On July 11, we announced the Kin Developer Program, an initiative that will empower developers to successfully create Kin-powered apps, or build Kin-powered experiences into their existing apps. The program offers developers financial incentives of up to $115,000 (400M KIN, $60,000 USD). Over the past month, more than 200 developers from 38 countries around the world have proposed new and innovative use cases for Kin.

We’re excited to announce that we’ve accepted 40 developers into the first stage of the Kin Developer Program. We originally set the program’s capacity to 25, but due to the high volume and quality of the applications we received, we’ve increased the program’s size to allow more developers to build with Kin. These developers will begin building with and integrating Kin immediately, and they will present their experiences in a virtual demo day on Oct. 2.

Each application was carefully reviewed by our selection committee, comprised of four team members and a technical advisor. These members included: Natasha Shine-Zirkel (Director of Partnerships and Developer Relations), Ayelet Laub (Product Manager of the Developer Platform), David Sherman (Head of Product Studio), a Kin exec (To be announced at a later date), and Yossi Segev (Tech Lead of the Developer Platform)

The committee scored each application on a number of criteria as they examined the quality of the product’s use case, the quality of the team, and the likelihood that each development team would meet the program’s predetermined milestones.

We’d like to thank everyone who applied to the program. We are humbled by your support, and are incredibly impressed by the creativity within our community and beyond.

What’s next?

Each development team will now begin building out their proposed use cases, and they will participate in a virtual demo day on October 2 where they will show that their app is ready to handle real users earning and spending Kin. From there, approved apps will go live on the Kin Blockchain and will receive the first incentive of 50M KIN (value of $7,000 USD) and $15,000 USD. Developers who reach 10,000 monthly active wallets (MAW) on January 1, 2019 will receive the second incentive payout, and those who reach 50,000 MAW on April 1, 2019 will receive the third incentive payout.

Without further ado, here are the 40 participants in the inaugural Kin Developer Program!

Communication & Social

Addme — Israel

Addme is an existing app that allows users to aggregate their social media profiles into a single location. The app will integrate Kin to reward users for performing certain actions, including aggregating their social media profiles into the addme platform. Users will be able to spend Kin to unlock new in-app features.

Blastchat — United States

Blastchat is a social messaging app that allows users to blast direct messages to their most important friends, customers, and fans. The app will use Kin to replace its existing reward system, and it will allow users to earn Kin by interacting and engaging with peers. Users will also sell or bid on items in the app’s marketplace. Other spending experiences will include buying promotional placements, chat themes, and exclusive content with Kin.

ChatSwapDitch — Australia

ChatSwapDitch is an existing fun and friendly chatbot service that lets users meet new people based on common interests. Users will be able to earn Kin for accepting chats from other users, and by receiving likes on their in-app profiles. Users will also earn Kin for multi-day logins, and for generating referrals to the service. Users will be able to spend Kin on one-to-one chat requests to match with other users, and can add emojis and other personalization features to their profiles. Kin can also be used to purchase additional time in one-to-one chats.

Lollicam — United States

Lollicam is an augmented reality (AR) camera app with face filters, masks, and effects, and it currently has 500,000 existing users. Users will be able to earn Kin by using branded AR content in the app, and by sharing their photos on social media. They will be able to spend Kin on paid AR content, like sticker packs.

Matchmaker — United States

Matchmaker is a new crowdsourced, gamified matchmaking app. Users will be able to earn Kin by becoming a matchmaker and deciding whether a couple should be introduced, and will be able to spend Kin to have their dating profile get matched by a matchmaker. After Matchmaker, the Proffer team plans to expand the ecosystem of crowdsourcing / expert-networks apps on KIN with Peer to Peer tutoring (matching students to tutors in real-time) and health/legal consultations.

Nearby — United States

Nearby is a social network for meeting new friends. Kin will replace its existing points system, Nearby Points, to reward its millions of users with cryptocurrency. Kin will be earned through actions taken within the app, and it will be spent on tipping other users, sending virtual gifts, and other entirely new features.

Panion — Sweden

Panion is an existing app that encourages users to use technology to make real-life connections between people who share similar interests. Currently, the app allows users to send messages to those with mutual interests, but with Kin, users will be able to use their tokens to message anyone on the platform. Kin will also be used to increase engagement and incentivize good behaviour in Panion Communities (large networks of people with the same interests). Users will be able to spend Kin on the creation of new communities, or on joining existing communities. Users will be able to earn Kin in Panion by completing and personalizing their profile, suggesting new keyword tags within the app, and inviting friends.

