If you’ve been following me on social media, you’d have seen that I broke my leg on Christmas Eve, and you may have also noticed an increase in interest in and posts about cryptocurrencies.

I took my downtime to learn as much as I could about Blockchain technology, different alt coins out there, what they do, what the future is, and basically how I could get rich from inside the four corners of my room that were otherwise driving me crazy.

One of the things that quickly became obvious to me is that we’re going through a bit of a transition from “coins” to tokens that actually use the Blockchain technology to solve real problems, as opposed to mathematical problems that get harder simply for the sake of “mining.” Basically, if we use Bitcoin as an example, the way mining works is computers around the world solve mathematical problems that progressively get harder and harder, and every time a problem is solved, a coin is “mined.” Now imagine that collective computational power solving problems that aren’t random and actually do something.

In short, the next generation of crypto currencies are built on a Blockchain that actually has a commercial purpose; which has lead me to heavily invest in two projects in particular, Nucleus Vision, and Basic Attention Token.

I wanted to write a little about the latter one, BAT, because it’s a project that looks like it will really shake up digital advertising, an industry I work with daily, and hey, if it’s going to put the current model out of business, I may as well make some money from its downfall.

As a media strategist who loves technology, I have a love hate relationship with Programmatic. Basically the way that programmatic works right now is publishers sell left over inventory, impressions they haven’t sold directly to clients, through a third party exchange. Those impressions are bid on by advertisers based on an audience they are trying to reach vs a price they are willing to pay, and matched and bid on in real time by a program. It’s like an instant automatic eBay for your clicks. The automation is fantastic, but the exchanges take a cut, and the industry is seeing a lot of problems around brand safety (a Johnny Walker ad served next to an article about drunk driving), viewability (ad placement) and ad fraud (paying for clicks that aren’t real). Plus, it doesn’t really reward great content or have a real metric for engagement or attention outside of clicks and views. Facebook, which runs a very similar model, for example this week classified a zero second view as a view for their video metrics. Think about that for a second, and you’ve thought about it longer than the video was actually watched.

BAT, developed by Brendan Eich; the creator of JavaScript and the co-founder of Mozilla and Firefox, has been developed from the ground up to try to address these issues, and in the process potentially revolutionize the way users experience ads while browsing. According to the whitepaper released, “Basic Attention Token is a utility token based on the Ethereum technology that can also be used as a unit of account between advertisers, publishers, and users in a new, blockchain-based digital advertising and services platform.”

What this means is the blockchain completely replaces the third party exchanges. Currently the whole model is built into a browser they have developed called Brave (remember, it’s developed by the co-founder of Mozilla and Firefox, so they have some clout there), with third-party support in the pipeline. Rather than being served ads through programmatic exchanges, what Brave does is track what the user is interested in, on device meaning the user data never leaves the browser insuring anonymity, and then asks them to serve an ad based on that data, while ad blocking everything else. It then tracks how and how long the user views the ad, and rewards them AND the publisher with BAT, which, like other alt coins and tokens, can then either be traded for other crypto coins or dollars. So the user AND the publisher are being paid, and the advertiser gets a higher ROI and better targeting; quality over quantity, and all of this is done using the blockchain instead of a third party exchange, meaning less money lost during the transaction, and total transparency about the real world metrics.

I was curious as to how exactly the ads were being served, so I reached out to Brave’s Senior Ad Tech Specialist Luke Mulks. Rather than pulling out quotes, I’ll publish exactly what he had to say, because this is a new concept, and I think we need as much information from the source as possible. Luke says:

“The ads are matched locally, using local machine learning and browser data (search, history, etc.) – the most accurate, rich and direct data set available – along with contextual data to match ads from the inventory catalog to the user. Envision a progressive ad experience, where the user model looks at the entire browsing context as opposed to the narrow scope of a single domain or audience segment.

We essentially push the ad inventory to the device on a recurring basis, and the user model replaces the 3rd party cookie and cloud-based ad server auction and exchange layers, openRTB, etc.

Also worth considering is that BAT ads will have much tighter frequency caps. Users won’t receive more than 10 ads per day, and will most likely see 3-5 (will be determined as we go forward with ad trials).

By limiting the frequency, and by containing the ad slot to a push notification, we create an ad rail separate from the content. Competitive separation becomes reduced to domain and publisher content, as opposed to advertiser vs advertiser (since there are no additional slots for ads to be placed next to each other).

The strengths of local matching also apply to negative targeting. Advertisers will be able to negative target from the advertiser interface, and set controls on displaying with content categories that are undesirable.

