INTERNET RETAILER — Buy.com sees social networking as a springboard to the future of retail e-commerce; acquired metails.com last fall and has since renamed it Yub.com. “Social networking is the next wave of the Internet,” asserts Reed Hastings, Netflix CEO, which expects to boost its number of subscribers with a social networking feature it launched late November. Friendster (13 million members) just sells commercial advertising space so far. eBay’s system of letting buyers and sellers rate each other has for years served as a form of social networking. For now, Yub.com appears to be the only site offering to pay commissions to members whose product referrals lead to purchases. INTERNET RETAILER
Mark Brooks: Affiliate programs to the power ten. But will the ideavirus spread when there’s an obvious commercial agenda. Yub pays 1% to both buyer and seller. Add a little more weight to the percentages and everyone will become an MLM based affiliate. Shhh, don’t tell Amway.