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(Source: myYearbook.com)

There is an article on Mashable today stating that social site, myYearbook, has begun offering premium virtual gifts in exchange for their “Lunch Money” virtual currency.  Jennifer Van Grove claims that in the last 24 hours there have been over 1,000,000 Lunch Money transactions already. In the post, Jennifer breaks down the numbers and comes up with a revenue number of around $500,000 in 24 hours! I am a big advocate of virtual economies as a way to monetize your social site, but I find that number hard to believe. According to Quantcast, myYearbook sees about 4.8 million monthly global uniques. Given this number, 1 million transactions the first 24 hours does not seem feasible. The mathematical breakdown of the numbers looks correct, so I am wondering if there is not a miscommunication here. Either way, facilitating a million transactions or having 1,000,000 in lunch money exchange hands are both impressive feats in the first 24 hours of this new business model.

I have always been fan of myYearbook and I am happy they chose this course of action as a long-term strategy. I will be keeping a close eye on the progress of this new economy and I wish myYearbook luck.