The main point I’m getting at (aside from the IO/setup level) is that if we deliver on what we aim to deliver, the local agent in our user model will not place ads in a context that doesn’t make sense.

Obviously, it’s early days and we have much to prove, but essentially the strengths that apply to local matching could be applied negatively for exclusions as we scale.

In the near-term, this is less of an issue as we’re not running an exchange-based programmatic model. With more direct flights and control, we can provide an array of features ongoing to meet demands and needs of advertisers that are utilizing the platform.

We don’t need cookie-on-cookie if we deliver on our local agent to match appropriately, and exclude accordingly.

The last thing I’ll mention here is that the user will be rewarded for viewing ads, and will be able to provide feedback. These signals will also help with optimizing the user model to avoid collisions over time.”

In regards to brand safety, something I pressed Luke on, advertisers will be able to use negative targeting, much the same way the current model is set up. Meaning, for those unfamiliar, that Johnny Walker will be able to run an ad with an exclusion for “alcohol” negatively targeted against “drunk” and “driving.” The user will then have the added built in ability to block certain ads either totally or on certain sites or content.

In fact, while it intends to shake up the industry, the team assures me that in regards to campaign flow, things will be very familiar to ad ops, ensuring an easy up take and transition for the industry.

Another interesting aspect is that, people using the Brave browser can directly donate (think tip) content creators using $BAT. A user either purchases or earns BAT by viewing ads, and can donate to their favorite YouTubers, or blogs, or other content creators, as a form of support or thank you. Otherwise they can cash the BAT out, or spend it like currency online for whatever they want. The content creators can then also do with the BAT as they wish. This means content creators can earn money for the content they create on larger publishers side by side with the publisher.

Win/win/win right? Straight off the bat (😂), I love a model that rewards both the user and the publisher; the publisher draws the user’s attention by creating great content, or supporting a community of content creators, and the user then gives their time to view an ad — everyone in that ecosystem and time transaction should be rewarded.

So will this shake up the digital advertising industry? The biggest obstacle is probably Google, because they own Chrome and DoubleClick, one of the biggest programmatic exchanges. The Brave browser itself is still a little buggy, I found it fine on my MacBook but it froze a couple of times on my iPhone. And a lot of what this new advertising model could be requires the BAT and Brave roadmap to continue smooth development, as the whole thing is still a work in progress, albeit with a strong team and pipeline. However, if you consider the team behind BAT and the Brave browser, what they have achieved previously and already with this project, then I am optimistic for their future. The model makes a lot more sense for publishers and advertisers, and certainly a lot more sense for users and content creators, and major publishers are already jumping on board, notably Twitch.tv, as well as support for YouTube creators.

BAT itself may not kill programmatic, but it represents a huge step in that direction and more importantly acknowledges the growing sentiment in the industry that the current programmatic model is flawed. It represents a huge paradigm shift towards rewarding quality publishers, user generated content, real engagement, and quality advertising rather than rewarding views and clicks, which has lead to an internet full of clickbait. It also takes the industry and data out of the grips of third party exchanges and instead powers it by the decentralized, and transparent, blockchain.

BAT represents an evolution of blockchain technology; solving real world problems, and while Basic Attention Token may not kill programmatic, a future blockchain technology probably will.

The fact that this is even being discussed proves that the industry and publishers are hungry for something better, safer and fairer. We are finally moving back to a model that is designed around quality over quantity. And it may seem hard to believe that we can change the course of the ship now, but considering 91% of users say ads are more intrusive today compared to just two to three years ago, and the rise of adblockers and outcry against the current programmatic problems – advertisers and publishers may not have a choice. Currently, this model appears to be the most likely alternative, one that seems to have the best needs of everyone at its core.

At the very least maybe it sparks the flame the industry needs to evolve itself.

As an investment, BAT is pretty new, and there is a lot of room for the token to grown in price as Brave use grows, as more third party support is announced, and as more advertiser money is pumped into the model. As I write this, a single BAT token is worth about US$0.20. The market right now is pretty low across the board. So the coin will definitely grow in price, and probably double by the end of the year. I’m not a financial adviser, but I’ve certainly put my money where my mouth is an invested.

So yes, BAT is certainly something for investors to consider and for publishers and advertisers to think about when they consider the future of their industry.

If you’d like to buy some Basic Attention Tokens, you can purchase BAT on Binance, and you can try out the Brave browser, and earn BAT when you view an ad, for free here.