Is anyone else completely turned off by most incentive devices? I don't want your damn point for leaving a comment on my friend's wall. I don't want to be "mayor" of a damn coffee shop. Ever watched a bunch of 5 year old's play before?
Also: Suppose I don't feel that playing into everyone's inner narcissist for my profit is something I'd be proud of. Does that matter at all?
You're right in that there is more going on here - the fact that you can't imagine what is clearly going in in front of you suggests that you project your system of values on other people to such an extent that it deprives you of empathy to those people. If you don't get this under control this will seriously hamper your (future) business in pretty much any area other than serving people who are exactly like you. This blindness is not likely to be confined to narcissism. People revel in all kinds of crazy stuff, but you seem to think that one kind of crazy stuff is more worthy than the other.
To the latter half of your response, I'm working on it. Even if my original comment was a bit snarky, it was a still a prompt for conversation on the matter. I'm well aware of the popularity of things like this (Farmville, anyone?), and I'm trying to understand it.
I'd be interested in your response to my suggestion that people are much more obvious about this online. While people certainly do things for status in the real world, almost all would take offense if you gave them a gold star for getting a date. Why are people so willing to cede authority (judgment) to a website? The game element doesn't seem to explain it all.
You seem to want both a financially successful product, and one that is "strong to stand on its own". My spidey senses are telling me there is a lot of baggage in that latter quote - it looks like you want your contributions to the world to be not just financially successful but also noble in a way, or real-manly (the opposite of "the easy way out"). These two are very different goals - one is of financial independence and the other one is of advancing up the Maslow's hierarchy to "Esteem" level.
There are several ways to go about it:
1) Give up on the money part and set about satisfying the Esteem need by getting a very esteemed job (which may not pay very well) - policeman, polar explorer that kind of thing.
2) Get the Maslow's urge under control via artificial means, and remain absolutely cold-blooded in business. When you make enough money the urge will let go of you, and even if not you will have means and training to attack a harder, worthier problem. The first business is not the end of life.
3) Keep building the business but surrender to the urge and let it control you. It will give you a lot of staying power, but it will also periodically send you on the wild goose chase (like writing your own high-scale online storage because real men only eat what they kill). It's a very round-about way about getting there.
I am not entirely over this either - far form it. I do iPhone apps with a loyal user base but modest revenue, while my friend is making crazy money on affiliate marketing. I should really just go and join him, yet I can't bring myself to do it. Unlike you I don't find appealing to users base instincts beneath me, to the contrary I think that emotional engagement is something people crave and I must provide to create a great product. The basic problem however is similar - I have a seemingly more profitable opportunity that I am not pursuing for reasons that are not entirely rational.
Also, I wouldn't be so quick to assume you're not acting rationally. Not robotic, certainly, but a rational human would consider the way his work makes him feel, etc. I realize this may seem contradictory, as rational/emotional are often seen as opposites, but we are human and we have emotions, so ignoring them entirely must be irrational. In other words, working towards maximum profit is not necessarily rational.
I'm torn on appealing to base instincts... I believe it can enhance an experience, but I have a hard time stomaching out-right manipulation. Naturally there is room in the middle, but I guess it's up to each of us to draw that line for ourselves.
1. In RL you're a peer and assigning someone a rating you are attempting to establish your dominant position where none existed before. A web site is not a peer so the idea of ceding authority to it is less outrageous.
2. Website is a game. This induces an age regression - people feel like children who get scores assigned to them (their work) and get their worthiness judged based on those scores. To that end it helps to make things fun, easy, brightly colored, with large letters and not too much time commitment.
3. There is a "suspension of disbelief" going on there to help with #2 - like in a movie.
4. Web site has already assigned judgment to someone people perceive as their peers. Thus peer's acceptance of such judgment creates social proof of authority.
5. For some reason people discount opinion of a single, known peer after some time taking it as a given, and then seek validation from strangers.
6. Web site has an oracle-like property to it - it knows things about you. This goes deeper into horoscopes and stuff. You could pull it off yourself it you bothered to learn horoscoping techniques - basically telling people what they want to hear about themselves.