I’m still getting my mind around Facebook’s strategy change for Credits. Facebook announced it will support subscriptions and local currencies with its payments mechanism, and will phase the Credits virtual currency out. Facebook still collects its 30 percent cut, and hopes to simplify for the consumer the process of making purchases. The extra step of adding a virtual currency layer may have proven burdensome for users, and developers still tended to add their own virtual currency layer. What Facebook got out of its extra layer of abstraction was a currency that could work across different developers – it still has that, but with transparent payment value.  It might be harder to weave in a favorite notion of mine: the idea that the currency could easily support things other than cash. Things like enabling a user to barter his time, for example: Watch this ad and get 3 credits you can cash in at Zynga. Facebook and its developers can still do that, and work towards loyalty programs, but the actual cash-money value isn’t hidden by the abstraction. Facebook isn’t scaling back its payment ambitions, and perhaps it’s a good idea to add the transparency, if that indeed reduces user complexity.