Thursday, May 13, 2010

Easy Kwedit

Kwedit Has Legs – Repayment Rate above 33%

It first launched in February – see our post describing it as the “first completely unreliable payment network.”

At launch time the company told me they had absolutely no idea what percentage of people would pay back Kwedit promises because they hadn’t tested the product yet. Since virtual goods are free to create and sell, though, there wasn’t much downside for the seller.


Why am I reminded of the housing bubble?

This will do wonders for teaching our children what money is all about.


Credit for Kids? Kwedit Goes on the Defensive

But Kwedit Promise is unique, and disquieting enough to draw Colbert's ire. "I know that it sounds like a website that hooks little kids on borrowing credit, so let me explain," Colbert said on his March 4 broadcast. "It's a website that hooks little kids on borrowing credit."

Except it really isn't, says founder Danny Shader. "We don't extend credit and we don't have kids using our site," Shader says. What wasn't communicated in Colbert's piece and wasn't immediately clear in the press coverage of Kwedit is that the company does have some baseline rules. Users have to be older than 13 to use the service, and any promises made are nonbinding.


I had no idea that 14 year old users are not considered kids. Why aren't we sending them to Iraq? This is also great news for the movie industry.

PG-13 Films Not Safe for Kids, UCLA Researchers Say

Silly UCLA researchers! Once you hit 14 you aren't a kid any longer though. Danny Shader cleared that all up for us.

So let's just be consistent.


The Twilight Saga - Lunch Box

Manufacturer's Age: 14 years and up

Super Pogo

Manufacturer's Age: 14 years and up

Kwedit

Manufacturer's Age: 14 years and up

M-16 Assault Rifle

Manufacturer's Age: 14 years and up?

Crazy talk?

Youngest Soldier in the Civil War

SERGEANT JOHN CLEM, Twenty-second Michigan Volunteer Infantry, is the youngest soldier in our army. He is 12 years old, and small even for his age. His home is Newark, Ohio. He first attracted the notice of General Rosecrans at a review at Nashville, where he was acting as marker of his regiment. The General, attracted by his youth and intelligence, invited him to call upon him whenever they were in the same place. Rosecrans saw no more of Clem until his return to Cincinnati, when one day coming to his rooms at the Burnet House, he found the boy awaiting him. He had seen service in the mean while. He had gone through the battle of Chickamauga, where he had three bullets through his hat. Here he killed a rebel Colonel. The officer, mounted on horseback, encountered the young hero, and called out, "Stop, you little Yankee devil!" By way of answer the boy halted, brought his piece to "order," thus throwing the Colonel off his guard. In another moment the piece was cocked, brought to aim, fired, and the officer fell dead from his horse. For this achievement Clem was promoted to the rank of Sergeant, and Rosecrans bestowed upon him the Roll of Honor. He is now on duty at the head-quarters of the Army of the Cumberland.

Sergeant John Clem did pretty good for himself at age 12, but just think how much better off he would have been had he been given the opportunity to pretend to pay for pretend guns in pretend games using pretend credit. That's a winning combination if ever there was one.

8 comments:

mab said...

Stag,

I don't get it. Why would anybody need "Easy Kwedit" when they can get the real thing - Easy Credit?

And I'm shocked any of the Easy Kwedit users bother to pay. It's not like Easy Credit users bother to pay.

Complexity was used to justity and hide simple fraud. The wheels are falling off. Just wait until the majority realize that bank bailouts will lead to a gutting of public services, social security and medicare.

It will all end badly.

Stagflationary Mark said...

mab,

Here's the deal, as seen through the eyes of an ex computer game programmer and as a computer gamer.

There are quite a few games you can play for free on the Internet. Some make money by charging you for extra content. Generally speaking, these games tend to be fairly crappy.

Picture that you are playing as some sort of warrior with a short sword. The game might offer you Excalibur for $1 though. You can certainly play for free with a short sword, but the game would be more fun if you upgrade.

Kids want Excalibur but they have no easy way to pay. They don't have credit cards in general.

That's where kwedit comes in. They can get Excalibur if they simply promise to pay.

If they actually pay (through the mail for instance), great. If they don't pay, no harm done. It costs the company close to nothing to crank out a nearly infinite number of Excalibur swords.

So why would anyone pay? Buy too many virtual goods without paying and you are done. No more kwedit! No more kwedit means you can't buy Excalibur II, an even better sword that costs $2! And let's not forget Excalibur X. A steal at just $7.99!

As possibly heard in the back office of my theoretical game company example...

"OMG!! We just sold another Camelot! Woohoo!!!!"

mab said...

Stag,

Ben Bernanke:

Let them eat Tasty Cakes

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?sid=ab_zidXUrYM8&pid=20601087

Stagflationary Mark said...

mab,

The Tasty Baking Co. story is indeed inspiring. If there is one thing this country needs, it is more tasty bakery products. If nothing else, I'm sure Hostess Brands welcomes the new competition.

Hostess Brands: Sustainability Initiatives

Hostess Brands is committed to implementing sustainable business practices...

It's kind of like Germany's fear of hyperinflation. Been there once, don't want to go back.

Hostess Brands

Hostess Brands, Inc. (formerly Interstate Bakeries Corporation (IBC)) is the largest wholesale baker and distributor of fresh bakery products in the United States, and is the owner of the Hostess, Wonder Bread, Nature's Pride, Dolly Madison, Butternut Breads, and Drake's brands. For many years it was based at 12 East Armour Boulevard, Kansas City, Missouri. After it emerged from bankruptcy in 2009 it moved to Irving, Texas.

EconomicDisconnect said...

How much credit does one need for the super-neutrino cosmic "equalizer" gun in Halo3??

Stagflationary Mark said...

GYSC,

If you have to ask, then you can't afford it! ;)

mab said...

Stag,

Your response made me realize that my comment was WAY too much of an inside joke.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tasty_Baking_Company

From the wiki link:

On Bastille Day, a woman dressed as Marie Antoinette throws approximately 2,000 Tastykakes from a tower of the Eastern State Penitentiary to the audience below, while shouting, "Let them eat Tastykake!"

Tasty Cakes were/are huge in the Philadelphia area. I grew up on them. As kids we used to love to drive by their plant - for blocks and blocks it smelled like our favorite snacks. I had always assumed they sold their products nationally.

Stagflationary Mark said...

mab,

On Bastille Day, a woman dressed as Marie Antoinette throws approximately 2,000 Tastykakes from a tower of the Eastern State Penitentiary to the audience below, while shouting, "Let them eat Tastykake!"

Hahaha!!!

I had never heard of Tasty Cakes.

I am currently eating tasty cake though. My girlfriend made a coca cola cake a few days ago. It's all I can do to eat it at a reasonable rate and not simply inhale it.

I've never had it before. What a sheltered life I've lived here in Washington State.

I grew up in that small farming community and pretty much just assumed people were rational everywhere for the most part. Now I'm not even convinced anyone is rational, including me.

I recall that the people went about with pale and worried faces, and whispered warnings and prophecies which no one dared consciously repeat or acknowledge to himself that he had heard. A sense of monstrous guilt was upon the land, and out of the abysses between the stars swept chill currents that made men shiver in dark and lonely places. - "The Terrible Old Man", H.P. Lovecraft