It’s silly, but what if this crazy idea worked? Save an Alien, an Israeli Facebook app hopes to create the “million dollar page” effect through an extra terrestrial plot. If 10M people adopt an alien each, the cute aliens will be saved from imminent death and this Israeli start up will have 10M subscribers- not bad if you plan to do some targeted marketing. At the time of writing this post, the app had 2,314 daily active users. I predict that this number will grow fast in the coming weeks. As a comparison, according to appsaholic, the leading apps reach up to 1.689,000 daily active users.
So how does Save an Alien work?
The story is simple. Save An Alien is a campaign aimed at saving 10 million unique aliens from certain death by a meteor that’s bound to hit on May 1st 2008 (183 days from today and counting).
The solution
10 million humans need to each adopt one alien. All the aliens need to be adopted to be saved
What’s so special about these aliens?
Each alien is unique, and after adoption it will be yours. They kind of look like a Tamagotchi. Except that you don’t need to feed or play with the alien (its not a pet).
You can walk around planet alien through a flash-like interface, to select the alien that you want to rescue. You can also ‘replace’ your alien later on.
What can you do with your alien?
Once you adopt an alien you can use its pictures as a desktop wallpaper, cell phone background, IM icon (ICQ, Messanger, Skype) and even print its picture and put it on your desk. If you really like your alien you can buy a custom t-shirt with him on it. As for other revenue generators, the FAQ says it best:
In the future we will add more ways for you to show the alien that you love it, for now we are focused on saving the aliens on the planet.
There’s also a social aspect
see your friend’s aliens and invite others to take part of the rescue mission. You get points for saving other aliens by inviting people and by filling up your profile and verifying your email. 
Did you save an alien already?
I'm a former general partner at google ventures, head of Google for Entrepreneurs in Europe and founding head of Campus London, Google's first physical hub for startups.
I'm also the founder of Techbikers, a non-profit bringing together the startup ecosystem on cycling challenges in support of Room to Read. Since inception in 2012 we've built 11 schools and 50 libraries in the developing world.
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