Of course, what you’re doing draws inevitable comparisons to the Facebook’s Beacon system, but there’s a huge difference between explicit endorsement through product placement and implicit endorsement through having your activity stream mined (let alone by a broken opt-out system!).

The open question is how people who see photos will react to the explicit product placement. Clearly apparel has a strong tradition in this space–people actually pay money to wear branded clothing. I am curious how well that will carry over to online photos of apparel, let alone to other domains. And, of course, I’m curious to see how you’ll handle the inevitable attempts to abuse your service if it becomes popular.

In any case, I’m looking forward to seeing where this goes, and always happy to share ideas. Thanks for stopping by!

Glad to hear you’re interested in Udorse! We definitely want users to endorse things they’re really enthusiastic about rahter than just what they think will make them a buck, and we’re always on the lookout for ways to encourage and reward that kind of authenticity. That’s why it was important for us at launch to let users tag anything they want and link it where they please, and to explicitly disclaim payment by dedicating their partner earnings to charity. I’d love to hear form you if you have more ideas – we’re going to be working hard in the coming months to grow Udorse is a healthy and sustainable way. Thanks again for the write-up!

Trevor Austin
co-founder, Udorse