Token Economy?

There was another board I was once the memebr of that had a token economy going that worked pretty well for a number of things.

Essentially, gents (and ladies if they were so inclined) could support the board by making donations to get initial "income." For instance, for every five dollars you donate, you get ten "board bucks." These really had no value, but came in handy for threads that had contests for fun and the "board bucks" could be charged as entry and awarded as prizes. You could give them to ladies and they could use them in part to purchase premium ads or banners, at a rate of 4 to 1, so that the majority of the money still went to supporting board operations. Basically they worked as coupons.

You were awarded "dollars" for longer, meaningful posts by other members.

There were all sorts of applications for them. I am not sure if there is a template for this type of token economy on your board software, or if it would be a nightmare, but it might be something to spice things up a bit if it can be done easily.

Not that I would be against this idea--sounds interesting--but I think it would require too much attention on the part of the Mods (or others) to maintain. And could give rise to disputes that take up a lot of useless energy.

Good point. . .

I've heard of this "imaginary money" used on different sites, but is the jury still on the value of that system?

What do you with imaginary money except buy imaginary products or services?

What's the attraction?

You could do football and basketball pools. Gentlemen had wagers. Since ladies could use them towards paying for banner ads and such they did have some value. Some providers even had "board buck" specials. There are a number of ways they would come in handy.

Really they are like electronic poker chips. . .

The best reason, is they would generate revenue for the board to offset costs, because gents would buy them to use on the board.

We still have the old "Supply & Demand" law of the system that require that these two forces be in balance, but it must not be easy or else the government would be doing it by now? Agreed?

Who would be entrusted to keep the accounting for this system? Is Arthur Anderson still around to answer that question?

It apparently works not much different than your status, post count, and reviews. It was listed right under your avatar along with a clickable button to send or buy board bucks.

I was only on that board for a few months, but folks more familiar with it might be able to chime in.

I'm all for new gadgets.

How does it work?

We need smarter people than me, and folks that were on that board longer and know how to set it up in the software can chime in if they know how this is done. It was the board that shares a name with a type of auto racing.