Play Money: Game of Life Takes Visa

Hasbro and Visa have partnered on an update to the classic Game of Life board game with a credit card that is integrated into gameplay.

The effort plays off Visa's "Life Takes Visa" tagline. "Hasbro gets the chance to reflect consumers' desire to use electronic payment in the course of their daily lives and Visa gets a great brand fit," said Visa spokesman Michael Rolnick. "The fit between the brands is so natural."

In addition to the Visa card, the game also features elements of Visa's financial literacy curriculum Practical Money Skills for Life. Players can choose four paths to pursue their life goals, including the adventure track, family track, college track or the career track.

"For us, it’s an opportunity to give parents a chance to start a dialogue with their kids about financial practices," Rolnick said.

Critics, however, say the deal is the latest attempt by marketers to exploit young children.

"This co-branding with children's toys means that children can't even play a game without having some product marketed to them," said Susan Linn, do-founder of Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood and the author of Consuming Kids. "Credit card companies have saturated the teen market and are now trying to seek younger and younger customers. That's concerning, especially when credit card debit is a growing, among young people. It's just sleazy of Hasbro."

Rolnick, however, countered that Visa's goal is to teach players about financial responsibility. The company will place brochures for its Practical Money Skills for Life curriculum in board game packaging, he said.

"We are not marketing to kids," Rolnick said. "We are helping to educate kids. It’s never to early."

Game of Life: Twist & Turns edition hits stores in August, selling for $34.99.

via Promo

Supplemental:
Cashless Monopoly
Play Money

Cashless Society: Vending Machines and Plastic

Cadbury Schweppes and MasterCard are testing 750 vending machines in the Dallas area, New York and Chicago to answer a key question: Will people spend more at vending machines if they can use plastic? The early answer is, yes.

Some of the machines were installed in January and have seen sales increases of 5 percent to 35 percent without any change in prices, said Mark Jackson, a vice president with Cadbury's U.S. beverages subsidiary.

Cadbury's experience fits with sales increases that other companies have reported when they shift from cash to plastic. Possible explanations vary from consumers not wanting to carry change to ATMs that dispense only $20 bills, which can't be used in most machines.

Cadbury is retrofitting machines in Dallas, New York and Chicago to take all major credit cards and debit cards. They still accept cash, too.

After three months, Cadbury will evaluate sales data and decide whether to retrofit more machines and introduce them in other cities.

''There is always going to be a degree of cash transactions,'' Jackson said. ``But we recognize the fact we're moving more and more to a cashless society. We wanted to offer consumers a convenient way to buy our products out of a vending machine without having change or getting change.''

According to Vending Times, an industry publication, vending was a $46 billion business in 2005, and it was virtually all cash. That makes it an appealing target for banks that issue credit cards.

Tests like Cadbury's are taking place now because the declining cost of wireless communications has helped make operating the machines economical.

''Vending is going to be the ultimate test for cashless'' transactions, said Nick Montano, executive editor of Vending Times. ``It's going to be five or 10 years before it really takes off.''

via Miami Herald

Unbanked: Banking America's Undocumented Immigrants

According to the FDIC, an estimated 10 million American households are "unbanked" or "underbanked" (the Economist estimates 12 million) -- they do not have accounts at banks and other mainstream financial institutions.

According to a Aug 2006 study by BearingPoint and Visa, approximately 84 million people are un- and underbanked, representing $1.1 trillion in income. Assuming these consumers spend 1% of their income to pay for financial services, that amounts to $11 billion.

These cash consumers pay excessive fees for basic financial services, are susceptible to high-cost predatory lenders, or have difficulties buying a home or otherwise acquiring assets.

Undocumented immigrants — 10 million to 20 million in the USA, depending on estimates — blended long ago into the mainstream Hispanic market, which corporations are increasingly courting. +

Figures on how much undocumented workers spend are hard, if not impossible, to come by. But researchers from the Federal Reserve to PricewaterhouseCoopers predict that the Hispanic and immigrant economy will grow rapidly as those populations soar in the coming years.

The University of Georgia's Selig Center for Economic Growth projects that Hispanics' spending power — personal income after taxes — will rise from $490 billion in 2000 to $1 trillion in 2010.


In recent years, banks across the country have been offering checking accounts and even mortgages to the nation's fast-growing ranks of undocumented immigrants, most of whom are Hispanic, and many are generally unable to get major credit cards.

