Originally posted by: Luthien
The millions they are spending on the $10 & $20 off will end up making them far more money in the long run. IMO google is setting itself up as the new preferred checkout system over specifically Paypal which is a good thing. Like paypal did to garner custumers some 8 years ago when they started out they gave away $20 then $10 then $5 for referral signups. Google is doing the same thing now. In the future there is no doubt in my mind that google will be offering itself as the number one alternative to paypal as an online payment service as well as fast checkout for every vender on the planet. Enjoy the battle and reap the rewards. Google will save you a lot of money initially until it kicks paypals fat greedy rear and hopefully ebays greedy rear will be next. Yes, I know ebay owns paypal...
yes its an investment of course. and google has a lot mroe money to throw around than paypal did as a startup.
now that everyone has an account and has a gmail account, they dont have to deal with the "well i cant use that since i dont want to setup an account" issue.
im sure they will build their own auction site too, hopefully a competitor to ebay.