The world of cryptocurrencies is nothing new but it has attracted attention since the famous Bitcoin has reached so much value and the blockchain has been applied to new uses such as merchandising and collecting thanks to the NFT.
However, as we say, this is not new.
For some time now, we've had software that uses blockchain as a functional tool or as an incentive to work with Free Software. Regarding the latter, the Brave web browser immediately comes to mind . Brave is a web browser that uses the open-source Chromium project as its foundation and includes additions and improvements for the end user.
One of those improvements is the use and reward of a token or as it is commonly called, the BAT cryptocurrency.
Brave was developed by Brendan Eich, co-founder of Mozilla . Tired of the new direction Mozilla Firefox was taking and the insistence of the rest of the Mozilla Foundation on maintaining the old Firefox engine and not changing it, Brendan Eich decided to leave Mozilla and create Brave.
Brave wasn't just a Chromium browser; it added useful features for users, such as an ad blocker, reduced RAM consumption, and the use of containers to mitigate security issues. Despite all this, Brave wasn't very well received, so Brandan Eich and his new team decided to focus on the advertising problem, arriving at a very interesting solution: blocking third-party ads like those from Google and other companies, but in return, offering creators and those who make a living from advertising an alternative advertising system that isn't intrusive for the end user. This is how Brave Rewards was born, a tool that is gradually gaining popularity and causing Chrome and Firefox users to switch their web browser to Brave.
What are BATs?
BAT stands for Basic Attention Token . It's an Ethereum-based token that uses Ethereum technology to deliver ads anonymously and pay the user or advertiser based on interest.
It sounds weird, to me personally it sounded weird the first time it was announced on Brave, but when you start using it things become clearer and more normal.
Currently, if we browse a website that has an ad system or ads, our computer generates cookies that remain there and can be used by any website or ad system. Thanks to the BAT, announcements are encrypted and do not allow or send information or receive it, so the user is safe and cannot be used by another website or advertiser. In addition, the system creates non-annoying ads that can be used by the user or not. Brave Rewards and BATs are free to choose, the user can decide at any time to suspend it, not use it or use it.
Regarding the advertiser, with traditional systems, the advertiser paid the same whether the user saw their ad or not. Now, thanks to the use of this Ethereum token, the advertiser only pays for the ad that actually reaches the user , resulting in lower costs, because they are actually paying for "attention" and not for the advertising itself.
For all this, many users recommend Brave, as it is an alternative that respects the privacy of the end user and this does not mean that the advertiser has to disappear.
Installation
To get BAT's or use the Brave Rewards program, we must first have the web browser installed. We can get the BAT's, as we have said, by buying with real money or by using the web browser.
Brave is a cross-platform web browser, it is currently developed for Windows, macOS and for Gnu / Linux.
Within the GNU/Linux world, Brave is available for 64-bit architectures ( who doesn't know what architecture they have? ). Like many other programs, Brave can be installed via repositories and the terminal . There is also a snap version . The Brave team recommends the initial installation, as it receives more frequent updates than the snap version. Detailed installation guides are available for each of the most popular Linux distributions.
My Listings
Well. We already know what the BAT's are (we will see it often when you enter the Brave settings), we already know how to install the browser on our computer. And now that?
After installing and opening Brave, an installation wizard will appear that will help us step by step to configure our web browser. It is in Spanish and explains everything in a simple way. And one of those steps consists of activating or not "Brave Rewards". We can activate it now or do it later, Brave gives you that freedom.
In case of not activating it and doing it later, to do so we have to go to "Settings" which is in the browser menu or directly to the "Brave Rewards" menu, both take you to the same place, to this window:
In this window, you'll find all the Brave Rewards settings in two columns. The right-hand column displays a panel or box showing all the BAT tokens you've earned, how much you've been able to buy, how much you've been able to distribute, and access to your Uphold wallet, the cryptocurrency wallet Brave uses by default to store your BATs.
The only problem I see with this wallet is that you can't verify it until you reach 25 BAT , but if you're not in a hurry, it's not a major issue. UpHold lets you transfer crypto to other accounts or wallets, so once your account is verified and you want to use your BAT with other wallets that support it, you just transfer the BAT and you're all set.
In the column on our left we have five boxes or blocks arranged one on top of the other, the blocks are: iOS Rewards code, Ads, Auto Contribution, Monthly Contributions and Tips.
The most important one is Ads, since with the switch button it has, you activate or deactivate the Brave Rewards program.
Between the switch button and the title of the block there is a configuration button that allows us to tell the system how many ads we want per hour.