Bank of America, for example, has begun offering credit cards to customers without Social Security numbers, typically illegal immigrants, the Wall Street Journal recently reported. The new Bank of America card is open to people who lack both a Social Security number and a credit history, as long as they have held a checking account with the bank for three months without an overdraft, the Journal said. BoA tested the program last year at five branches in Los Angeles, and last week expanded it to 51 branches in Los Angeles County, home to the largest concentration of illegal immigrants in the U.S., the Journal said.

The bank hopes to roll out the program nationally later this year, claims WSJ.

Why?

-In 2005, Bank of America opened more than 1 million checking accounts for Hispanic customers, equivalent to the customer growth of a big Latin American bank.

-48% of U.S Hispanic households use at least one Bank of America financial product, from checking accounts to mortgages.

Nearly half of Bank of America's new hires last year were bilingual Spanish speakers. Bank literature and signs in many branches are printed in Spanish. And the company makes strong showings at Hispanic community events such as Fiesta Broadway, a Cinco de Mayo celebration in Los Angeles that draws a half-million Latinos.

Bank of America also puts on "financial literacy" seminars at Mexican consulate offices to educate immigrants about banking services, including SafeSend, a remittance service that's free if customers also open a checking account.

"We want to establish a good and solid financial relationship with the Hispanic population," Wagner says. "We know they want to save and put their money in a safe place."

The impact on these markets with regard to loyalty may hold huge potential for banks who can help people get over the economic handicap of first-time credit access. Read this recent testimony from an undocumented immigrant who states, the "credit card is the real ID in America".

At least 200 U.S. financial firms and other businesses accept an identification card called matricula consular, which is issued to Mexican nationals by Mexican consulates. More than 4 million immigrants carry the cards, according to the Mexican government and the Congressional Research Service.

And then there is the global picture of the unbanked...

I quote from a Oct 2006 Economist article, “Most South Africans do not have bank accounts. But most do have mobile phones”.

"In most of Africa, for example, only a fraction of people have bank accounts—but there is huge demand for cheap and convenient ways to send money and buy prepaid services such as airtime. Many Africans, having skipped landlines and jumped to mobiles, already use prepaid airtime as a way of transferring money. They could now leap from a world of cash to cellular banking.

Heretofore, the problem has been that the cost of customer acquisition and maintenance has been higher than the expected revenues and so these markets lay fallow (or were priced - from the consumers’ point of view - prohibitively expensively).

Check out upstarts like Wizzit which offers a view at just how we may get the world's unbanked onto the grid thru cell phones.


And South Africa is certainly not exclusive to mobile-phone banking: countries such as Japan, South Korea and the Philippines are dialing in their unbanked thru mobile technology.


via Reuters, USA Today, Wall Street Journal, and Economist

Postcards from Second Life: Legality of Virtual Sales

I was just noting the other day about the virtual gold in them thar hills in Second Life and the opportunities it may present for payment systems.

Shankar Gupta of Gaming Online/MediaPost, reports on various legal issues that plague virtual sales:

Online auction house eBay banned the sale of "virtual goods" such as currency or avatars used by players in massively multiplayer online games like "World of Warcraft," "Everquest," and "Neopets."

Exempted from eBay's ban is sale of virtual goods+services of Second Life property, meaning that islands, housing or fursuits can continue to be sold on this, and other, secondary markets.

eBay spokesman Hani Durzy said the move stemmed from growing legal concerns surrounding the sale of virtual property. "Because of those legal complexities, we felt the most prudent thing to do at this point was to ban them from sale for the site," he said.


The taxability of online assets also remains unresolved. In October, the congressional Joint Economic Committee launched a probe investigating how virtual property and income should be taxed. Nearly every game's terms of service state explicitly that all in-game property is actually the property of the game developer or publisher, and not the player in question.

EBay likely could have put off this decision until the legal complexities were resolved and not come out any the worse for wear, but it is very, very likely that the company has been under pressure from game developers to end the secondary market for virtual goods. Why? Developers hate this market, especially when it creates entire companies (like here and here) dedicated to making money by "farming" virtual worlds for in-game cash and rare items. It's such a huge business that workers in Korea who spend hours a day doing nothing but farming virtual goods have attempted to form a trade union, claiming that virtual farming is a $1-billion-per-year industry.

