It doesn’t matter how much we hate Facebook, we’re never going to leave it. Even though we’re little more to Facebook than a consumer that advertisers will pay to target, it’s not enough to convince us to join social networks like Ello that shun advertising and commoditizing users. What if you could make money though? What if there was a social network that didn’t shun advertising, but actually shared the revenue with you?
People are tired of being commoditized, sick of their photos and posts and life stories being used to sell advertising. But few social networking upstarts have been able to capitalize on this, because even people who loathe Facebook won’t leave it. But Tsu (pronounced “sue”) is taking a different approach: Use ad dollars to pay users. Share the revenue with everyone. Tsu, which bills itself as “the people’s social network,” launched last fall, shortly after Ello catapulted into our collective conscious and then promptly faded away. The network has been flying under the radar, gathering more than 3 million users through an invitation-only system, and recently debuted an overhaul of its website and mobile apps with new creation and discovery tools. Tsu CEO Sebastian Sobczak compares what his network is doing with what Jay-Z’s new streaming service Tidal has done for musicians. Tidal shares equity with artists who get in on the ground early, to give them more of a financial stake in the success of streaming. Tsu shares its revenue, not equity, but the principle is the same: Give money to people who create content.
