Acebucks Gets $1.5 Million For Virtual Facebook Currency
Nick Gonzalez
28 comments »
Acebucks, the maker of a virtual currency for Facebook has raised a $1.5 million round of investment. AceBucks was originally purchased by Michael Lazerow to form Buddy Media, whose investors include Howard Lindzon, Peter Thiel, Mark Pincus and James Altucher.
Acebucks is a virtual economy that pays users Acebucks for installing applications and referring their friends (kind of like a virtual pyramid scheme). Users can then spend the currency on either virtual goods in the Acebucks mall or put them toward real items like an iPod Nano.
Acebucks is using the financing to grow the company. They want to become the de-facto virtual currency of Facebook, and will soon launch an API that lets users integrate Acebucks into their own applications. They are also expected to announce a business partnership in the coming days.
I found installing the application to be rather spammy. It refused to let me through the sign-up process unless I sent notifications to my friends, automatically checking five of them. You can uncheck the friends and press the submit button, but they don’t make this obvious.
While virtual currencies haven’t had much luck on the web at large, Facebook may provide the right environment to ensure the security of their money supply and merchandise that precursors lacked.
acebucks, not acevucks
I heard that Facebook is gearing up to launch its own micropayments platform soon, thereby making Acebucks redundant.
ugh, I cant stand the idea of virtual currency. The fact that they got 1.5 mil makes me sick
what’s wrong with the term “faceBuck”? i think it sounds so much better and could be so much bigger. maybe there is legal issues or something.
ugh is right. First all the blogrush hype and now this. I sure hope Web 3.0 isn’t the home of spammy virtual pryamid schemes.
MLM
why would people want to send friends here and there to get monopoly $ online? I just don’t get it.
When I think virtual currency I think Beenz and all the other Web 1.0 startups…it’s not a vertical I’d be investing in
on a 2nd thought, if I have 30 hours a day I can write an application that use the Abuck API and print my own $$. Or simply applying 200 yahoo email to get free startup $.
so how many email accounts do I need to get an ipod nano?
I think the situation is different on Facebook. The environment offers a closed system where the currency can be controlled and virtual goods distrubuted, similar to the way they are on other virtual worlds (second life, WOW).
A key difference is that, unlike beenz, this virtual currency doesn’t need to be converted into real-world currency. Also, advertiser buy-in is easier with a plethora of applications looking for promotion as a virtual good or limited time offers.
All that being said, it does seem hokey, but hey, so does MySpace.
IMHO, even though the thought of trading virtual currencies seems a bit hokey, the proliferation of casual gaming on Facebook, and the young audience makes virtual currencies compelling.
Please check out Zuckerbucks (http://apps.facebook.com/zuckerbucks/). We’ve been around as long as Acebucks, and have a more complete feature set, including:
* API that any app developer can sign up for.
* Sponsored auctions where you can spend your Zuckerbucks for real-life products.
* Integrated “Profile Plot” virtual real-estate game
* Integrated market place where Zuckerbuckers are trading goods
* Integrated service provider directory
Thanks!
Facebook will definetely want to control virtual currency. They’ll come out with there own solution thus making all in this space redundant!
In time once a third party works out how to make it work in Facebook, they’ll copy the formulae and add it to there arsenal of home made applications!
This is virtual currency with no physical, and i see very little chance of them moving into the micro payment space that facebook is targeting (read : real virual money) because of their model right now. I doubt if facebook will look at them as a threat in terms of virtual facebbok currency.
I think Facebook will have better things to do than control the business relationships between app developers. It’s not like they’ve shut down other virtual offerings, like free gifts.
We’re more likely to see them enter the app advertising space, either through their own competing platform, or solving a lot of the promotional issues apps deal with by actually making an app directory that works. Why they haven’t applied the “social graph” directly to the app directory by letting you see the most popular/engaging apps amongst your friends and friends of friends boggles my mind.
Soon, soon it will burst. Facebook which is worth 5 billion virtual dollars, trying to build an internet inside the internet, and these Flooz and Beenz startups on top of it.
Virtual Money, that sucks
http://vidsonly.blogspot.com
I think facebook will go the second life way “facebook dollars” , it has become a virtual closed-society … though not an internet within the WWW
While I originally thought a currency would have broad utility, I now think they are more useful to the casual gaming crowd. Therefore, I’m not convinced that everybody needs “Facebook points” attached to the platform.
My users have convinced me, however, that given the right sponsorship - a virtual currency carries a ton of value. What you get by sponsoring an auction is much more (in terms of user engagement and passion) than spending the equivalent money on banner or text ads. However, managing this will require very specific analytics and thus virtual currency providers.
Attempting to create your own economic ecosystem is tougher than people think. Look at the issues that face Second Life when their too good to be true bank went defunct. I agree with the other commenters that these virtual currencies are in effect a pyramid scam and will blow over with the social network pop.
Why doesn’t TechCrunch evaluate an applications that promote saving for real goals with real money like iWant does?
Congrats to Mike and the team. What people on this board seem to miss is that investors aren’t just betting on a virtual currency here….they are betting on PEOPLE (Mike Lazerow) who have done the startup-to-buyout thing before.
The investment is in BUDDY MEDIA, the (intended) media focus is on their first project….Acebucks.
Disclosure: I’m personally a small investor in this through Howard Lindzon’s fund and very happy to be invested in Lazerow and his team.
The fatal flaw is that unlike Linden Dollars in Second Life, Acebucks and presumably the forthcoming Facebook-backed micropayment platform will not be convertible to and from real money. You go around accumulating Acebucks or whatever through your automated programs (or legitimately, but who would waste the time) so you can spend it on…what exactly? one of a very specific number of items with whom Acebucks happens to have partnerships. Not quite as flexible as good ole greenbacks in my opinion.
What the world needs, is a good free micropayment engine.
Why not use real money? or is it already being done?
Acebucks has the ability to become S&H greenstamps reborn!