The Basic Attention Token (BAT) Mercury release is right around the corner, so I decided to take the Preview for a test drive as a User and go through the process of becoming a Publisher. The Mercury release (among other things) integrates a BAT wallet into the Brave browser and allows Users to add BAT, ultimately to be shared with Publishers. You can read more about Basic Attention Token here and follow them on Medium here.

User

The User side of the triangle represents a user of the Brave browser. For the Mercury release, the User can opt-in to Brave Payments which allows BAT to be sent to Publisher’s websites that the User browses. In the future, Users will be awarded BAT for their attention from Advertisers, the 3rd side of the triangle.

The first step is to head to github and download the appropriate Brave browser for your platform. For this test I used 0.19.37beta for Mac OS. Once installed launch the app and head to Preferences, then choose Payments on the side menu or use this direct link . You should see something like this:

Flip the switch to on and you will see:

I tried to take a screenshot while the wallet was being prepared, but the process was too fast. You can choose a monthly budget which shows an approximate amount in USD. For the test I left it at 25 BAT. Next click Add funds… and you will see:

Clicking Next takes you to:

Choose a funding method (I chose BAT) and you will see the address of your Brave browser wallet:

Send some BAT (or whatever funding type you chose) to the address provided and you will see your funds pending:

Your Brave wallet will soon be set to soon start sharing BAT with Publishers! You can choose to auto-include which sites to send and / or toggle them on or off manually. In the screenshot above I’ve chosen to include cbetz.com — more on that next…

Publisher

In order to test the Publisher side of the triangle I needed a site to verify. I decided to use my personal site, cbetz.com. First step was to head to https://publishers.brave.com and click Start verification button:

Next, fill out the form:

Finally, add a new DNS record as outlined below (note: I removed the Value below, you will see a long value in that text area):

After clicking Verify DNS Record you should see the following:

All set! I would expect to see the verified indicator (white check on green hexagon) next to my site in the list below, but that’s not the case:

I’m not 100% sure of the process, and for all I know it takes a while for this status to flip or there are additional steps. I’ve reached out to their support for more information.

In summary, processes on both sides of the triangle were smooth and fast. I was especially impressed at how easy it was to become a verified Publisher. Looking forward to the next release!