What is BAT?

Update Dec 23, 2017: We have added a new Tutorial series, one of which walks you through How to Purchase BAT through exchanges like Coinbase and Binance.

Update Nov 17, 2017: The method of acquiring BAT through Uphold.com has been modified. It has come to my attention that they do not provide a simple way to acquire BAT, such as through a credit card purchase.

The Basic Attention Token (BAT) platform was recently released this October of 2017. It is a digital currency which serves to transact value between users, websites, and advertisers across its platform using the Brave browser.

In the future, there will be multiple ways to obtain BAT through the Brave browser, which I will outline here. But if you feel that BAT may become quite valuable and want to get some immediately, skip ahead to the last method (#3) in this article.

1) Free BAT from the User Growth Pool (UGP)

The BAT/Brave team has allocated 300 million BAT to give to users of the Brave browser completely for free. These tokens are what’s known as the User Growth Pool (UGP) as a part of a promotional campaign by the BAT team.

The release of the BAT tokens from the UGP is slated for fall 2017/winter 2018 during the Gemini-update on their roadmap. So if you want to start checking out the Brave browser before that happens, you’ll be ready to get some free BAT to play around with when they start rolling out the money!

However, one caveat is that the BAT given out from the UGP can only be spent towards websites. Any unused BAT given by the UGP will be returned to the UGP after a certain time. (As a promotional campaign, the UGP is designed to promote usage of the tokens to be on the actual platform, not for users to withdraw and walk way with free money). But, the BAT team has been constantly working with publishers to accept BAT as a form of payment for goods and services. That means that there is a high chance that the BAT you receive can be used to purchase real products or services from participating websites!

Once again, the free BAT from the User Growth Pool will probably not be available until early-mid 2018. (But when it comes out, we’ll be sure to let you know! Subscribe to our mailing list and we’ll notify you ASAP!)

2) Getting paid in BAT from ads (viewed in the Brave browser)

This is what will launch BAT/Brave into stars, next to the internet giants of Google and Facebook! The ultimate plan for BAT and Brave is to reward users for any ads that are shown. (This system is not yet implemented, but scheduled for mid-late 2018)

Sure, this has been done in the past with other services that specifically pay for watching ads or filling out surveys, but what is different about BAT and Brave is that there are absolutely no sign-ups required. You launch your browser, do what you do, and start pocketing that glorious BAT whenever you come across a participating advertisement. Since BAT is a crypto currency, value can be transferred and stored into your personal wallet (which resides in your Brave browser), and can be withdrawn by you at any time. (Of course if you want to cash out into dollars, you’ll need to either link up banking information, or most likely sign up with their money partner Uphold.com.)

But what if I don’t want to watch ads? No problem! If you didn’t already know, Brave automatically blocks all advertisements and trackers by default! Brave is the safest and fastest browser you can surf the internet with right now. The platform of getting rewarded by voluntarily allowing and watching vetted, relevant, and safe ads is opt-in only. So if ads are not your thing, it’s no problem!

Of course the amount of money/BAT you will accumulate will probably not be substantial, but if you were going to surf the internet anyway and an ad slips through your ad-blocker, why not get paid for it?? (So how does this all work? Subscribe to our mailing list and we’ll tell you all about it in our upcoming articles!)

Once again, the estimated release date for this final form of the BAT platform is scheduled for mid-late 2018, as stated in BAT’s roadmap.

3) Investing in BAT before the Advertisers do

So you’ve read all about BAT, understand that it has incredible potential, and want to get some right now. There are a few ways to get BAT, but currently there is not a quick/easy way to acquire it, such as via credit card.

Easy way (if you’ve never touched crypto currencies): Currently, there is no 1-step easy way to acquire BAT, such as signing up with a service and buying with a credit card. As soon as this service exists, this article will be updated accordingly.

Medium-difficulty method: The next simplest way is to sign up with BAT’s official financial partner, Uphold.com. Uphold is a digital money service, which stores and transacts real and digital money. They accept and work with over 30 international currencies, and also handle several crypto currencies.

