WTF!?!

Virgin Mobile is going to offer its subscribers a chance to make money for being creative. They are introducing Studio V. It is a chance for them to make wallpapers and ringtones for Virgin Mobile phones. The network is set up so that it is free to upload their creations and free to edit them. Then every time someone downloads their creation, they will profit from it. For wallpapers and ringtones that are created and then downloaded, the artist will receive around 10 cents for it. The total cost to the consumer is only $2.00 for a wallpaper and $2.50 for a ringtone. The money that is earned from these downloads will then be placed in the creators account. Imagine if you created a hit ringtone or a hit wallpaper and several thousand people were downloading it. That would be a nice bit of money just for doing something that you already like to do.

This is a major step in peer to peer abilities of a cell phone. Soon, wap site will become more prevalent and popular. Before too long I would not be surprised if each mobile phone user had a MySpace-like account where people can browse other phones on the network. Allowing users to generate money from their artwork seems like a great idea, however, from reading the article, I am not sure if these creators can actually receive cash or a check for their work. It says that the money is credited to their account. This may just mean that your work will pay your phone bill and you may not actually get any cash payment for it. Studio V sounds like a very innovative program on mobile website design and it will be interesting to see how they progress and which networks try to mimic them. To get some more info on this new network and mobile website hosting, check out this CNN article.