BuddyMedia.com - AceBucks - Virtual Facebook Currency

Social network application company Buddy Media has recently come out with a currency for Facebook users, called AceBucks. You can acquire AceBucks by doing things that you are already doing on Facebook, such as adding applications, taking surveys, playing games, etc. You can cash in your AceBucks on Facebook to buy virtual gifts for your friends, or you can convert them into cold hard cash to buy real items (the site cites iPods and phones as examples). When you sign up, the application urges you to invite your friends, and you'll actually earn more AceBucks for doing so. If you're an application creator, AceBucks will soon be launching an API that lets you integrate AceBucks into your app.

"Buddy Media's AceBucks application is the largest underground currency on Facebook. Facebook members can earn AceBucks by playing games, adding applications, completing surveys, inviting friends, opening a store and more. AceBucks can be used to buy both virtual and real goods and services through the AceBucks Mall and user-created stores".

AceBucks could be useful for encouraging Facebookers to add more applications and get reluctant users to become more involved with the recent Facebook changes. Since you don't have to change your Facebook behavior to earn money, AceBucks should appeal to those already set in their Facebook ways.

I'm kind of disgusted by this idea, to be honest. It just contributes to the degradation of Facebook; what once started as a community for college students has expanded into a mecca for teenyboppers which now not only encourages correspondence that would be better exchanged in a chat room or game site, but also monetizes these same actions. Adding to my frustrations is the fact that AceBucks's success depends on a pyramid scheme which pushes you to invite others to install the application.