This will be a two-part series covering web monetisation using the brave browser in part I and monetisation using XRP in part II (this will blow your mind and it only gets better)
Part I
How to monetise your content using the brave browser?
Introduction
So, for any content creators out their looking for a way to monetise their platforms without necessarily having a bank account or any initial investment then this I believe will be quite useful to you.
The internet is packed with content creators from all walks of life hoping to put their message out there for a large or small audience with the hope of connecting on an interpersonal level. Reaching out is amazing and building a following is always exciting but it can get hard to follow your passion if you can’t pay the rent.
As you explore this document, you’ll learn of some of the best platforms out there that are built specifically with a purpose to fully and seamlessly integrate into websites and major social media platforms that we know today, however a lot of people aren’t aware of this. Hence this article is meant to act as guide through a series of currently available blockchain technologies that have actual potential business usecases. Hopefully you will be in position to be a pioneer in this new emergent and functional ecosystem. 😊 Enjoy.
The blockchain space moves at astronomical speeds, arguably faster than anything currently pursued on the internet on a global scale. I don’t have stats on that, but common sense tells me that money is the greatest motivator. This developing digital environment can harness the mental capacity and creativity of anyone in the world with a promise of “since you’ve done a good job, here is your monetary reward” and all this without having to rely on a slow fiat based gateway that may or may not be available in you or your sponsor’s place of residency. The ideas I’m providing in these series will be surrounding blockchain technologies that fit rather comfortably in the current global regulatory framework.
The most common method current used to accept cryptocurrency payments is by a content creator and anyone really, posting her (Bitcoin) BTC, (Ethereum) ETH, XRP(XRaPid/ODL), (Bitcoin-Cash) BCH, (Tether)USDT, (Litecoin) LTC etc. wallet addresses directly on their platform, product or service.
For Instance, “hope you liked my video please feel free to donate BTC below. This would help to facilitate our production and continue value provision for our followers”
169XtEBXJ5AMwCqbToSbhEmVmzTucSnas6 (Donations would then be sent to the BTC address)
This is obviously efficient, but it has it’s draw backs. It limits the publisher to contributions provided to her mostly only by an audience that is “cryptocurrency literate”. This greatly limits her return on potential donations and at times might even force her to limit her content (casting a narrow net) , because having a social media account talking about philosophy, brick-laying or even top-ten tricks to never mess up your next date, would not cut it with an address that is in the form of alpha numeric characters, BIP39, BIP32, Hexadecimal addresses etc. This gets in the way and frankly speaking the less barriers to entry the better for everyone.
More potential downsides to this. In the case that the publisher and audience all own various cryptocurrency assets, it may be cumbersome to for the users to contribute. Now as a person that has made thousands of cryptocurrency transactions in all forms, shapes and sizes I can attest to the pain.
There are ways being developed to interlink blockchains and enable interoperability but that’s a whole other writing.
SO!
How to monetise your content using the brave browser.?
Founders: Brendan Eich and CTO Brian Bondy on May 28, 2015, launched on January 20th, 2016. Now before you brush off these people, you should probably be aware that Eich is known to have created JavaScript and is co-founded of Mozilla and Firefox. I think we are now off to a great start. Hope I now have your attention.
Another aspect apart from the founder that sets the brave browser apart, together with its native cryptocurrency token BAT, is the fact they have been vigilant with understanding and staying within the regulatory framework whilst providing a secure and futuristic approach that is enabling them to build a robust system that any person from any walk of life can participate in on an equal global playing field.
A few of the extracts below show interactions and engagements on the ‘brave insights’ tab in the brave website. (Follow link the in the description at the end of the article should you wish to see a deeper overview of their engagements)
What is the brave browser?
Brave is a free and open-source web browser developed by Brave Software Inc, based on the Chromium web browser. The browser blocks Ads and website trackers. The company has adopted a Get paid to surf business model. How the browser incorporates revenue is by having its ecosystem revolve around the Basic Attention Token (BAT) to drive revenue through it.
