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DAPPBasic Attention Token (BAT) Mercury phase officially released (basicattentiontoken.org)

submitted by CryptoJennie

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[–]kilmartaTrader 43 points44 points  (8 children)

finally got around to downloading brave, just like chrome and firefox but with more ad blocking. I like it, was easy to import my bookmarks as well.

Going to buy some BAT and use the browser for a while.

Thats all from my inner monologue

[–]jr_bit 15 points16 points  (1 child)

Great to hear! Make sure you donate your BAT to great websites who haven't got the green publisher tick yet- when certain donation milestones are met, they will be notified that bat is waiting for them... :)

[–]babblelol 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Okay! Thank you for saying this. I was wondering what would encourage websites to become publishers. I'd definitely join if money was waiting for me

[–]yea_nope 9 points10 points  (2 children)

The Brave desktop browser is great, but you will be amazed by the iOS and Android versions. Both are super fast, further more they really save your data from ads and such that safari and chrome do not.

[–]shitpersonality 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Brave shines on mobile.

[–]windfisher 1 point2 points  (0 children)

+1 - Brave on Android is amazing, I'm sold

[–]DontTautologyOnMeEthereum fan 1 point2 points  (2 children)

I agree, Brave is pretty fast and the ad block is great. It'll be interesting to see how many people download it and block all ads vs those that watch ads.

[–]kilmartaTrader 1 point2 points  (1 child)

I like ads myself and cookies so the ads are better.

The plan is to pay the people that watch ads in the future?

[–]DontTautologyOnMeEthereum fan 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yep. Pretty big consumer behavior change.

[–]blakes4560 | ⚖️ 0 34 points35 points  (2 children)

You need to understand how advertising networks function to understand the value proposition of BAT. Middlemen are the issue and BAT eliminates them.

The current system has the following players: 1. Publishers (websites, content producers, etc.) 2. Advertisers 3. Ad networks (the middlemen that propagate the trade between advertisers and publishers), and 4. The consumer (you and me).

Currently, ad networks capture a small piece of what the advertiser pays the publisher to show their ad. But ad networks provide a valuable service! They have information on consumers that they collect through third party cookies, trackers, etc. which enable advertisers to target specific consumers. For example, if I go to hotels.com to look at hotels in Florida, several third party cookies may be installed on my computer. If I then go to nytimes.com and start reading an article about restaurants in Florida, I may see an ad for a hotel I recently viewed! Amazing!..and I'm not even mad...it may actually be good because it's relevant!

Now the issue people face now is more in the scope irrelevant advertisements. Since information about consumers may not be entirely accurate or complete (as gathered from cookies and trackers), you may see an ad for something completely irrelevant to your life...which is annoying! Also, these cookies and trackers installed on your computer reduce battery life and slow your browser. Also annoying!

Well, the whole point of BAT is to get rid of these cookies and trackers that actually slow your computer and (which may or may not) collect information you don’t want other people to have. Instead, BAT has developed an algorithm that is able to accurately track your “attention” (hence the name “Basic Attention Token”). Now if you opt into receiving advertisements, advertisers will be able to use the algorithm to directly target you with !!!RELEVANT!!! Ads. This is good!! This means, since they didn't have to go through that middleman to find you, they can actually PAY YOU to look at their ad, and you, as the consumer, can PAY THE PUBLISHER to keep producing their kickass content. Now this is just one example, advertisers will likely pay publishers and consumers in a way I cannot determine, but the point is this process eliminates the middleman that destroys value for the consumer.

In essence, the massive, massive, massive ad industry will need these tokens if there is mass adoption of Brave which will cause massive value appreciation in BAT.

TLDR: BAT eliminates the middleman between publishers and advertisers and transfers that value to the consumer and publisher. BAT has an algorithm that is able to track your attention accurately and you can opt to have that info given to advertisers so they can advertise to you with relevant ads. Advertisers will need these tokens which will cause value appreciation.

[–]mazzafish2 - 3 years account age. 300 - 1000 comment karma. 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Great comment. The adtech industry is filled with fraud, unethical tracking of user data and botting. Brave/BAT brings a legitimate solution and really tackles the problem at its core.

[–]CryptoJennie[S] 42 points43 points  (7 children)

In case you missed it: direct credit card to BAT buying coming:

"Users will also soon be able to fund their BAT wallets with credit cards."

For the rest of the BAT roadmap (subsequent phases, Gemini and Apollo), see: https://basicattentiontoken.org/bat-roadmap-1-0/

One of the first real-life uses of a crypto token is spooling up...

P.S., Brave browser just hit 1,000,000+ (1M) downloads on the Google Play (Android) store.

[–]jr_bit 21 points22 points  (5 children)

This is big.

