tkanet

Not involved in any of those cited ...but just a question. Who says X alternative is NOT recommended ?

Is that not recommended because it is new ? or because it does not comply with X regulatory compliance or just because you dont like them.

Also, all these alternative do not target the same marketplaces that paypal has grown up with. Some address remittance for example. Others P2P payments. some national. other international.

I think this is just anti-innovation, labels that do not mean anything and so easy easy to throw into a new innovation.

When Paypal started, everyone was saying the same.So lets give a chance to the new players and respect their own targets.

As far as intimacy and close privacy are concerned...why not just go email. People will upload these "intimate or personal" pictures ...and then later complain about privacy concerns. Why all this struggle and buzz. If you want privacy, stay offline or go email.no need for a new app for that. Seriously.

think that Groupon and clones will go through the same strugles. I just fail to understand how "discount only" cn be a business. it just mean someone is paying for the service and giving up their profits and customer relations.

In just a year or so, we will see the same story about the coupons' madness. How valuable is it to get 10% out of a coffee ? if groupon and daily deal makers do not change the mechanic and move to the next(?) level, it will end up as pure spam. Coupon fatigue just like checkin fatigue

Foursquare, Gowalla ...are simply missing an opportunity to move to that next level of guinuinely discovering places. They havent (yet) found a deeper motivation for checking in (than badges for younger gamers). I recently read a book mapping some modern places (in european cities) with their forgotton history. You could walk to some restaurant in Paris and discover (from the book) that some historical event happened here. Historical view as well as many other angles are possible and could drive attention for mass markets ...and that looks like a guenuine discovery.

I dont believe "check in and get coupons" is really enough

I think it is just a matter of "new marketplaces". Paypal benefited from the eBay marketplace ...and found casual online merchants.

Generally, marketplaces get hooked with very few mainstream payment methods.

Next time there will be a completly new marketplace, with new types of merchants and new market mechanic...you will see a new, major player...but it has to be disruptive to PayPal.

Online to Offline is a new marketplace in many ways...looking for a unified payment. If i am not mistaken, the next big payment player may come from that....