Tuesday, June 13, 2006

I want my MT-Free

Are we willing to sacrifice time for free stuff? Virgin Mobile USA has jumped on the wagon of ad-supported 'free' services. Their new service aptly dubbed SugarMama allows for teenagers with too much time on their hands to watch ads on the mobile phone or over the web - reply to a few content related questions and receive free air-time in return for their rapt attention. This model has been launched before by the much discussed Gizmondo boys - later to be confused with XERO Mobile - both being based on free services supported by ad-revenue. As many tech-sources have discussed Xero Mobile seem like a poorly orchestrated attempt to re-invegorate the executives (prior with Gizmondo) poorly performing vehicles.. but that, as they say, is another story.
The interesting question here is - will the youth be interested in the ad-supported model (you get 1 minute for each minute of ads you've seen and replied correctly)? Will a black market of cliff-notes to get free airtime without watching the ads mushroom up on colleges? Time is rapidly becoming the most scarce resource on the planet .. that is not what these people are betting on.

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