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Twitter, American Express Letting People Purchase Goods Via Hashtag
Nerval's Lobster writes "What could possibly go wrong with this? American Express has announced a partnership with Twitter, giving customers the ability to sync "eligible cards" with the social network. Tweeting special product hashtags (i.e., #uselessjunk) will purchase a product via that synced card. American Express will then send a purchase-confirmation Tweet, and the usual shipping-and-handling of the product will commence. For Twitter, the partnership also holds significant advantages. If this initial foray succeeds, it could potentially evolve into a workable e-commerce model, and thus a separate stream of revenue for the social network aside from advertising. Also, research has shown that people tend to spend more money when using credit cards as opposed to cash. It's also quite possible that a streamlined online purchase mechanism—think any number of e-commerce Websites' "Buy Now" buttons—could compel potential customers to buy more often and in larger amounts."
Are you telling me that Packard-Bell is back in business?
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
Seeing how secure Twitter is, what could possibly go wrong?
I'm not sure I understand. How does one browse products via twitter, or if one isn't in twitter, why would one use it rather than the purchase channel of the site they are on?
I tried #blowjobs and nothing happened.
could compel potential customers to buy more often and in larger amounts.
Gee, wasn't spam supposed to do that? Businesses who go after impulse purchases like this are a danger to the foolish and an annoyance to everyone else. A credit card company should not be trying to create economic activity, only to facilitate pre-existing activity or pre-existing needs that are encumbered by technological and social boundaries. This crosses the line into monstrous.
Bio questions? Ask me to start a Q&A journal. Computer analogies available for most topics!
I need you to clarify, when you tweeted #dell were you interested in buying Dell's new $50 thumbstick computer, or DELL (NASDAQ) for 24.4 billion USD?
- Steve
Just what we need: another quick, mindless way to increase our credit card debt!
WTF... who the hell thinks this kind of crap up?
Marketing drones.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
In this case, I imagine a seller creating a short hastag, ala bit.ly, that is used a pointer to the item itself. So the hashtag would be something like #q9iHH8, not the long string you just posted.
God invented whiskey so the Irish would not rule the world.
"Dude, I just bought the new Monkey; it is really cool! #monkey"
(Monkey has been charged to your account.)
"Stupid American Express. I didn't want to buy Monkey again! #monkey #1stworldproblems"
(Monkey has been charged to your account.)
"Damn you American Express!!!!! I do not want a 4th Monkey!!!!!!! #monkey #ihateae"
(Monkey has been charged to your account.)
The G
Is see this as being ripe for abuse. The first time this goes live, someone is going to link a hashtag of something innocuous (like #wintercoat) to something expensive, and lots of people won't realize the mistake until they read their monthly bill and see a charge for $2000 on it. I can't imagine the system will last more than a day once people start complaining.
God invented whiskey so the Irish would not rule the world.
please answer my question. I have never used Twitter, ever. Don't really feel compelled to, about the only social media I engage in is some FB.
I thought at it's core Twitter was just basically a 140 character text. So is this purchasing concept, essentially sending a text with product/store information to some kind of purchase processing service?
'The unexamined life is not worth living' - Socrates
... and the price of hacked Twitter accounts just went up by 1000. I'm glad I don't use it.
Unless Amex lets you update your shipping address by Tweet, this doesn't really make a hacked Twitter account any more valuable. It's more annoying for you it someone hacks your account and tweets a thousand #BuyPlaxtexTamponsNow tweets using your account, but a hacker in Nigeria probably isn't going to bother sending products to people they don't know. And since a merchant will need to register with Amex, the hacker won't be able to tweet #BuyMyFakeCrapNow to get you to automatically buy whatever fake crap he's trying to sell. Amex will be able to vet merchants.
First you need to tweet a certain hashtag.
AmexSync then sees this tweet and then replies to your tweet with a second hashtag you must tweet to complete the purchase.
You can either tweet this second tweet to confirm your purchase, or wait 15 minutes and the window closes, and it will require you to go back to step one.
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
... #AmEx or #AmericanExpress and drive the whole thing into a deep recursion.
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
"Heh, look at this idiot: RT Damn you American Express!!!!! I do not want a 4th Monkey!!!!!!! #monkey #ihateae"
(Monkey has been charged to your account)
You are in a maze of twisty little relative jumps, all alike.
You're assuming that you will only be able to purchase physical, ship-able things. I'm sure you'll also be able to buy virtual gift cards, WoW subscriptions, cell phone plans, game purchases, iTunes, stocks, etc. With the current (you must give the companies your CC number), only the companies you have done business with can take your money. With the twitter thing, ANY business that does transactions over twitter could potentially take your money (or people use your money to get stuff from them).