Facebook Introducing Internal Payments

Facebook is tweaking its credits system, introducing a new way of making internal payments.

At the moment, the credits are used to buy gifts – such as a picture of a birthday cake to post on a friend’s wall - as well as advertising, said legal advisor Teddy Underwood in the Facebook blog.

The Financial Times said the credits system is being tested on three applications, and could make it easier for developers to make money from their creations. The paper also quoted analysts who suggested the site could eventually become a shopping site, as well as offering applications and music downloads.

Gartner analyst Ray Valdes said such transactions could eventually be worth a third of Facebook’s income, by taking a payment processing fee for every sale.

The new payment system could help Facebook monetise its 30 million active users, especially after a recent $200 million investment raised questions about the social networking site's business model.

Facebook took care to stress the site remains free, with Underwood saying “we have no plans to change that.”

In keeping with its new governance policy, Facebook gave users three days to comment on the new terms, saying they did not require a vote because so few concerns were raised.

Facebook did not respond to request for comment at the time of publishing.

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Microsoft 'Bing' First Look

Microsoft has launched its latest assault on the search market with Bing. Is it a worthy opponent for Google at last?

It’s got to be a good thing that things are happening in the search market at the moment. Just a few weeks ago Wolfram Alpha was hailed as a potential Google killer, before people calmed down and realised that it wasn’t, and it wasn’t trying to be.

Last week though, the word started to break that Microsoft was ready to dump its Live Search brand and go with a new engine that was rumoured to be called Bing. Naturally this sounded like a ridiculous name and could therefore be dismissed as rumours, so when it was revealed as in fact being factual, it just goes to show that there’s often nothing stranger than the truth.

In fact, Bing isn’t really going after Google, it’s chasing Yahoo, who is after in second place in the search market. It’s actually the third time that Microsoft has rebranded itself – going from MSN Search, to Live Search, to Bing, which in naming terms at least, is quite a jump. On first hearing, it’s clearly a daft term, but after a morning of so, we were already getting used to it, so as a brand, it could be a grower – after all it worked for Nintendo, when it altered Revolution to Wii.

Bing naturally is still in Beta, but is set to take over from Live Search in a few days. As of today, not all of the features have made it to the UK version and the UK specific features are being rolled out in the next six to 12 months.

Go to Bing.com in the UK right now and you’ll find a static background, and though it might be using the new Bing search algorithms, it’s not too different from Windows Live now.

To see a sneak preview of how it’s going to look further down the road, click on 'your country' at the top right and select ‘United States English’.

In this version, down the left hand side you’ll find a number of categories listed under Explore: Image, Videos, Shopping, News, Maps, and Travel.

The background image is not static, and when you roll over parts of it, a box with some accompanying text will pop up explaining that part of the image along with a related link. These images will change and you’ll be able to scroll backwards to previous ones. You will also get a related search in a bar at the bottom of the image, and a list of ‘Popular Now’ terms, which is zeitgeisty in a Twitter hash tag kind of way. The new home page is a pleasing alternative to Google’s use of customised logo and is certainly engaging.

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GM Offers Dealers Up to $1 Million to Wind Down Store

General Motors is offering some dealerships $100,000 to $1 million to wind down their businesses over the next 17 months, according to three sources familiar with the proposals.

For Pontiac-only franchises, GM is offering only $10,000 to $200,000, according to two sources.

The offers are contained in so-called wind-down agreements that the bankrupt automaker has sent to dealerships that will not have their franchises renewed when they expire on Oct. 31, 2010.

Each dealership will be offered an amount based on its inventory, overall cost structure and regional rank, said GM sales chief Mark LaNeve in a Monday interview, without providing figures.

Following the interview with LaNeve, Automotive News spoke with dealers who had received a copy of the agreement. GM spokesman Pete Ternes declined to comment on the terms.

The money is intended to help dealers sell their remaining inventories. But if the dealer accepts the payment, GM will not buy the unsold inventory. In addition, the dealer must agree not to sue GM until their franchise agreement expires.

The terminated dealers also will not be allowed to order new cars from GM, yet they must stay in business until January. Ternes confirmed that provision.

One dealer attorney who has studied GM's wind-down agreement said the conditions are onerous.

"The level of coercion is dramatic," said Eric Chase, an attorney with Bressler, Amery & Ross in Florham Park, N.J. "When it's life or death, what are you going to do?"

But some dealers say they'll sign anyway. "I suspect I'll sign them," said Paul Walser, CEO of Walser Automotive Group in Bloomington, Minn., a suburb of Minneapolis. "I don't see any point in arguing at this point."

Walser got a wind-down contract to sign for his Bloomington store, which carries Buick, Pontiac and GMC. General Motors will allow him to keep his other dealership, a Buick-Pontiac-GMC store also near Minneapolis.

If he signs, Walser will receive 25 percent of the settlement immediately and the balance after he has sold his inventory.

"I don't want to spend my life fighting with anyone," Walser says. "I think it's time to rebuild the company, build this relationship and move forward."

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