We have a fork of 1 ad and 5 ads per hour. Obviously, if we want 0 ads, we don't want the system and if we want more than 5 ads per hour, the system would become annoying for navigation and would be effective for the end user. Once we have marked the number of ads we want, we go to the bottom of the block and we will see when the BAT's are transferred to our wallet, how many BAT's we have earned and how many announcements we have received in the last month, including a history of the announcements received during the last 7 days.
This is a very interesting block that I personally use the most because it gives me an overview of the system at a glance.
Automatic contribution
Automatic Contribution is a section located below Ads that allows us to become micro-patrons of registered creators. The process is simple: we set a monthly BAT amount in this section . We need to have the BAT amount available, as it's not credit. Once set, we leave it running and browse the internet with Brave. At the end of the month, those BAT will be distributed among the creators we visit based on our visits and engagement.
This section, maintaining the spirit of the web browser, will show the registered creators to whom we have donated that amount of BAT's and the service for which we gave that amount. The creator must be registered in the program, but we will not know any information about them, except for the username they used to register, nor will they know anything about us except that we are a user who has donated to them.
Monthly contributions
Brave aims to balance user privacy with advertising revenue, which is why this section, located below the Automatic Contributions section, is so interesting and important. The Monthly Contributions section allows us to select a registered creator or website from all those we've visited and donate a monthly amount of BAT as a form of micro-patronage within the budget we set in the previous section. This system only uses the BAT in our account and automates the process so that, for example, we can have a YouTube content creator receive a monthly amount of 20 BAT or a percentage of all monthly donations made through the Automatic Contributions section.
Tips
In the previous blocks we could allocate an amount to creators, in another block we could indicate of everything we give to whom we give more and to whom we give less and in the tip block we can donate the amount we want directly to the creator. We can control it in this block and the creator will receive that amount of BAT's every month if we have that amount, if we do not have it, the donation is not made.
But curiously, this function isn't configured from this block, but rather from the BAT icon in the address bar. This block only provides a general overview of the tips we've given. We can also configure the type of creator we want to see; so, in addition to a registered website, we can have the tip icon appear on Twitter, GitHub, and Reddit.
We choose the creator we want to donate and by pressing the BAT icon the following window appears:
We choose the tip, we click on the "Send Tip" button and the creator will receive the BAT's at the end of the month in his account.
Some confusing points about Brave Rewards
At this point, we can see that the operation is simple, but sometimes there are things that can confuse us.
One of those things, which I was also a victim of, is the confusion of the traditional advertising system with Brave Rewards ads.
An ad blocker, like Adblock or DuckDuckGo Private Essentials, is one thing, and Brave Rewards is another . Using one doesn't mean you have to activate or deactivate the other . In other words, if you use an ad blocker, you can still use Brave Rewards because it uses a different way of displaying ads. And if you want to use Brave Rewards, it doesn't mean you have to put up with ads and cookies from certain websites and have to turn off your ad blocker and trackers. These are distinct things that need to be clarified.
BATs are Ethereum tokens with a relative value . For example, we might buy BATs for $1 and donate 5 BATs thinking we're giving $5, but at the end of the month, that value could be half or even triple. If the price changes, we'll only be charged at the time of purchase, but the creator will receive the BATs. When they convert those BATs to real money, they'll only receive the value of those BATs at that moment. This might seem obvious, but many content creators still don't understand how cryptocurrencies work and sign up to have more income streams, without knowing the system or what using cryptocurrencies entails.
Finally, there's the issue of wallets and Uphold. BATs are only transferred via Uphold and then to any wallet you choose. However, Brave has a section called "Crypto Wallets," a wallet management feature that allows you to manage your wallets through a web browser , similar to the digital certificate function. This feature is unrelated to BATs unless you link one wallet to another. This is important because you can choose not to use the Crypto Wallet section but still access Brave Rewards.
Opinion after more than a month of use
Tired of Chrome and Edge background processes, Firefox heaviness, and Chromium issues, I decided to go for Brave and I really like it. Not only for compatibility and use but also for things like Brave Rewards. It seems to me a very interesting and novel advertising system. But a system that is very poorly explained by the creators of Brave.
In a world where crowdfunding and crowdfunding are becoming a great option to financially support content creators, tools such as Brave and its Brave Rewards are a great incentive and a way to pay for content with our money or with our data, but knowing us the risk and what all this entails.
I will continue using this browser because I like its philosophy and how it works. And you, will you be brave and try it? What do you think about this use of the blockchain? Do you already have a BAT?