public that uses their services AND advertisers seeking to monetize the web--towards networks "that take intimacy and privacy more seriously than Facebook, not just because it will put that new network in line with regulators/the public, but also because it will lead to better monetization." McClure, as an ex-Pay-Pal employee, might know a little bit about monetization.

I'd have to say that it is a pretty interesting argument--creating what I'd call "buying clusters" of close friends--the people you actually go out and spend money with--that are networked together and then targeted by advertisers. That's a system taht not only rewards groups of friends for sharing collective traits about the sorts of things that they are interested in, but allows advertisers to wield the power of peer pressure to promote their products. Sure, it's creepy, and I don't necessarily think that Facebook is the platform for launching a network of "buying clusters", but if a program came up in the future, and they said "sign up with your group of friends and get special deals on the things you like to do together"--that might be something I'd be interested in.

And if the network, similar to a GroupOn/Facebook mash-up, throwing in a little Twitter real-time search aspect, and you've got one heckuva network for purchasing power. Advertisers would pay top dollar target groups of friends interested in niche markets--like "rock climbers of Indianapolis" or "people who like to go to comedy shows in Bloomington". But even smaller than that would work too: "Alex Luboff's Fan Club" (which is really just me and my parents) or "Alex's Saturday Night Crew" (which, once again, is just me and my parents).

That's good for advertisers, and it could be fun to be 'catered to' as a consumer.

Maybe I'm way off the mark, but these are the sorts of things that make new markets.