In addition, we’ve just completed construction of quids.org, a non-commercial implementation of the superfluid technology. With a focus on volunteer projects, it has a simpler process, and a cost-free model that requires only a $1 donation to the Electronic Frontier Foundation.  -superfluid.biz is also free for the time being (at least a year for beta users), but will eventually have an annual subscription fee.  As quids.org is all about collaborating on services, it doesn’t allow commercial transactions, or those involving physical goods, so we don’t collect W9 information and membership is available to international participants. We envision it being used for social good/software/games/art and any number of other areas we haven’t yet conceived.

Upcoming for quids.org is a facebook application, allowing you to pull together your volunteer projects from that site as well, and a mess of other stuff that we won’t spoil by mentioning now.

If you have any questions or suggestions, please do let me know. We continue to develop superfluid.biz and quids.org with a lot of feedback from the community, and are pretty responsive to needs, whether that’s in the form of functionality or rounding up offerings of specific interest to current members.

What we’ve come to realize is that in this economy, many businesses have stripped down to a bare minimum of employees and rely heavily on outsourced talent (especially in the creative and technology fields where we’re initially focusing). So we see a lot more individuals attracted to the system, both because that’s where the surplus is, and because this is clearly a bootstrapping era, where the value we can provide is quite often in helping talented folks come together to create new projects and businesses. Some of these efforts are commercial, and some are not; we’ll now be relevant to both. -And b2b continues to be important, as we provide a path for businesses to legitimately barter in compliance with IRS regulations for such things.

So, the b2b side will continue to service business needs, where the service traded has a real commercial value (including any barter of physical goods). And the new c2c side will service users’ needs for a mechanism enabling the trade of avocational services. -We had a very nice mention recently, by Douglas Rushkoff in his Web 2.0 keynote, that ties in to some of our thinking in this area.

We do have a couple of changes that we’ve just put into place within b2b superfluid, as well. When we launched a few weeks ago, we made a few assumptions based upon the thinking that it would be better to be conservative to start, then loosen up appropriately. One of those assumptions was that members would be sensitive about who saw their offerings, and who was admitted into superfluid. This led us to take two actions;

1) We required new applicants to have an invitation from an existing member.

2) We required new members to immediately fill out a W9, before viewing offerings or completing the membership process.

It turned out that users were much more concerned with growing the community and had little or no desire to hide offerings from the greater public, which is an inclination we’re more than eager to facilitate. So, we have ditched both of these elements, and now users now only have to provide W9 information when they first either post or order an offering. This frees up users to see what’s on offer, and really try out the functionality before committing all of their information.

superfluid is all about fair value for participants; it’s built to facilitate utilization of unsold or spare time, and to compensate each participant fairly within the system. This is also a great way to create a project from scratch, without the insecurities of buying into someone else’s vision, or giving a piece of your project to someone who may or may not be the ideal partner in the long term.

I believe that in general, the existing models of executing on a concept tend to be less than ideal, and don’t draw on community in the wholesome, yet self-interested way that superfluid can. One conventional path to completion of such things is for an entrepreneur to spend enough, from savings or debt, to fund the project. Another classic path (especially in open source) is for one person with the vision, personal magnetism, and technical skills to start the project, to work like mad on it until eventually it’s complete enough that he can draw others in to join him on it. In this context, a shared vision brings in others who join together to create the finished project. -The problem with the latter is that the timing, personalities, and skillsets don’t always necessarily align to enable even a brilliantly conceived concept.

It’s simple to use superfluid for such a project. You’d first want to define your needs (programming, design, project management, marketing, etc.) then assess how many Quids this is likely to cost you from vendors in superfluid. Then sell your own services into the superfluid system and claim Quids to convert into a project. If you’re a programmer, you sell programming into the system (possibly to other concepts at startup stage), if you’re a marketing expert, you sell that, and so on. You keep your own project and everyone else keeps their own projects, while the organic whole allows for execution of as many projects as possible.

btw: If you’re a business (game developer, designer, marketing folks, etc.) that’d like to participate in superfluid, for a limited time you can submit for the beta here.

-Nathan

It seems to us that in the current economy, most entities and individuals are straightjacketed by either a lack of clients, a lack of available investment dollars, or a lack of credit. And while all of these are real issues, they’re a bit pathetic in hobbling worthwhile efforts. So, we came together with an idea for a project that could bypass these problems, and help businesses to thrive and better enjoy what they do have.

Our goal with superfluid is to provide a barter exchange in which businesses can sell the surplus time and goods that they cannot quickly move in money-based transactions. Using superfluid, participants don’t need to find someone in the system with whom they can directly swap goods, they simply use in-game currency (Quids) to buy and sell from each other.

So, you may be wondering what the hell this has to do with games; and, as that’s the background I bring to this project, clearly I think it’s a valuable aspect:. On the one hand, we’re bringing the experience and understanding of negotiation from gameplay, and the structure of an MMO economy. On the other, we think that a significant subset of interest for the userbase could be the creation of games. If a base of programmers, designers, etc., come into the system to offer their own skills, and purchase the skills of others, it could enable a variety of projects by professionals.

On September 8, we begin a closed beta release of superfluid, and I’d very much like to begin testing its facility in the development of games. -I should emphasize that superfluid is entirely business to business, so all skills should be at professional level. The beta will be free of charge, and the initial participants will have a year of free usage, before we begin charging an annual fee of $200.

If you’re interested in helping to test superfluid for game development, please shoot me an e-mail at nathan[at]superfluid [dot]biz to request participation. A membership will enable you to post your skills and a Quid-based price for services.