MMO developers, obviously, don't see a cut of this money, and on a more fundamental level, secondary trading of items and currency can destroy a finely balanced virtual economy by causing massive inflation. Professional farmers spend hours collecting money and rare items. They can then put the rare items up for sale in-game, for in-game currency. Then, all the currency they've received is sold outside the game for real cash. Players then use the cash they buy to buy in-game goods, putting that virtual currency back into the pockets of the pros, who can then resell the currency out-of-game again. Over and over again.

Second Life gets a pass because it's not really a game -- it's a virtual world. Second Life has no game rules to speak of, other than the limitations of the platform and the rules set up on individual islands, and no goals, other than the goals that users set for themselves. And the process of people buying and selling virtual items in- and out-of-game is part of the appeal of the virtual world.

EBay's move to ban the sale of virtual goods is a boon for game developers, who recognize that buying and selling virtual goods online is the equivalent of offering your friend $50 for the Park Place card in a game of Monopoly. The exemption of Second Life helps draw a distinction between virtual worlds and simple online gaming.

Keep tabs on the economic state in 2L here
or read SL Business for the latest goings on.



via Gaming Insider and Online Media Daily

Cashless Society: Mobile Payment Meets Social Networking

It has been a minute since I have posted a Cashless Society update...

Found this quiet and clever bit about OboPay, a US mobile payments company which has acquired BillMonk, a Website that helps people to keep track of the money they owe each other.

Seattle, Washington-based BillMonk's Website is aimed at social groups such as roommates who share bills, friends going on a trip together or dining out, or co-workers raising funds for a group present.

Obopay's acquisition of BillMonk means that BillMonk users can not only keep track of the money they owe each other, but also settle their bills using Obopay's text messaging service. They can use BillMonk to generate a running statement of exactly who owes what to whom. BillMonk users input their spending via text messages or directly onto the Website.



Oh, did I mention that BillMonk works seamlessly with/thru Facebook?


Obopay's payment service enables subscribers to send money to each other via mobile phone text messages. The recipient has to register at the Obopay Website to gain access to the money they have been sent.

An Obopay spokesperson says that BillMonk plans to support virtual currencies that are used in online worlds such as Second Life and World of Warcraft.

AKI RANT: I am beginning to feel vindicated about my crusade around here for getting in on the virtual cash economies (flashback and flashback).

Virtual gold is simply an untapped opportunity (stay tuned for updated $numbers i've dug up on this, soon). This is a no-brainer, services cost (from the fresh rims on my Grand Theft Auto to some "companionship" in the champagne rooms on 2L, to the designer sword for my ogre on World of Warcraft). Or if you don't like that, then you'll need increased branded sponsorship (Maybe free rims to all visitors at the Napa Parts Store on 2L? Free trial weoponry by Remington at the Cabela's on 2L? Free condoms from Durex on 2L?). Trust and security and exchange systems for money will be key in virtuality! OboPay+BillMonk are smellin' that pot o' e-gold over the rainbow.



But let's check into more about this OboPay...

Obopay has signed up the first U.S wireless operator to support its mobile payment service. Service is now live on all Amp'd Mobile handsets. Amp'd Mobile phones all contain embedded Obopay application software.

Mobile phone users who have registered with Obopay's Website can send money via SMS text message to another mobile phone user. The recipient has to register at the Obopay Website to gain access to the money they have been sent. As an alternative to text messaging, a mobile phone user can use their handset's Web browser to send money to a third-party.

Obopay offers a stored-value account which comes with an Obopay-branded prepaid MasterCard debit card. Users can spend money in their Obopay account by using the card at ATMs or merchants which accept MasterCard. The prepaid card, which is issued by First Premier Bank, is linked in real-time to the Obopay stored-value account.

Los Angeles, California-based Amp'd operates a broadband wireless network that offers 3G voice and mobile entertainment services in the U.S. Obopay users can check their account balance and transaction history on their Amp'd mobile phone.

Initially, the main uses of Obopay are likely to be sharing money with friends, but the company envisages the service being used to pay merchants. Ultimately, Obopay wants to take advantage of Near-Field Communications (NFC) technology, which enables mobile phones to make contactless payments, a spokesperson says. Obopay last week signed a deal with VivoTech, the Santa Clara, California-based contactless card reader vendor, to allow Obopay users to access the ViVOwallet software to pay for purchases by waving their NFC phone at a VivoTech POS reader.

AKI RANT #2: The first rounds are fired for disintermediating banks and, in someways the traditional payment systems like Visa+Mastercard+Amex+Discover from the mobile payment sphere. At what point might the phone company provide me with all I really need to buy, sell and trade?


OboPay
BillMonk

via ePay News