Thursday, March 6, 2014

Tech News: uPVALUE could be a Simple Solution to a Complex Problem

Upvalue is complex algorithm created to produce a monetary designation for social media profiles in order to establish and standardize a controlled marketplace for the allocation of personal adspace.  That’s a mouthful and it sounds like a headache.  Or worse, another overnight pop-up trend site, it’s only real value equating to a couple of kicks during a boring Wednesday lecture.  In fact, profile value calculators have been around for quite some time, came and went due to their viral you-have-to-check-yours-too yet all too common nature.  Their methods of computation were iffy and misleading, most likely only obtaining the basest of variables, such as number of followers, friends, and number of posts, since after all, the method wasn’t important, for soon there would be another similar website boasting more accurate numbers of an arbitrary value.  So, like the many Twalues and Tweetvalues, and FBMEs and ProfileWorths before it, it falls by the wayside and disappears, because it’s a fad with no purpose.  So, how then, could this Upvalue be any different?

Upvalue is not a fad site.  It doesn’t hope to gain popularity by simply being passed around in a viral weekday burst, only to fade away with the coming of the next.  KJ Williams, Upvalue’s Founder and the creator of its unique algorithm, is well aware of the arbitrary nature of assigning any value to a free profile.  “But that’s missing the point,” he says.  Upvalue is the first site to focus on the personal adspace of a social media profile.  It’s intended purpose is appraise the value of a profile solely on its potential to generate hits for an advertiser, as if it were a banner in a mall or a billboard near a busy intersection.  Advertisers would be able to search for a profile’s Upvalue and buy adspace for a certain amount of time.  However, the advertiser is not exchanging money for adspace, they are investing in a product and feeding into an expanding marketplace.  The second, and revolutionary, function of Upvalue, is an indirect result of the first function.  The fact that there is a standardized value for the purpose of buying adspace, means there is a very likely potential for growth, in which the consumer can benefit.  Instead of a simple exchange of currency for adspace, the consumer actually acquires uPid's, equity in the personal profile that matures as, you guessed it, the profile increases in popularity (i.e. gets more likes, followers, what have you).  Each uPid is a unique encrypted script much like its cryptocurrency counterparts.  It is used as a share bond. The shareholder then has the opportunity to sell those shares at the increased value in the Upvalue marketplace, and collect the profits.  Unlike real stock, an Upvalue is rarely at risk of declining in value, since the popularity of a profile is much more likely to go up than down, at worst maintaining a stagnant plateau of zero gain.

Got all that?  So what is this complex problem that Upvalue is supposed to solve?  It is no secret that there is a great disparity in terms of wealth in America.  The substantial percentage of profitable equity belongs to a very small percentage of Americans.  The rest simply don’t have the expendable income to invest in a volatile market.  However, there is a wealth of talent and creativity, especially in the youth, every year becoming even more savvy and adept at marketing themselves over social media.  Those who live and breathe Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and all the others, have the biggest advantage, because for once, they have the upper-hand, getting in at entry level while the big boy’s like Google generally wait until at least 1,000 subscribers.  Upvalue is thus a way of leveling the playing field.  It transforms the almighty ‘Like’ from little more than a brief pat-on-the-back validation of social standing, to something we can all ‘cash’ in on.

--You can follow uPVALUE on Facebook