[–]educatedd1 - 2 years account age. 200 - 1000 comment karma. 32 points33 points  (3 children)

Very good project! This announcement should have more visibility.

[–]thomasthetankerUnidexV3 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Should we send up the BAT signal?

[–]bushwarblerslover 2 points3 points  (1 child)

Consider me interested but this team needs to work on their personality/image. Too many "and why not download it now?" links on their browser home page, a : - ) smiley face... and comments like "Visit the application prefs to adjust the tab settings" on the browser onboarding screen. (taking issue with "prefs")

Lacks some professionalism and the image could use some cleaning up. Hopefully easy to fix issues, though; the concept is very intriguing. Especially onboarding people through the browser first and then introducing the tokens -- a lot of potential here considering the proven performance.

[–]HardGayManscat man 5 points6 points  (2 children)

I'm so glad out of the dozens of alt coins I've held and sold for some reason I never sold any BAT. It just felt like a keeper.

[–]jabiredd4 - 5 years account age. 250 - 500 comment karma. 2 points3 points  (1 child)

same here

[–]HardGayManscat man 2 points3 points  (0 children)

It still has a long way to go before it will prove itself, possibly years away. But it's one of the few projects I actually still feel good about. I used to be the biggest Golem supporter alive, but I now hold absolutely none. Maybe some day I will regret it, but I put my money where my heart is and I don't believe in Golem like I once did. Same with other coins. This stuff changes so fast it's unreal.

[–]Brazzozloading... 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Haven't got any tokens but congratulations to the BAT team! Apparently on of the few legit projects out there.

[–]fredrock12 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Been bag holding BAT for awhile now great to see their progress.

[–]billykingggKraken fan 1 point2 points  (0 children)

as a web developer discovering the JavaScript creator having an ICO, im going all in balls deep. no questions asked

[–][deleted] -1 points0 points  (41 children)

Can someone explain to me why this has market value? I only gather how it is earned, not what is can be used for. I only read it can be used to voluntarily pay sites or advertisers you frequent.

If that's all it can be used for, I wouldn't say that's a particularly tight economic system.

[–]jr_bit 8 points9 points  (35 children)

My attempt to boil it down- It is positioned to become THE multifaceted in browser payments system, woven into the commercial fabric of the Internet - not only from advertiser to creator to user but more broadly from supplier to consumer.

[–]CryptoTrashman 9 points10 points  (3 children)

I was somewhat unclear on this as well. Do you mean that eventually the users that receive small amounts of BAT by "participating" will be able to trade them back to the advertisers/publishers for discounts on services, products, etc.? Sort of setting up a good faith relationship between the users and advertisers, as opposed to the current one-way bombardment of ads in which there is no benefit for the users who are eye-raped by them?

If that's the case, I could definitely see this model working. The Jim Schlomo Internet user will not migrate to a new browser simply because it's better. And that was my initial gripe about this project when I did briefly glance at it a few months ago.

But if they get wind that they get fun bucks just for using the Internet the same way they normally would, that kind of changes everything.

I... think it's time for me to dig deeper into this project.

[–]CryptoJennie[S] 14 points15 points  (0 children)

I will help outline it:

  1. Users will get compensated in BAT for their attention (e.g., having ad-blocker off in Brave, or engaging with ads, viewing them, etc.).

  2. BAT is also an ad exchange. When advertisers purchase ad space on publishers' websites (or also premium private ad slots, like a private ad tab), they will buy ad time and space with BAT. Publishers will receive this ad revenue in the form of BAT (which can be converted to fiat for them). Users will get a cut of this ad revenue as well. In the current system, users receive nothing.

  3. Users, with their BAT, can cash it out for fiat or any other currency they like. On sites or apps that accept BAT as a form of payment for premium articles, services, etc., they can use the BAT they accumulate to pay for these.

  4. BAT is not restricted to the Brave browser. Any app can be hooked up to BAT and participate in the system above. For example, video games, mobile games, and more can all be hooked up to BAT. Brave is just one of these apps (which happens to be a web browser) that is hooked up to BAT. It's the one being developed by the same team as BAT, so it's naturally the first use case and proving ground for BAT.

  5. The reason why BAT exists is that it is solving a major problem on the internet and in the advertising industry. Everyone is turning on ad-blockers these days. But just like you can't get rid of bees without killing the entire ecosystem, you can't turn on ad-blockers without consequences. When you turn on an ad-blocker, publishers and content-creators go extinct. That's why so many publishers (like NYT) are putting up paywalls everywhere and many YouTubers, streamers, etc. are shutting down. However, users understandably turn on ad-blockers because they don't wanna be tracked around the internet and have their privacy violated. Also, having ads on only wastes their attention and time—a valuable resource. So, BAT solves this underlying problem by compensating users for their time/attention and bringing them into the picture. And as a result, it also puts publishers back in business and creating the content that makes the internet fundamentally valuable.