So Brave is a new system for properly evaluating user attention, with a focus on blockchain based digital advertising. The idea is that since the current digital advertising media/agencies use trackers in our phones, it makes us pones for digital targeted advertising.
This creates negative effects such as phone battery drainage and increasing phone bills spent towards bandwidth consumption. As a result, people are developing separate add-block software like ‘adblocker’ to try and combat the numerous data intrusion systems for the centralised browsing platforms that are currently in existence.
Brave browser has thus realized a solution to this by creating blockchain-based digital advertising. Basically, a digital Add exchange based on the blockchain.
There are stages to this implementation
- Stage 1: Already implemented as part of the core purpose and underlying tech within the browser. It blocks Ads and trackers by stripping them from their native websites as well as incorporating a ledger system for rewarding user attention (viewing pages, reading Ads, & general web-browsing) through brave rewards. (Rewards will be further explained in the article). The idea is to eliminate untrusted 3rd parties that take a large chunk of the system’s resources.
- Stage 2: Developing a decentralized add exchange that involves a digital currency referred to as BAT (Basic Attention Token). The token denominates user attention on advertisement, content creation and as well as using a self-automated system that learns the user’s web activity in order to appropriately reward them. Publishers are rewarded in BAT token micropayments. These can then be withdrawn or paid to other web users.
A summary of some of brave’s other advantages.
“We’re not in the personal data business” – No viewing, storage and trading of user data
“Customize your shield settings” – User’s choice in how many Ads and trackers are blocked in a day on any specific Tab Page.
“Security meets simplicity” – Brave does all the background check within browser experience and interactions with extensions.
“Defaults that matter” – the claim is such that the default state is optimum for smooth and secure user experience.
“Sync your devices bravely” (In beta) – allows users to encrypt and synchronize their preferred settings and bookmarks. Brave would not store the user’s Private keys.
Let’s set you up now
Here I’ll explain how users, content creators and Advertisers can benefit from using the brave browser.
The platforms that are currently supported by brave rewards are; Websites, YouTube, Twitch, Twitter, Vimeo, GitHub and Reddit.
Brave has a system called Brave rewards. Through this feature, content creators and consumers are rewarded by viewing Ads that they accepted to receive as they browse. This is built on the BAT.
Publishers/content creators can also further sign up with the brave rewards to earn extra income on their various publishing platforms.
First, you have to download the browser. You can use my affiliate link. It would really help to support my start-up and allow for even more valuable content creation https://brave.com/maw102
You’ll see this page popup.
From this point I suggest you setup your brave wallet.
Click on the triangle at the top right corner and follow the steps accordingly. You’ll be presented with a 24-word Mnemonic seed phrase. (You cannot let anyone see this phrase and you should never lose it.) This is the only guaranteed way of having access to your brave wallet anywhere and on any computer. If you wish, you can read more about mnemonic words here. https://coinsutra.com/mnemonic-passphrase/
Hope you’re done with setting up your Uphold account (just follow what the browser requests). This account will help you move your funds in and out of the brave wallet and it also supports visa, debit and credit card deposits and withdrawals. That tells you that these guys are tightly engaged with the regulators.
… I made a transfer from my uphold wallet to my binance exchange BAT wallet and I received my pay-out at no cost in under 2 minutes. So yes, this is an actual business model unravelling right in front of us.
Publishers and content creators
You can go to this link https://publishers.basicattentiontoken.org/#. This will take you to the publisher’s setup.
And here is where the magic happens. Their login is something pretty cool. You type in your email and you are then sent a link which then gives you access to your account.
On opening the link, you’ll be presented with a 2factor Authentication
Setting up your Two-factor authentication is very important for security reasons. The links below will take you to the android or apple google authenticator apps but also Microsoft authenticator is a good option.(Make sure to download and setup your 2FA as a must)
Android-https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.google.android.apps.authenticator2&hl=en_AU
Apple - https://apps.apple.com/au/app/google-authenticator/id388497605
Now that’s all out of the way. After logging in you’ll be presented with this screen on which you can setup a channel and tipping banner and guess what! it’s all way too easy. easier than pie.