Rave — Canada

Rave is a fusion of media and messenger in a single app. It’s a place for people to come together and enjoy content from Netflix, YouTube, Vimeo, Viki, Dropbox, and Google Drive together while chatting over text and voice. Rave will integrate Kin to allow its 300,000 monthly active users to earn Kin for adding friends to the platform. Users will be able to spend Kin to tip users for sharing and creating great content. Users will be able to spend Kin to add weight to votes on content, and can unlock exclusive new skins or stickers in the app.

Reveald — United States

Reveald is a mobile dating app that reveals a user’s personality traits while simultaneously revealing photos to throttle the rapid judgement that most modern dating apps promote. Users will be able to earn Kin by reviewing content posted by other users, and will be able to earn Kin for successfully matching their friends with other users in the app. Users will be able to spend Kin to unlock features like the ability to see who has viewed their profile, or the ability to see where users drop off while reading their profile.

ThisThat — United Kingdom

ThisThat is building a crowdsourced knowledge discovery utility, where users can ask and answer questions to learn about new things or to explore diverse opinions. Users will be able to earn Kin for completing polls, and for helping to improve the health of the platform and community through up-voting and down-voting content, and reporting abusive content. Users will be able to spend Kin to create their own questions or polls and to boost them to more users.

Vent — Australia

Vent is a community-driven social platform that lets its 120,000 users express their feelings and support for one another. They will integrate the Kin Marketplace to allow users to earn Kin, and will re-distribute Kin to those who complete core actions in the app, such as completing profile details and posting regularly. Users will be able to spend their Kin by tipping users who support them, and can also unlock themed emotion sets for their profiles.

Gaming

Coin Fantasy — Armenia

Coin Fantasy is an existing app that allows users to learn about cryptocurrency markets and to trade tokens. They plan to integrate Kin as a replacement for their native currency, CF Points, which is used to enter contests and get rewards. Users will be able to earn Kin by inviting friends, and by completing missions or games. Users will also be able to spend Kin on contest entry fees and raffles.

Draft Fantasy — Israel

Draft Fantasy is a market leader for draft-style fantasy football (soccer). They will integrate Kin into their existing app, and will allow users to earn by making contributions to their platform in the form of fantasy football content or scoring points in their fantasy drafts. Users will be able to spend Kin to engage in trades with other users, and can spend on premium content like stadium skins, badges, and customized jerseys.

Hipster Bait — Canada

The Hipster Bait team will develop an augmented reality geolocation game that helps rock n’ roll fans discover new music. Users will earn Kin by unlocking badges, by progressing through the game, and by “re-hiding” the content they discover. Kin will be spent to purchase song storage, and to access advances in the game, like the ability to teleport to other cities and countries to unlock more content.

Kinder Explore — Israel

Kinder Explore is a social game that lets players participate in a scavenger hunt to find Kinder, (magical creatures), in their town or city. Kinders are hidden in public locations, stores, parks, and historic sites. Users will be able to earn Kin when they find Kinders in their area, and will earn additional Kin for taking a photo with the creature, sharing their photos to social media, and engaging with other users’ photos on social media. Users will be able to spend Kin to tip other users for creating good content, and will also be able to spend on hints to find their next Kinder.

POP.IN — United States

POP.IN is an existing video app where users can play multiplayer party games, like Liar’s Dice, as part of events that incorporate live audiences. The app will integrate Kin to compensate users for providing positive experiences for their community, including inviting new members to play and hosting and winning competitive events. Users will be able to spend Kin on tipping other users, getting access to exclusive events or games, or getting the right to be the first to host new games. POP.IN is powered by Smiletime, Inc.

Reality Chain — United States

The team at Reality Chain will create an augmented reality collectible card game that lets players search for collectible cards. Users will be able to battle for cards, and will earn Kin when they win each battle. Users will spend Kin to trade cards with other players, or to purchase additional cards in the app’s marketplace.