  6. By fundamentally rethinking the way ads are delivered (Brendan Eich has great perspective on this, since he's one of the inventors of the tech that is used to deliver ads these days), BAT can achieve ad targeting like the existing system, except even better and never exposing the user's information or data to the world. This is because ads are delivered from within the app (like the Brave browser), rather than from the website that would need to communicate with third parties that hold, buy and sell a tracking dossier on you.

Source: I work for BAT. I am aware that very few people really understand what BAT does, how it does it, and why it is brilliant. Just wait till they understand ;).

[–]alivmo 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Yes.

[–]Ndhujenendjdudksns> 4 months account age. < 500 comment karma 2 points3 points  (0 children)

They can also exchange them for other coins and fiat currencies on exchanges.

[–][deleted] -2 points-1 points  (30 children)

But a big part of it ia voluntarily paying content providers? If so, that surely won't work long.

[–]jr_bit 5 points6 points  (14 children)

The bat micropayments will help with seamless and pain-free content acquisition for the user. Voluntary contributions will play a part but the commercial incentives cycle is the driving force of the ecosystem. Advertisers will be incentivised by the market now freed of the middlemen, publishers will receive more and users will inherently benefit

[–][deleted] -1 points0 points  (13 children)

Ok I do get how to earn it, and the concept is neat, but fundamentally what drives demand for this? Why would it have a price?

[–]Ndhujenendjdudksns> 4 months account age. < 500 comment karma 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Because that's how advertisers pay for ads. BAT.

[–]jr_bit 1 point2 points  (11 children)

The tokens price comes from its utility and the solutions it presents, and in bat's case these are clear in its offering.

[–][deleted] -5 points-4 points  (10 children)

Not to be impolite, but these just sound like buzzwords and non-answers, and just reaffirm my suspicion. I have friends interested in this and they can't answer my questions either. It's beginning to sound like a scam, even if it is led by a renowned developer.

[–]neffnetAhkeeekiii keeekiiiikee!! 4 points5 points  (4 children)

Advertisers will need to acquire BATs to pay for their ads in the Brave network.

[–][deleted] -1 points0 points  (3 children)

Ok, then we're cutting out the content producer? How do they make content then? Or why would they join this platform?

[–]Ndhujenendjdudksns> 4 months account age. < 500 comment karma 3 points4 points  (1 child)

Content producer can allow ads on/in their content. So the advertiser pays a portion of the BAT to the publisher and the consumer.

[–]neffnetAhkeeekiii keeekiiiikee!! 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Content producers can charge micro-payment fee in BAT to access premium content, or even pay out to consumers to incentivize their content. And of course they're also getting paid for hosting ads on their site if they choose to, along their users.

[–]jr_bit 4 points5 points  (3 children)

My response was a polite was of saying dyor. Im surprised you do not understand how bat can derive a price when it's not hard to imagine it's scarcity in a future situation with the various stakeholders interests engaged I. E. advertisers publishers and users.

[–][deleted] -3 points-2 points  (2 children)

It does not seem you thoroughly understand what you're getting yourself into if these questions cannot be answered.

[–]jr_bit 2 points3 points  (1 child)

This seems a bit circular dude. Sorry to say but dyor and let me know if you still have questions but I have done my best!

[–]Ndhujenendjdudksns> 4 months account age. < 500 comment karma 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Ads. If I want to advertise I need bat to pay for the ad placement.

[–]alivmo 3 points4 points  (14 children)

Do at least the tiniest bit of effort in research before you say stupid things.

[–][deleted] -1 points0 points  (13 children)

I did and it still seems to have a gaping loophole 😂. That's why I'm asking you guys.

[–]alivmo 0 points1 point  (12 children)

So when you've researched enough to realize that it's not stupid and you were just ignorant, I'll put for the effort to answer your questions.

[–][deleted] 2 points3 points  (11 children)

I'm honestly asking and this should benefit other users too. Downvoting/not-answering me looks bad to me and everyone else.

My question is what fundamentally pulls demand for these tokens? I understand the plentiful ways to earn it, but if spending it doesn't get me anything but a charitable way to give to content providers, then this is not an air tight economic system.

This kind of loophole was also present in STEEM, which is why I also question its viability.

[–]blakes4560 | ⚖️ 0 4 points5 points  (7 children)

You need to understand how advertising networks function to understand the value proposition of BAT. Middlemen are the issue and BAT eliminates them.

The current system has the following players: 1. Publishers (websites, content producers, etc.) 2. Advertisers 3. Ad networks (the middlemen that propagate the trade between advertisers and publishers), and 4. The consumer (you and me).