As you can see on the top right corners, you can setup your channel and Tipping Banner. The tipping Banner essentially allows your followers to send you direct tips through the banner. This happens when the follower opens the brave rewards panels from the URL bar (The triangular link), and then clicking the “Send Tip Now” button. It really is simple.
The preview banner above is the one I made quick. Took me like 30 seconds, plus there is an already pre-written message for you that is customisable to your target audience or purpose.
You can currently setup channels with any of the platforms above by just giving access to them (logging in). Extremely smooth process.
That’s pretty much it. You should be all set up to start building.😊
Criticisms of the platforms
I won’t say that this browser hasn’t come under criticism of some sort. Major critic revolves around brave’s savvy business practices i.e. The fact that brave relies on a business model that is very heavily reliant on blocking, removing and stripping all advertisements issued on any website and replacing those Ads with its own Ads selection. These Ads are received in form of notifications. This way the user is more likely to engage the Ads because there is an incentive to access them. Think of it as a Netflix for Ads, but in this case, you are paid for what you watch.
This is one example of a brave Ad notification that popped up as I was writing this. You just click it and get paid in BAT immediately. That simple.
At the same time many critics also do acknowledge the effectiveness of the brave platform by commending its fast loading speeds and advanced ad-tracking controls.
Advertisers and Adverts in general
First, according to brave browser, users receive 70% of the gross ad revenue, while Brave receives the remaining 30%
For advertisers: According to the brave Advertisers tab.
“100% of your ad spend is placed for active users that opt-in to a rewarding private ad experience”
“Brave uses local machine learning with the browser profile to only place Ads in optimal conditions. Ads are matched to opportunities, and users become partners instead of targets”
“Craft effective offers and provide captivating full-page experiences directly with consumers in Brave’s Private Ad Tabs”
Private ad matching efficiently matches Ads directly from the device, without breaching personal information.
Brave browser also does have equivalent support for the mobile app version as well. This page will elaborate further on eligibility and you will get a much clear view on the steps to take if you want to eventually build an ecosystem around their Ads-centric product.
Brave Ads are available today in the U.S., Canada, France, Germany, and the U.K, with more countries on the way in Europe and Asia. Brave Ads will also be integrated in Brave’s iOS app in the coming months. For more information on the general atmosphere you can click here to contact the brave team to sign up for more information on how to “launch a brave campaign”
Conclusion
In my opinion. This is a major step towards the right direction in the whole cryptocurrency & digital finance space. Technologies such as these bringing real world use cases with real world returns that can drive real world innovation and creativity through a globally activated monetary system.
Disclaimer
I have no affiliations with braver browser whatsoever neither do I have any personal motive towards the promotion of the BAT token. This is purely a subjective view of the evolution of digital technologies that I believe are already impacting the globe on a massive scale.
Stay tuned for Part II where we introduce you to web monetisation using On-Demand-Liquidity😊(Mind blowing)
After that I will introduce other actual ways that you can employ to slowly keep earning legitimate passive income online through digital currencies are your grow your knowledge.
I will include ideas on how to develop a data trading economy on the blockchain with some blockchain platforms that are emerging from the shadows. (This is the future so keep your eyes peeled).
If you made it this far congratulations and remember these quotes as a takeaway
Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn't matter to me. Going to bed at night saying we've done something wonderful, that's what matters to me. -Steve Jobs
To any entrepreneur: If you want to do it, do it now. If you don't, you're going to regret it." -Catherine Cook
You can access brave browser through this affiliate link (It will be much appreciated)
Download brave browser - https://brave.com/maw102
Brave insights https://brave.com/insights/
My twitter handle in case you want to drop me a follow 😊 https://twitter.com/MawaMaverick