**Edit: Nov 17, 2017: Currently, Uphold does not support credit/debit purchases of crypto currencies. You can only purchase by making a bank transfer, which takes a few days. This is a bit more complicated than I would have liked it to be, but it’s currently the easiest way to get BAT without having to learn much about managing crypto.

After you acquire any crypto currency through them, you’ll be able to manage your funds from their website or app. The only downside to acquiring BAT from Uphold is that they charge around a 2% transaction fee when buying BAT with dollars (but free to withdraw afterwards, say, to your own BAT wallet).

If you are already familiar with crypto and want recommendations on the best ways and exchanges to get BAT, you can continue reading. Otherwise, come on in and connect with the community in our next article, Where’s the BAT Cave?

Hard way (buying from an Exchange): We recently released a tutorial series on how to purchase BAT from exchanges, as well as how to manage them yourself should you decide to move them into your own wallets:

If you end up acquiring BAT through either Uphold or an exchange, be aware that Brave’s wallet is not yet bi-directional. Which means if you deposit BAT into your Brave wallet, you will not be able to withdraw it – only used to donate to websites currently. In the future, they will allow withdrawals from your browser wallet.

DISCLAIMER: Do not take this article or anything on Whatisbat.com as investment advice. Whatever coin or asset you decide to invest in, please do your own research first. BAT is a utility token (based on blockchain technology), and can be extremely volatile. If you decide to purchase BAT, invest at your own risk!

What makes Basic Attention Token (BAT) valuable?

Let’s look at gold, silver, and diamonds. Gold is “relatively” scarce, both silver and gold have actual utility, and diamond supplies are heavily restricted while being marketed as a premium gemstone. The general, overarching reason for their value is that there is limited supply with high demand.

And this is why crypto currencies and tokens are valuable as well:

There are a limited supply of tokens/coins (and in many cases, finite). The more people that acquire that coin, the more its value increases.

However, each crypto currency/token is different. The ones with more utility, more reputation, larger user base, becomes more expensive faster. This is why one Bitcoin was worth $0.25 in November 2010 (when it was relatively unknown), and is now over $7000 in November 2017.

So where does BAT derive its value?

Basic Attention Token’s main utility is to act as a transfer of value within 2 networks and economies:

Online advertising (in association with Brave) and
Payments to websites (donations and for content)

By acquiring BAT, you are investing in the online advertising industry that is being established by the BAT/Brave team. So if Geico decides to spend $10 million dollars in an ad campaign on the network, they have to buy BAT to transact through the ecosystem, which raises the dollar value of every BAT that you hold. This is the single most important difference between BAT and any other crypto currency:

The BAT ecosystem is not limited to just everyday users acquiring the token. There will possibly be incredibly large amounts of money flowing in from digital advertising, which is over $50 billion per year since 2015.

The amount of advertisers participating is yet to be determined, but we know that Brave already has millions of users. At the very least, this should make the Brave/BAT platform quite enticing for advertisers.

The secondary utility of BAT – which essentially acts as a tipping (donation) mechanism from users to publishers – will be another channel for websites to monetize. If you own a website, you’ll basically be getting free money whenever a participating user visits your site. The BAT team has also announced plans on working with major publishers to accept BAT as payment for goods and services.

Oh, and another cool thing about Brave/BAT:

Whenever advertisers show you an ad, you get paid in BAT from their ad campaign straight into your digital wallet in your Brave browser (without any signups or banking information required!) However, this functionality will not be available until 2018.

One last question to answer – how much will BAT be worth? Currently, as of Nov 7, 2017, the price is about 14 cents per BAT. We take this price and divide it into the number of tokens that is currently in circulation (1,000,000,000 – one billion), which comes out to a market cap of $140 million, which is the total estimated money put into the BAT ecosystem. If a number of large companies buy $500 million worth of ads, then the market cap will go up to $640 million, making BAT worth $0.64, and so on. There is a lot to talk about in terms of how successful BAT might become and who might jump in, but one warning I’ll give is do not take this as investment advice!

BAT, at the end of the day, is still a young blockchain token and an extremely risky investment should you decide to invest a little money into it. But if you want to know more and would like to get your hands on some BAT, check out 3 Ways to get BAT!