My first professional foray into the online world was with AllAdvantage back in 2000. Coming from the doldrums of the shrink-wrap software world, the ten months that I spent there were invaluable -- The environment was incredibly fast, exciting and new. But the company was also horrifically disorganized. It epitomized the "get big fast" mentality (our HR group had a "now serving" number mounted above the office to keep track of the new-hires), and we spent money like drunken congressmen (We had a "Chief Entertainment Officer" WTF?).
But right or wrong, we all learned a lot about the difficulties of managing an online property each day. Or at least most of us...
I was surprised to learn that some of the founders had relaunched the original concept a few months back -- minus the pay-to-surf part -- as "Agloco". This time the pitch to users was that, instead of cash, they'd receive points that would one day translate as shares in the company once they reached solvency.
Back in 2000, there wasn't much of a blogosphere, but that didn't save poor AllAdvantage from receiving the moniker "The Dumbest DotCom" in the mainstream media. Most people likened it to a Ponzi scheme, or at best a mis-guided pyramid (neither accurate). But what most failed to notice is how close, at least conceptually, they were to a successful idea. That is, the real promise was to connect users with advertising content that was highly targeted. By tracking your behavior with the their "viewbar" application, they'd build a compelling profile of your interests based on your surfing habits, and then deliver ads that were tailored to your interest.
But advertisers were only just warming up to the concept, and the company was absolutely hemorrhaging cash to Russian fraud bots. There just wasn't enough runway and time to tweak the idea into something more compelling.
And I suspect this is what brought the founders back together again. Forget the thin veneer of empowering users to "own a piece of the internet". The real interest here was harnessing a massive, captive audience for ad display based on context and interest.
Too bad Google beat them to it.
Agloco, R.I.P. (please)