Rock Paper Scissors by Ackee — Czech Republic

Ackee is the creator of RPS for messenger, a classic rock, paper, scissors (RPS) game for messaging apps. It will be integrating Kin to increase user engagement, by allowing users to earn Kin for each game they win. For each game of RPS played, users will make a bet in Kin. Whoever wins the game will collect their own bet and the bet of their opponent. Kin will therefore be exchanged from player to player for each game of RPS played in the app.

Trivia KinG — United States

Trivia KinG is a daily single-elimination trivia competition where users can choose their game mode and compete for a grand prize of cryptocurrency fit for a king. Users will earn Kin for answering trivia questions correctly. If users are able to correctly answer all questions in a given series, they will split the grand prize between other winners. Users will also be able to earn Kin by inviting friends to play, and by winning Kin from friends when they challenge them to a trivia game directly. Users will be able to spend Kin to receive categories ahead of the trivia game, and can spend to personalize their profile within the app.

Health & Fitness

GoChallengeMe.club — Canada

GoChallengeMe.club is a social platform that will incentivize people to achieve their goals through competition and accountability. Users will be able to enter competitions with community members who are working toward the same goal, and will earn Kin for being the first member to reach said goal. Kin will also be earned for completing surveys, polls, and quizzes. Users will spend Kin to set up their own competitions or to participate in the competitions of others. They will also be able to spend Kin on gift cards offered in the Kin Marketplace.

Kinetik — Canada

Kinetik is an incentive-based mechanism to help users achieve their goals. The first use case for this app will incentivize users to meet their fitness goals and engage in a healthier lifestyle. Users will be able to earn Kin for reaching certain fitness milestones, as measured by an integration with the FitBit platform where users’ achievements will be tracked. Users will be able to spend Kin to motivate other users to become active. They will be able to motivate others through fitness challenges, or through regular fitness programs that may be sponsored by fitness-oriented businesses.

Pause For — United States

Pause For is an app that will reward students for staying off their phones while they focus on studying. Users will earn Kin by completing their focus missions, or staying off their phone for a certain amount of time. Users will also be able to tip their friends as a bonus for staying focused. Kin will be spent on charitable giving to allow users to donate items like clean water to their favorite causes.

Remood — Germany

Remood is the first virtual reality (VR) mind machine app that uses scientific brainwave research and color and tone psychology to help users relax. The existing experience will integrate Kin to reward users for completing a certain number of relaxation, revival, or revitalization sessions in the app. Users will be able to spend their Kin on extended session-lengths, new soundtracks, or new sessions.

Step & Spend — United States

Step & Spend is a new app that will use Kin to incentivize users to improve their health. Users will be able to earn Kin for completing actions, like walking a specified distance, referring friends, or attending National Walking Day events. Opportunities to spend Kin include custom weight-loss programs, donations to charitable organizations, and peer-to-peer tipping.

Steps — United States

Steps incentivizes a healthy active lifestyle by rewarding users for meeting their daily walking goals. Users will be able to earn Kin for reaching their walking goals. They’ll be able to spend Kin on coupons and deals from local and online stores.

Visit — India

Visit brings together physicians, healthcare providers and technology, redefining health and wellness in today’s digital age. Visit helps users set up small and achievable health goals, nudging them to improve their daily lifestyle and bringing about a behavioural change. Visit aims to incentivize users by rewarding Kin on meeting their health goals, such as walking 10,000 steps a day, having healthier meals and participating in fitness activities with their friends. Visit collects and analyzes fitness data through GoogleFit, HealthKit, Fitbit, etc.

News & Entertainment

Kimeo — India

Kimeo is a new generation video platform that will use the IFPS protocol and Kin to create a content distribution platform where everyone gets rewarded. Creators will be able to earn Kin for uploading content, generating views, offering premium content subscriptions, and generating referrals. Consumers can earn Kin by watching promoted content, commenting and voting on content, and generating referrals. Users can spend Kin on premium content subscriptions and on creating promoted content and campaigns.

Klicktion — United States

Klicktion is a gamified platform where anyone can earn and spend Kin by reading and writing interactive fiction stories in single- or multiplayer game modes. Users will be able to earn Kin by submitting a story to the platform, editing stories that have been submitted, winning games or challenges, providing plot ideas to writers, or through other methods of platform improvement like helping writers code their stories. Writers will be able to spend Kin to personalize their in-app profiles, purchase higher visibility for their stories, or to join writing contests that will require Kin as an entry fee. Readers will be able to spend Kin to continue reading and to unlock game premium game modes, like time traveling. They’ll also be able to spend to personalize their profiles, or to join game tournaments.

