Grad Student Site Tracks Shared Expenses

The developers of Buxfer, short for "bucks transfer," are seen from left, Amit Manjhi, Ashwin Bharambe and Shashank Pandit, at their office on the campus of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Wednesday, Nov. 15, 2006. Splitting a group dinner bill can prove challenging even to the mathematically inclined, but three Carnegie Mellon graduate students think they have designed a program that could make post-meal haggling a thing of the past.(AP Photo/Andrew Rush) (Andrew Rush - AP)

That could add up to about one million to two million potential users worldwide, he speculated.

Still, the basic idea behind Buxfer may turn many people off: Unlike sites such as Friendster, Facebook and News Corp.'s MySpace, Buxfer "hinders the social," Galletta said.

"It reminds people that they owe you money," he said. "Most people don't care so much and they'll pay for things. OK, so they pay one extra time. But who cares if you're $6 over or $10 under?"

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On the Net:

Buxfer: https:// http://www.buxfer.com

BillMonk: https:// http://www.billmonk.com

Carnegie Mellon University: http://www.cmu.edu