Shostack + Friends Blog Archive

 

I am not an eyeball, I am a free man!

eye.jpg

Kim Cameron has a very interesting article on the distinction between accounts and credentials, “Grab them eyeballs! Any cred at all!:”

s this logical? It all escapes me. Suppose I start to log in to Dare’s blog using an AOL OpenID. Does that make money for AOL? No. I don’t have to give AOL two eyeball seconds.

What would make $$$ for AOL? To get my pretty eyeballs over there PDQ. What’s the best way to make that happen? Make it easy! Acquire new eyeballs! Acquire new eyeballs! Acquire new eyeballs! From anywhere and everywhere!

Me, I find the trend to refer to customers as “eyeballs” bizzare and twisted. You don’t want my eyeballs, you want my business.

This is the case even if you think you’re in advertising. The goal of advertising (eventually) has to be to drive business. Treating me like an eyeball isn’t aligned with that.

4 comments on "I am not an eyeball, I am a free man!"

  • Such insolence you resource….
    Hmm, other words I don’t like:
    – Resource
    – Headcount
    Can you think of others? We can make a bingo game out of it.

  • Rob Newby says:

    Ironically enough, you seem to be missing an “I”.
    (From your quote, first letter) 🙂

  • rybolov says:

    “eyeballs” is so dotcomish, when all that mattered was collecting pageviews and not really who was buying anything. There’s a reason it all came crashing down.

  • albatross says:

    I somehow have this creepy image of some back-alley organ vendor selling them eyeballs. Or maybe of the Corinthian running a dot com.

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