Loop — Pakistan

Loop is an autonomous media engine that allows users to find and contribute to credible and unbiased news stories. Claims for these stories are discovered by searching and rating claims from online and offline sources. Users will be able to earn Kin for contributing content to the platform and for verifying the accuracy of that content. Users will be able to spend Kin to purchase badges and to award badges to other contributors or to sponsor stories.

Tools

King VPN — Estonia

King VPN is a virtual private network (VPN) service that will use Kin as its payment mechanism. Users will be able to earn Kin by viewing advertising or by using the app regularly, and will spend it to purchase packages of up to 10 gigabytes of bandwidth to use the service.

WiCrypt — Nigeria

WiCrypt is a new peer-to-peer internet sharing app that enables users to get rewarded for sharing their mobile data. Users will use Kin to purchase a connection to a WiCrypt hotspot. Hosts will earn Kin for providing others with an internet connection, and can receive bonuses for high ratings from those who have used their internet connection.

WorkersAI — United States

WorkersAI is a new product that will use machine learning to incentivize users to contribute to the platform’s intelligence through labeling raw data (i.e. answering questions like “is this image a dog or a cat?). Anyone looking to have these kinds of data labelled will be able to spend Kin to create labeling tasks, and will assign an amount of Kin as a reward for each task they publish. Each reward will be based on the difficulty of the task, so transcription tasks will have higher rewards than image recognition tasks, for example. Users will be able to earn Kin by completing various labelling tasks.

Travel & Local

Beseech — United States

Beseech is a location-based forum for suggestions, referrals, information, micro-tasks, and classified ads. Users will be able to post a set amount of Kin as a reward for the user who provides the best answer or suggestion to their post. Kin will be exchanged between users as they post and reply to items published on the forum

Find — United States

Find is a diverse community of open-minded travelers looking to discover new friends. Users will be able to earn Kin by forming new connections through the app, and can spend Kin to book tours or use other travel-related services. Kin will also be used to tip other users for giving travel advice.

KinQuest — Belgium

KinQuest is a social platform by Spaced that will help travelers meet and socialize with other travelers in their local area. Users will be able to earn Kin by performing quests, and thus meeting up, as well as completing their in-app profile, reviewing users, and for referring other users or businesses. In the future, users will be able to spend Kin by joining sponsored quests, and will be rewarded with discounts or special offers from the sponsor of that quest.

Education

Kinguist — United Kingdom

Kinguist is a language-learning app that lets users create modules and quizzes in their native language to help others learn new languages. Users will earn Kin by completing surveys and quizzes in the Kin Marketplace, and by creating education modules for other users. Users will be able to spend Kin to unlock additional modules and quizzes, and to ask questions to module creators.

Syngli — Canada

Syngli is an AI-based education platform that will empower teachers and learners alike. Educators will be able to earn Kin by creating, editing, organizing and distributing quality content, and garnering positive reviews and ratings for their work. Learners will earn Kin for regularly signing in to the app, answering positive questions in its interactive tutoring environment, and completing key milestones. Users will be able to spend Kin to unlock new content and other premium features.

Finance

KinTipBot — United States

The KinTipBot will allow for peer-to-peer transactions across multiple platforms without the need for integration on each individual platform. Users will be able to earn Kin by completing surveys, quizzes, and polls and can earn tips from other users. Kin will be spent on peer-to-peer transactions, or tips, to other users.

Shopping

Caddle — Canada

Caddle is a research and trial-driving app that rewards its existing users for engaging with brands and purchasing products. Caddle’s clients include Nestlé, PepsiCo, and Domino’s. Users will be able to earn Kin for completing actions in the app, including watching videos, taking surveys, and making purchases. User will be able to spend on in-app bonus offers, boost ballots for in-app contests, and sneak peeks on upcoming offers.

PicsOS — New Zealand

PicsOS is a leading creator of photo printing apps including Printicular, Photo Prints Now, PicDrop, Photo Mail Joy and Local Prints Now. The company has an existing base of hundreds of thousands of monthly-active users. The team will integrate Kin into select apps to allow users to earn tokens for completing tasks, and participating in promotions. Users will then spend Kin to have their photos printed through participating printing services.