Currently, ad networks capture a small piece of what the advertiser pays the publisher to show their ad. But ad networks provide a valuable service! They have information on consumers that they collect through third party cookies, trackers, etc. which enable advertisers to target specific consumers. For example, if I go to hotels.com to look at hotels in Florida, several third party cookies may be installed on my computer. If I then go to nytimes.com and start reading an article about restaurants in Florida, I may see an ad for a hotel I recently viewed! Amazing!..and I'm not even mad...it may actually be good because it's relevant!

Now the issue people face now is more in the scope irrelevant advertisements. Since information about consumers may not be entirely accurate or complete (as gathered from cookies and trackers), you may see an ad for something completely irrelevant to your life...which is annoying! Also, these cookies and trackers installed on your computer reduce battery life and slow your browser. Also annoying!

Well, the whole point of BAT is to get rid of these cookies and trackers that actually slow your computer and (which may or may not) collect information you don’t want other people to have. Instead, BAT has developed an algorithm that is able to accurately track your “attention” (hence the name “Basic Attention Token”). Now if you opt into receiving advertisements, advertisers will be able to use the algorithm to directly target you with !!!RELEVANT!!! Ads. This is good!! This means, since they didn't have to go through that middleman to find you, they can actually PAY YOU to look at their ad, and you, as the consumer, can PAY THE PUBLISHER to keep producing their kickass content. Now this is just one example, advertisers will likely pay publishers and consumers in a way I cannot determine, but the point is this process eliminates the middleman that destroys value for the consumer.

In essence, the massive, massive, massive ad industry will need these tokens if there is mass adoption of Brave which will cause massive value appreciation in BAT.

TLDR: BAT eliminates the middleman between publishers and advertisers and transfers that value to the consumer and publisher. BAT has an algorithm that is able to track your attention accurately and you can opt to have that info given to advertisers so they can advertise to you with relevant ads. Advertisers will need these tokens which will cause value appreciation.

[–][deleted] 0 points1 point  (6 children)

Ok that's helpful. So what's left are how do publishers get paid? I've read it's based on charity. Is there a better way in the works?

[–]blakes4560 | ⚖️ 0 1 point2 points  (4 children)

As I said in the post I was unsure of how advertisers would allocate their funds. It will most definitely be a combination of publisher and consumer with the publisher receiving the vast majority. The consumer has the power to support the web pages they like most or can use their bat to offset costs of a product from an advertisers. This is the beauty of the idea though...there are any number of scenarios.

With the algorithm, advertisers will be able to tell which websites you frequent most and will pay those websites to show their ad.

[–]CryptoJennie[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Publishers get paid by advertisers. Advertisers buy ad space on publishers' websites, and whenever there is attention or clicks on their ads, they pay the publisher. This is how digital advertising works.

With BAT, when the publisher receives this ad revenue, a share of it also is paid to the user for having given their engagement and keeping their ad blocker off. That's how we fix the underlying economic incentive problem that, up until now, has been bankrupting tons of content creators/publishers.

You cannot use an ad-blocker without consequences in the ecosystem, just like you can't make bees go extinct without it affecting the rest of the ecosystem.

[–]Ndhujenendjdudksns> 4 months account age. < 500 comment karma 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Advertisers buy BAT so they can pay for ads. Ads cost money, they are paid for in BAT. So BAT has a value that can be exchanged for fiat or other coins. People can use BAT to buy brave network ads. People can also use brave for microtransactions for premium content. For example: pictures of your mother's breasts or a "how-to" video.

[–]birch_baltimore 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Premium content. Crowd-sourcing. Can you think of any others?

[–]ifreeski4201 - 2 year account age. 100 - 200 comment karma. 4 points5 points  (4 children)

Eventually, the goal is to have advertisers pay the consumers to watch their content in BAT

[–]killin_nazi_business 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Is there a date for when they plan on letting consumers earn BAT for watching ads?

[–][deleted] -2 points-1 points  (2 children)

Ok, once again I get that and it is neat, but what does the consumer do with them? If there's no convincing answer here then this project has a loophole and is not a good investment.

[–]Ndhujenendjdudksns> 4 months account age. < 500 comment karma 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Users exchange BAT for fiat, coins, digital content.. anything anyone is willing to accept BAT for. There will always be buyers of BAT so long as advertisers want to advertise on BRAVE.

[–]the--collectorredditor for 3 months 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I have this pesky 'money' thing. But what can I do with it....? :P

As for weather or not its a good investment --- its classic supply/demand. Consider the tokens as "locked-up" as they are waiting to be redistributed to users/publishers (after advertisers have purchased ad space with them). Also consider the absolutely massive rivers of money flowing through the digital advertising space, values in the hundreds-of-billions. The investor potential here seems enormous. But thats just my opinion as someone who currently has BAT.

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