Bubblews Wants to Pay You for Your Every Thought

With Facebook, Twitter, and some of the other social network heavyweights like LinkedIn now being firmly entrenched for several years now, there’s the growing sense that the social network space is growing stagnant and needs some shaking up. Bubblews believes they could be the ones to help do it. The company, which recently left its testing phase and officially launched is hoping to lure disenfranchised people to its platform; one that rewards people for the “bubbles” or posts they make with cash based on a revenue sharing program.

The concept of revenue sharing for content creation isn’t new in and of itself. Writing and news platforms like Helium and Associated Content have been paying users for their submissions for years, which ranged from short answers to full-blown news articles or commentary. However Bubblews is likey a first when it comes to social networks, whereby people could earn money through nothing but the random thoughts that pop into their heads. Users will be required to filter those thoughts however, as the site will limit users to 10 posts per day.

The site will make payments based on a combination of page views, the number of likes the post receives, as well as the number of comments. Users will also be rewarded for their general engagement with the site, as far as commenting on and liking other people’s posts. Users start with $1.00 in their accounts, and can withdraw money to their Payapl accounts once they reach $50.00. It’s clear however that such a system is ripe for being gamed, and that will be a major challenge Bubblews will need to monitor.

A cursory examination of just some of the posts on Bubblews shows highly suspicious behavior. Poorly written posts that could be considered borderline nonsensical gibberish have obscene amounts of “likes” relative to their numbers of views, in addition to numerous comments vaguely praising the post (and not surprisingly, asking them for a return of the favor). There is clearly no system of self-moderation in place as of yet that will reward quality posts and deter people from just posting nonsense. If the overall quality of content on the site is poor as a result, it will likely drive the majority of interested people away from it.

If nothing else, it’s possible that the concept of paying users for their content and engagement could catch on with the existing social networks, which could increase engagement in those platforms, and give existing users more incentive to keep using them; or start using them again.